Elizabeth Arden

Elizabeth Arden traces its origins to 1910, when Canadian-born entrepreneur Florence Nightingale Graham opened the original Red Door salon on Fifth Avenue in New York City. She soon adopted the professional name Elizabeth Arden and built a global business around salons, skincare and color cosmetics. Arden played a visible role in early 20th century beauty culture, supplying red lipstick to suffragettes and helping to normalize the use of makeup in mainstream society.

Fragrance became a key pillar of the company with the release of Blue Grass in the 1930s, followed decades later by widely distributed scents such as Red Door (1989), Sunflowers (1993), 5th Avenue (1996) and Green Tea (1999). These launches established Elizabeth Arden as a major player in accessible prestige perfume, especially in North America and Europe. The company has also managed fragrance licenses for other names including Elizabeth Taylor, Britney Spears, Halston and Mariah Carey.

Ownership of the brand has changed several times: Eli Lilly acquired the company in 1971, followed by Fabergé in 1987, Unilever in 1989 and FFI Fragrances in 2000, which later became Elizabeth Arden Inc. In 2016, the business became a wholly owned subsidiary of Revlon, Inc. Today the Elizabeth Arden name covers skincare, makeup and a large fragrance portfolio that spans classic department-store staples and mass-distributed celebrity lines.

Within perfume circles, Elizabeth Arden is known less for avant-garde compositions and more for wearable, often gently floral or citrus-forward scents sold at relatively approachable prices. The brand is especially associated with daily-use fragrances like Green Tea and 5th Avenue that prioritize ease of wear, lightness and broad appeal over niche experimentation.