Jacques Courtin-Clarins

About

Jacques Courtin-Clarins (1921-2007) was a French entrepreneur and the founder of Clarins, the Paris-based beauty and fragrance house. He was a brand founder and visionary who championed plant-based formulation, not a traditional 'perfumer' in the nose or composer sense; he is credited on Clarins fragrances as the brand's founder-creator rather than as the hands-on author of their accords. Born in Paris on 6 August 1921, Courtin interrupted medical studies during the Second World War. In 1947 he commercialised the Médecin'Bust rotary water-massage device, his entry into the beauty trade. In 1954 he opened his first beauty institute at 35 rue Tronchet in Paris and named it Clarins. The treatment cabins drew a fashionable Parisian clientele and seeded a philosophy that would define the house: plant-based, body-respecting care rather than pharmacology. From that institute Courtin built an integrated skincare brand. Tonic Body Treatment Oil launched in 1965, the Beauté Plante range followed, and in 1985 the Double Serum that remains Clarins' flagship. In 1987 the house launched its first fragrance, Eau Dynamisante - a citrus, white-thyme, patchouli and ginseng 'treatment fragrance' that pioneered the eau-de-soin category. Courtin set the brief and the plant-led philosophy; professional perfumers composed the accords to that direction. He handed control to his sons Christian and Olivier in 2000 and died in Neuilly-sur-Seine on 23 March 2007.