Ex Nihilo — Cuir Celeste Par Mathieu Cesar
Essence
Cuir Celeste is the 2018 fragrance that launched Ex Nihilo’s Visionnaire collection, a unisex woody-leather by perfumer Quentin Bisch made in collaboration with French photographer Mathieu Cesar. The concept is leather as armor tinged with Haute Couture sophistication, inspired by Cesar’s everyday vintage B3 bomber jacket. The result is a deliberately airy, celestial take on leather: not a dark tarry hide but a soft, green-tinged, violet-and-tea-laced suede that hovers between fresh and grounded. It is one of Bisch’s most elegant, daily-wearable leathers.
Scent Profile
The composition is built as a journey from a white airy brightness to a black earthy depth, a structure Bisch described in exactly those terms. It opens with a kicky blast of black pepper and sharp galbanum over violet leaf and sage: green, ozonic, slightly bitter, a celestial clarity one critic likened to the exhilaration of a jet take-off before it settles into a fresh, cloud-like green. The leather introduces itself fairly early, soft and suede-like, softened by violet leaves and sweetened by osmanthus, whose apricot-and-suede facet adds warmth. A brief smoky tea note and a fleeting floral moment, reminiscent of peonies and of Bisch’s own Fleur Narcotique, pass through the heart. After several hours the base reasserts a musky leather close to the skin, with dry woods of cypriol, akigalawood, patchouli, sandalwood, and white musk. Here opinion divides: many find the whole thing soft and nearly linear, but a notable minority find cypriol’s earthy, almost medicinal rooty grip eventually dominates and weighs down the airy structure. The signature accord is a luminous violet-leaf-and-galbanum green draped over soft suede.
Performance
The pattern is excellent tenacity with deliberately restrained sillage. Longevity is widely called superb, with traces reported lingering on clothing days later and one wearer logging over 12 hours, while projection stays intimate to moderate, a quiet, soft, close-to-skin leather that does not pack a lot of punch. That combination makes it a sophisticated skin-leather rather than a room-filler. Apply generously if you want others to catch it.
Wearing Context
This is a versatile, refined leather that leans toward cooler-but-not-cold weather and moves easily day-to-night and office-to-evening, precisely because it is soft and non-aggressive. Its green-fresh top gives it warm-weather flexibility unusual for a leather, while the woody-musky drydown grounds it for autumn. It reads genuinely unisex, though several wearers feel it tilts slightly masculine in the peppery opening. It would feel wrong only where a loud, smoky statement leather is wanted; Cuir Celeste is the opposite, discreet and quietly luxurious signature-scent material.
Comparisons & DNA
Cuir Celeste sits in the soft-suede family with a distinctive green-violet twist. The most common reference is Tom Ford Tuscan Leather, but mainly by contrast: where Tuscan Leather is a rugged raspberry-suede, Cuir Celeste is far gentler, closer to soft purse leather. Within Ex Nihilo, its floral-leather moment echoes Bisch’s own Fleur Narcotique, with the same peony and osmanthus signature. Its blue-violet, ionone-driven soft leather also invites comparison to woody leathers like Givenchy Gentlemen Only, though Cuir Celeste is the more refined of the two. Conceptually it shares the aviator-leather romance of bomber-jacket scents but executes it far softer and greener than the genre’s heavyweights.
Reception
Reception is niche-positive, with a small devoted audience rather than viral acclaim. Praise centers on exquisite construction, a beautiful balance of light and depth, and superb materials, with one critic offering a glowing narrative review. The main axis of disagreement is cypriol: detractors feel its leathered, almost rubbery presence eventually overwhelms the airy opening, with one wearer saying that if not for cypriol’s unwavering grip they might have adored it unconditionally. A secondary axis is heaviness, as a few find the opening so strong they nearly scrub before it mellows after about fifteen minutes. Price is the other recurring caveat. It is best sampled before buying, with attention to how the cypriol-heavy drydown sits on your skin.
Versions & Reformulation
Cuir Celeste is a single composition, launched in September 2018 in the Visionnaire collection in 100 ml and 50 ml, plus a refillable travel set and a high-end artistic edition box. One account notes a bottle-format change over time, but no reformulation of the juice itself is documented, and it remains in production.
Acquisition Notes
Cuir Celeste sits in the niche-luxury price tier, originally around EUR180 to EUR260 for 50 to 100 ml. It is sold through Ex Nihilo boutiques, the brand site, and authorized niche retailers, with decants and discovery sets in circulation. Some older stock is sometimes framed on the secondary market as a discontinued treasure, but the line is current, so verify you are buying the current Visionnaire EDP. Buy from the brand or authorized stockists given the price.
Notable Facts & Lore
- It was inspired by photographer Mathieu Cesar’s vintage B3 bomber jacket, which he wears every day, reworked for him by a Parisian craftsman.
- Cesar, a self-taught photographer who has shot Bella Hadid, Natalie Portman, Lana Del Rey, and Daft Punk, trained as both a firefighter and a Formula One driver.
- Bisch described building a white part from ambrette, violet leaves, galbanum, sandalwood, and musks, and a black part from cypriol, akigala, osmanthus, and animalic notes.
- Bottles are inscribed with Cesar’s name, and the visual inspiration was one of his black-and-white photographs taken in Los Angeles.
- It was the launch fragrance for Ex Nihilo’s Visionnaire collection, conceived as a meeting of olfaction and visual art.