A sweet childhood memory reenacted.
A tangy and slightly green note of rhubarb mixed with the soft waxy smell of Granny Smith apples, grapefruit on top of tender musks and cedarwood drydown.
All about this fragrance
Vibe check
This is the scent of someone who carries a private memory with them in a very present, modern way: bright, composed and a little wistful. It suits close conversations and unhurried indoor spaces, where its tart fruit and soft woods can read as intimate rather than loud.
How to wear
Best in mild to cool weather, where the rhubarb and apple stay crisp and the cedarwood remains dry and clean. A light to moderate application is enough; the opening projects with a green, fruity sparkle, then settles into a softer musky-woody trail that sits close to the skin.
Who it’s for
For those who like tart fruit, green freshness and a restrained woody drydown rather than sweetness or heavy florals. It will appeal to wearers who enjoy transparent, memory-driven compositions with a polished, unisex feel.
Release year
2013
The nose
Olivier Cresp is a Grasse-born master perfumer at Firmenich, known for a style that feels lucid, polished and emotionally direct. He often builds fragrances from personal memory and keeps the structure clear, letting a few materials carry the whole idea. For Flash Back, that approach is especially fitting: he turns a childhood recollection of rhubarb tart into a bright, tart-fruity composition with green lift and a woody, musky finish. The result reflects the kind of restrained, readable elegance Cresp is known for, where the idea is simple but the texture stays vivid.
Collaborators
Céline Verleure, Olfactive Studio’s founder and creative director, shaped the concept by commissioning the fragrance from a single photograph rather than a conventional brief, making the image the emotional starting point for the composition. Laurent Segretier’s photograph supplied the visual trigger that guided the perfume’s memory-driven character.
Olfactive Studio’s story
Olfactive Studio builds fragrances as a dialogue between photography and perfumery, asking perfumers to translate a single image into scent. The house favors intuitive, artistic creation over market research, and its work is consistently framed around memory, emotion and a contemporary unisex sensibility.
Flash Back’s concept
Flash Back was the fifth fragrance in Olfactive Studio’s line and was developed from Laurent Segretier’s photograph, which led Olivier Cresp back to a childhood memory of rhubarb tart. The idea was to capture that recollection as something bright, tart and slightly green rather than sugary, giving the perfume its distinctive nostalgic freshness.
Extra info
Flash Back was launched as Olfactive Studio’s fifth fragrance. The bottle and packaging were designed by Camille Toupet, and the scent later inspired a separate 2018 flanker, Flash Back in New York, which is a different composition entirely.
A sweet childhood memory reenacted.
A tangy and slightly green note of rhubarb mixed with the soft waxy smell of Granny Smith apples, grapefruit on top of tender musks and cedarwood drydown.
All about this fragrance
Vibe check
This is the scent of someone who carries a private memory with them in a very present, modern way: bright, composed and a little wistful. It suits close conversations and unhurried indoor spaces, where its tart fruit and soft woods can read as intimate rather than loud.
How to wear
Best in mild to cool weather, where the rhubarb and apple stay crisp and the cedarwood remains dry and clean. A light to moderate application is enough; the opening projects with a green, fruity sparkle, then settles into a softer musky-woody trail that sits close to the skin.
Who it’s for
For those who like tart fruit, green freshness and a restrained woody drydown rather than sweetness or heavy florals. It will appeal to wearers who enjoy transparent, memory-driven compositions with a polished, unisex feel.
Release year
2013
The nose
Olivier Cresp is a Grasse-born master perfumer at Firmenich, known for a style that feels lucid, polished and emotionally direct. He often builds fragrances from personal memory and keeps the structure clear, letting a few materials carry the whole idea. For Flash Back, that approach is especially fitting: he turns a childhood recollection of rhubarb tart into a bright, tart-fruity composition with green lift and a woody, musky finish. The result reflects the kind of restrained, readable elegance Cresp is known for, where the idea is simple but the texture stays vivid.
Collaborators
Céline Verleure, Olfactive Studio’s founder and creative director, shaped the concept by commissioning the fragrance from a single photograph rather than a conventional brief, making the image the emotional starting point for the composition. Laurent Segretier’s photograph supplied the visual trigger that guided the perfume’s memory-driven character.
Olfactive Studio’s story
Olfactive Studio builds fragrances as a dialogue between photography and perfumery, asking perfumers to translate a single image into scent. The house favors intuitive, artistic creation over market research, and its work is consistently framed around memory, emotion and a contemporary unisex sensibility.
Flash Back’s concept
Flash Back was the fifth fragrance in Olfactive Studio’s line and was developed from Laurent Segretier’s photograph, which led Olivier Cresp back to a childhood memory of rhubarb tart. The idea was to capture that recollection as something bright, tart and slightly green rather than sugary, giving the perfume its distinctive nostalgic freshness.
Extra info
Flash Back was launched as Olfactive Studio’s fifth fragrance. The bottle and packaging were designed by Camille Toupet, and the scent later inspired a separate 2018 flanker, Flash Back in New York, which is a different composition entirely.