Perfumes Inspired by Extreme Terrain Set the Scene for ‘Dune: Part Two’

“My planet, Arrakis, is so beautiful when the sun is low. Rolling over the sands, you can see spice in the air,” Chani, played by Zendaya, says in 2021’s Dune: Part One. She makes the desert sound serene, but the ensuing action, continued in this month’s second installment, proves its hostility: Sandstorms strong enough to pierce metal rage on, as do battles to control that hallucinogenic “spice,” which is key to interstellar travel.

“According to [Dune author] Frank Herbert, spice smells like cinnamon,” the film’s production designer, Patrice Vermette, says. The real-world locations Vermette scouted are just as evocative. In Abu Dhabi’s Liwa desert, blazing sun softened to fog at night, when “the level of humidity in the air made the smell of salt explode,” he says. By contrast, the plant life in Jordan’s Wadi Rum was surprisingly abundant but cleverly hidden by the Dune crew. One day, rain halted filming. “The water had not only amplified the colors of the rock formation, but also the scents of sage, thyme, and mint. It made the landscape look even more out of this world.”

A crop of new fragrances aims to bottle such high-contrast terrain. Loewe’s Vulcan centers on the Spanish rockrose, a flower known to spring up after wildfires, joined here by a Mediterranean bouquet (thyme, lavender). Ayond, a desert-inspired skin care brand, debuts a trio of scents, including Metamorph—a blend of underbrush, cedar, and incense that evokes the “rain columns of lightning and darkness that sweep over the land,” says cofounder Porter Yates, a Santa Fe native. Hermès’s Oud Alezan pairs the Middle Eastern note with delicate rose, while Memo Paris imagines Turkey’s Cappadocia as a “saffron sunset,” says cofounder Clara Molloy, likening both the rocky scenery and myrrh-spiked scent to a Dalí painting “where everything goes soft.”

The interplay of past and future figures into Amouage’s Jubilation 40, with frankincense (long traded through Oman) alongside tobacco and evergreens. Francis Kurkdjian, Dior’s perfume creation director, also spotlights frankincense in his no-florals New Look, but he shrugs off history for pure mood. He says he was wearing “super elegant” sweatpants by Kim Jones when he started on the scent—cashmere and camel hair conjuring plush adventures.