Korean visual artist and photographer Cho Gi-Seok has spent years crafting a surreal yet intimate visual universe—where flowers emerge from skin, and ethereal models exist in dreamlike ecologies. Now, in a bold interdisciplinary move, Cho expands his creative language into the olfactory realm.

His debut fragrance collection, consisting of three perfumes titled “FLOWER STUDY,” “LOVE AND HATE,” and “BAD DREAM,” is not just an exercise in scent design—it is a poetic translation of his vision into the medium of memory, breath, and emotional resonance.

The Artist: A Profile in Multi-Sensory Expression

Cho Gi-Seok is known worldwide for his signature color palette, dreamlike photographic installations, and fashion collaborations that challenge the boundary between the natural and artificial. His images often blur skin with petals, human with object, and technology with soul. He sees the body as a landscape and the world as a series of emotionally charged still lifes. With over a decade of recognition in photography, fashion, and art direction, Cho’s move into fragrance is less surprising than it is inevitable.

“I want people to feel my world even when their eyes are closed,” he once said in an interview. This fragrance line is a literal embodiment of that idea.

FLOWER STUDY: Botanic Stillness Bottled

The first fragrance in the trio, FLOWER STUDY, is inspired directly by Cho’s photographic series of the same name. In those images, we see human figures almost consumed by flora—heads adorned with giant blossoms, bodies draped in vines. The scent mirrors that intimacy and weightlessness.

Olfactory Profile:

• Top Notes: Neroli, Green Mandarin
• Heart Notes: Peony, Water Lily, Orris
• Base Notes: White Musk, Amber, Sandalwood

FLOWER STUDY is soft and aquatic. There’s a botanical freshness that recalls not just florals, but florals inside glass—humid, delicate, slightly cool. It smells like touch, like condensation on a museum case or a greenhouse windowpane. It’s introspective and grounded, leaning toward meditative rather than bright.

The scent is genderless, atmospheric, and pairs well with quiet moments: reading in sunlight, walking in the early morning, or sitting in still rooms. Much like Cho’s photographic environments, it doesn’t demand attention—it invites it.

LOVE AND HATE: Duality Distilled

Where FLOWER STUDY is subdued, LOVE AND HATE arrives with more tension. This is the scent of contrast—warmth and sharpness, soft petals and thorns. It’s inspired by Cho’s recurring theme of duality, where beauty lives beside sorrow, and harmony is always one breath away from chaos.

Olfactory Profile:

• Top Notes: Blackcurrant, Ginger
• Heart Notes: Rose Absolute, Tuberose
• Base Notes: Vetiver, Leather, Patchouli

The perfume opens fruity and bright, but soon darkens with earthy, animalic notes. The rose here is alive—neither grandmotherly nor perfumey, but full-bodied and provocative. The ginger snaps the nose to attention. The leather base gives it sensuality.

LOVE AND HATE is dramatic in a quiet way, evoking late-night walks in the city, love letters never sent, and heartbreaks revisited. It’s the scent that lingers after a meaningful conversation—or a beautiful fight. The most artistic of the three, it’s also the most emotionally charged.

BAD DREAM: The Uncanny in Vapor Form

The third fragrance, BAD DREAM, might be the most uniquely Cho Gi-Seok. It doesn’t aim for elegance or comfort. Instead, it disturbs, pulls, and sticks. Inspired by the surreal imagery in his lesser-known editorial work—where bodies are fragmented, and eyes look in multiple directions—BAD DREAM leans into discomfort as aesthetic.

Olfactory Profile:

• Top Notes: Aldehydes, Elemi Resin
• Heart Notes: Incense, Violet Leaf, Cedar
• Base Notes: Tonka Bean, Metallic Musk, Asphalt Accord

There’s something deeply synthetic and deeply human about BAD DREAM. It smells sterile and smoky, like a fashion show inside an abandoned church, or a dark room in a forgotten sci-fi film. The violet leaf and incense give it a vintage air, while the metallic musk suggests something future-facing and clinical.

This is not for everyday wear—it’s for staging, for atmosphere, for collectors. It’s the scent of art itself: ambiguous, polarizing, unforgettable.

Packaging and Design: Objects of Desire

Each fragrance comes in an architectural glass bottle, uniquely shaped and hand-finished. The typography is subtle, with each name etched faintly into the surface. The outer packaging includes printed stills from Cho’s archive—each scent accompanied by a visual moodboard that offers interpretive entry points for wearers.

The box design feels less like consumer packaging and more like a limited-edition zine, with a soft-touch matte finish, layered textures, and no external branding save for a discreet “CHO GI-SEOK” monogram.

It’s clear: this is not perfume as product. It is perfume as art object.

Why Fragrance?

Fragrance is a medium uniquely suited to Cho’s world. Scent, like photography, plays with memory, emotion, and intimacy. It’s ephemeral, lived on the skin, and interpreted through personal context.

In launching this line, Cho enters a rich legacy of visual artists who’ve crossed into olfactory creation: from Serge Lutens’ early photo-perfume collaborations, to Anicka Yi’s museum installations, to Maison Margiela’s Replica series. But Cho’s work feels especially personal—drawn directly from his aesthetic universe rather than simply licensing his name to a nose.

He has collaborated with a team of independent perfumers in Seoul and Paris to bring his visions to life, ensuring that each fragrance holds true to the same emotional charge his photographs are known for.

A New Dimension of Experience

For fans of Cho’s photography, the fragrance line is not just an extension—it’s a deepening. It allows the audience to carry his world with them, to step into his lens not just with their eyes, but with their body.

Each scent plays like a movement in a symphony: FLOWER STUDY (grace), LOVE AND HATE (tension), BAD DREAM (disruption). Together, they form a triptych—three chapters of an olfactory memoir that feels at once futuristic and deeply emotional.

Impression

Cho Gi-Seok’s foray into fragrance marks a new chapter—not just for the artist, but for how interdisciplinary design can move culture forward. In a world where branding often overtakes substance, Cho offers something rare: sincerity, complexity, and sensory beauty.

Whether worn, collected, or admired from afar, these scents offer an intimate access point to an artist who has consistently challenged how we perceive the body, the environment, and the invisible threads that tie them together.

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