constantin weriguine

The Weriguin family is one of the oldest in Russia and has been awarded ranks and estates for its devotion to the motherland. The collection of the Russian Museum contains an icon-portrait of the boyar-steward of the Tsars Alexei Mikhailovich and Peter the Great - Fyodor Weriguin, painted in the seventeenth century. Konstantin Mikhailovich Weriguin's ancestors served in the navy and army. His grandfather Konstantin Mikhailovich (1813-1882) married Maria Ivanovna Pokhisvena (1838-1896) and through this marriage was related to the Tatistcheff, Naryshkin, Kologrivov, Chelishchev, Ogarev, Netchaeff, Novosiltseff families. His father Mikhail Constantinovich Weriguin, a lieutenant in the Guards Hussar Regiment, had inherited a family property in the Oryol Oblast. He married a gypsy with an extraordinary beautiful voice, soloist of the Shishkin choir, Domna Alekseevna Massalsky (1872-1960), why he had to resign. They had three children - Constantine, Michel and Olga. After the birth of their first child in 1899, Mikhail Constantinovich bought a plot of land in Yalta in his wife's name. An elegant two-storey house in the Chugurlak district with a tower and fourteen rooms was quickly built there. The architect of the building is L. N. Shapovalov who had previously built Chekhov's White Dacha. The Weriguine house is distinguished by its rich decoration - bronzes, carpets, vases from the Sèvres manufactory, books bound in leather. Some of these objects can now be seen in the collection of the Sevastopol Museum of Art. The family moved to Yalta after the death of his father in 1911. In Yalta, when he was still a seven-year-old boy, a world of astonishing smells opened up to him. In the palace of the Netchaeff-Novosiltseff parents, his aunt Olga allows him to explore the contents of all his bottles of crystal perfumes with intoxicating smells. It is even allowed to mix the contents and create a new smell. Later, Weriguine would write: "From the age of seven, I firmly decided to create perfumes myself." He will remember his childhood in a family estate in the Orel region as a paradise of lilacs and flowery fields... He remembers the smells of Yalta magnolias and mountain grasses, the freshness of evening sunsets and the sea air. He does not yet know that he will make his profession of this knowledge of the world through smells. After graduating from Yalta High School with the rank of ensign in a grenadier regiment, he joined the Volunteer Army in General Barbovich's corps and went to war. He participated in the defense of Livadia and other Crimean territories. His sister Olga kept a diary all her life, of which here is an excerpt: "We celebrated the New Year at V.V. Konchine's, Alexander Vertinsky sang all night. But on the 9th we could not return to our studies, riots broke out. Sailors fired on the city from a destroyer and there was a gunfight in the streets. Red Army soldiers grabbed officers, shot them and threw them into the sea from the dock. On January 14th, searches similar to robbery began...." The family was then part of the Russian exiles via Constantinople, Malta, and Belgrade. On the ship "Crimea", they leave Russia forever.Their brother Michel remained in Soviet Russia and never saw his family again, he died in 1943. At the end of 1921, after receiving a visa, Konstantin Mikhailovich arrived in France. A little later, his family joined him in Paris. His childhood dream of creating perfumes led him to the Catholic University of Lille where he obtained a degree in chemical engineering in 1924. He did an internship at the perfumery "Marquise de Luzy" where he was very much appreciated. He tries to find a job in perfumery, without knowing how closed and secret this world is. He will then have to work in a paint factory to provide for his relatives. The family lived in Clamart, where his sister Olga met Alexei Nikolaevich Mozhaysky, nephew of the philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev. On November 14, 1925, Father Serge Bulgakov married them at the church of Saint Serge Paris. It was Olga who helped her brother enter the world of perfumery. Among his guests was a distant relative, Baron von Fitenhof, who knew the entire "Russian world" in Paris. He introduced Сonstantin Mikhailovich to Ernest Beaux, former perfumer to the Tsar, creator of the "Bouquet Napoléon" in 1912 and many perfumes, including the legendary Chanel N°5. A few days later, Weriguin was invited by the manager of the Chanel house - Count Sergei Alexandrovich Golenishshev-Kutuzov. Nine years followed in the laboratory of the Bourgeois house, under the direction of Ernest Beaux, which constituted a blessed period in his career. He received the official status of "perfumer-inventor" giving the right to authorship of the perfumes. Weriguine worked for thirty-five years in the house of Chanel, controlling the quality of the perfumes produced, the purchase of essences and oils, creating perfume databases. He had gone through difficult trials during the war: called up for compulsory labour, he was sent by the Germans to a chemical factory in Munich. After the war, he worked in the United States, replacing Ernest Beaux in the Chanel-Bourgeois factories that were opened there. He was elected president of the Association of Perfumers of France and, until the end of his life, he remained vice-president of the French Society of Perfumers. His colleagues called him the "poet of perfumes". In 1965 Weriguin wrote the book "Memories and Perfumes: Memoirs of a Perfumer" which his daughter Irina published in Russian in Moscow. It was the real discovery of a compatriot who was completely unknown in Soviet Russia. In his book, he writes: "I can only hope that my work will attract the attention of young people and reveal to them the close link between our experience and our sense of smell. Perfume, like honour, must be acquired and preserved from a young age." In Russia C. Weriguin is often considered as co-creator of Ernest Beaux perfumes such as - "Soir de Paris" - 1928, "Bois des Iles" - 1926, "Ramage" - 1951, "Glamour" - 1953. Indeed, he worked in a team with Ernest Beaux whom he considered a genius. Constantin Weriguine created the highly successful perfume "Mais oui" which was first released in the United States and then in France in 1947. The demand for this perfume was such that they created various by-products - soaps, colognes, powder and lotions. The same year "Miss Dior" was published. Weriguine's perfumes were produced until 1968. He created more than thirty perfumes including "Printemps de Paris", "Folies Bergère", "Christmas in July", "Flamme", "Vacances romaines". His fragrances are now kept at the Osmothèque de Versailles where they can be smelled. During an evening dedicated to his memory at the Société des parfumeurs de France on January 20, 1983, it was said: "He was a real lord, perhaps the last. He was penetrated by the smells of life."

His wife Sophie, born Shchabelsky and their children Michel and Irene, are buried in the same grave.