I love the big department stores of Midtown Manhattan; I started visiting them at a very young age, when my mother would bring me to see the holiday windows, and I still shop at some of the remaining stores: Lord & Taylor, Bloomingdale’s, Saks Fifth Avenue. (Gone, but not forgotten: B. Altman and Bonwit Teller!)
I didn’t know until recently that Saks Fifth Avenue offered its own women’s fragrance, called Paradis, in the 1980s. I have no idea how Paradis may have smelled, but the ad claims it was “an Eden of florals, of luxury and romance…”
It was also, apparently, a “fragrance that soars—to new dimensions, to a new destiny, to a higher level of scent.” It was available in various formulations at various price points, from $20 to $110 for an ounce of Parfum in a “faceted crystal bottle.”
This photo shows the Eau de Toilette. I think the bottle’s facets and its angled cap may be an architectural reference, designed to resemble a NYC skyscraper of the 1920s-30s.
Here’s a view of the Saks Fifth Avenue building from 1953. The Saks building opened on Fifth Avenue (at 50th Street) in 1924. It’s a solid example of 1920s modern architecture and, as in most tall buildings of the era, its highest floors are “set back” further and further from the outer limit of the building. (A zoning law required this adjustment, which also created a striking silhouette for new buildings!)
The Paradis bottle may have been a homage to the Saks Fifth Avenue building; it also resembles the stepped profiles of Rockefeller Center’s Art Deco complex, located just across Fifth Avenue from Saks (and built slightly later, 1930-39). Here’s a shot of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, which is visible from Saks.
And here’s a Paradis “mini,” just for fun. Even though the bottle’s design has been simplified a bit for this smaller scale, the ray-like facets and the stepped outline of the cap have been kept.
It’s fun to see that this architecture, although no longer new at all by the 1980s, was still considered striking and elegant enough to be used for an upscale perfume bottle.
Images: Saks Fifth Avenue Paradis advertisement via Vintage Ad Browser. Photos of Saks Fifth Avenue (1953, by Wurt Bros.) and Rockefeller Center (1935, by Arthur Vitrol) via Museum of the City of New York. Perfume photos from various online auctions.
