El Morocco Perfumery Travel Discovery SetEl Morocco PerfumeryFrom the instantly recognizable blue zebra print banquette seats to the constant celebrity sightings (including Lucille Ball, Rita Hayworth, Humphrey Bogart, Elizabeth Taylor, Jackie Gleason and Jack Lemmon, to name a few), there were plenty of reasons the legendary Manhattan supper club El Morocco was the peak hangout spot from the 1930s to the 1950s. The place to see and be seen, the club has captured imaginations for nearly a century. Now the hotspot of yesteryear is being reimagined as a premier fragrance line, El Morocco Perfumery.After discovering El Morocco, Lillian Shalom and Isaac Lekach have been going down a rabbit hole researching it ever since. That’s why the co-founders of Flower Shop Perfumes made El Morocco Perfumery their first in-house brand. “We were watching these Old Hollywood movies and any celebrity [that we saw in them] I wanted to know more about this person,” Shalom says. “I'd start researching photographs, especially the women, so I could get better glimpses of their jewelry and fashion of the time. They all appeared at this place that had a zebra print behind them and I thought what is this place? Then I realized it was El Morocco. This place used to exist that was so cool, and it turned into an obsession. We started collecting [original] matchbooks from El Morocco on eBay, scarves, ashtrays—literally anything we could find.”A vintage ashtray from El MoroccoEl Morocco PerfumeryAll of those details have gone into their line. El Morocco Perfumery is making its debut with its Travel Discovery Set, five travel-size scents in a silver metal case reminiscent of a vintage cigarette case. Since people rarely stick to a singular signature scent, launching with a collection made sense for their storytelling. Each of the fragrances is meant to transport you back to the heyday of the club. “In telling the El Morocco story, there's so many different facets to discuss,” Lekach says. “We had to keep it at five, but wanted to do more.”When Shalom, who also has a jewelry line, was researching El Morocco, she found an Edwardian silver cigarette case in the Vogue archives, a nod to the club’s smoking culture. “We're leaning into a romanticized version of smoking culture,” Lekach says, as Shalom laughs and adds, “I've never touched a cigarette in my life so it’s funny that everything revolves around smoking.” Eventually, El Morocco Perfumery will release full-size bottles of the perfumes and they will also pay homage to the cigarette accessories of the club to capture all of its elements through the line’s branding and storytelling. El Morocco Perfumery co-founders Lillian Shalom and Isaac LekachEl Morocco Perfumery“It’s one thing to be inspired and now you have the responsibility of being faithful to it,” Lekach says. Shalom continues, “I said if we're going to do this, we have to be so accurate. We need to make sure every font we use is right.” They dove into meticulous research to bring the club to life. “The reason why we wanted to do this is to romanticize an era that can no longer exist,” Lekach says. “We'd go back in time and watch these old movies where the pacing was different, the language was different, and it was a form of escapism. It was really, really wonderful. Perfume is a transportive sort of thing. We took that a step further and built a world around it.”Each of the five nostalgic scents is inspired by an historical element of the club, allowing its wearer to travel through time. For example, 154 is named after the club’s address at 154 East 54th Street. When John Perona opened El Morocco in 1931, it instantly became known for its zebra stripes, Schiaparelli cellophane palms and clubgoers smoking late into the night. Perfumer Alexis Grugeon captured this with notes of musk, cedar and sweet incense. A vintage charm from El MoroccoEl Morocco PerfumeryTwo Cigarettes In The Dark is named after a song by Bing Crosby of that era. “I just love the title,” Lekach says. “There's two people with two cigarettes in the dark, and a third always witnessing this. It's really about an affair. It's for lovers and those they leave behind. It’s made by Yann Vasnier and the challenge here was to obviously make a referential cigarette fragrance, but not one that smells like ash.” Vasnier achieved that with notes of cypress, cade and vetiver.El Morocco once created a perfume called Gala, named after Salvador Dali's infamous wife. “The composition of the fragrance is lost to time, but there are notes that are evocative of the era, mostly the florals,” Lekach says. “This is something that's the sum of its parts.” Perfumers Laurent Le Guernec and Celine Barel aimed to capture her spirit with a magnetic, seductive scent, with notes of Moroccan orange blossom, saffron and honey. An original menu from El MoroccoEl Morocco PerfumeryAnother perfume named after a song of its era by Fats Waller, Lulu’s Back In Town is meant to evoke evening mischief with Moroccan mint, tea leaves and amber, created by perfumer Celine Barel. “It's really sexy; it's a lot of fun,” Lekach says. “If you look at the lyrics, it's about Lulu coming back into town and you just know you're going to get up to something fun. She's a good time.”Highball is a tribute to American writer and railroad historian Lucius Beebe. Legend has it he helped coin the term "Café Society" and once said that "if a given celebrity fails to show up at [El] Morocco three or four times a week, he is dead, or even worse, he is out of town." A gossip reporter at the time, Beebe famously traveled exclusively by train and had two beautiful private rail cars. Perfumer Rodrigo Flores-Roux captured a mood of indulgence with peach, leather and oakmoss. “Highball is a type of glassware that you serve cocktails in, but it's also a railway sign,” Lekach says. “We thought it was a fitting dedication and appropriate name.” A vintage pin from El MoroccoEl Morocco PerfumeryAs El Morocco Perfumery continues to grow, they see it as an opportunity to tell more of the club’s stories. “We never chase trends,” Lekach says. “I don't care what's popular. I care what's going to tell the right story of the world we're trying to create. Being based on the club, it avails different opportunities to us, and we want to explore all of them.”And there’s a story out there for everyone. “There's different aspects of the club that you might gravitate towards, whether it's the fashion, the bands that played there, the celebrities, the interior,” Shalom says. “We want to present different aspects so you can find your niche and go down that rabbit hole. This is like a never-ending story.”