Pierre Negrin and Carlos Viñals

Carlos Viñals grew up watching his father, a flavorist working in the tobacco industry, and found himself drawn into the world of scent at an early age. He began his career at IFF as an assistant, where his raw talent caught the attention of Bernard Chant and Carlos Benaïm within months. They selected him for a formal perfumer apprenticeship, and he spent a decade refining his craft under Benaïm's mentorship. He went on to build his career across several major fragrance houses before joining Symrise in 2009. Pierre Negrin, born into a family of perfume merchants in Grasse, initially pursued photography before a friend offered him an internship in a perfumer's workshop during his physics and chemistry studies. He never attended a formal perfumery school, learning the craft instead in fragrance laboratories. A summer internship became a lifelong calling. "Suddenly I realized that instead of expressing myself through light, I could express myself through fragrance," he later said. Negrin moved from Grasse to Mexico and eventually to the United States, joining Firmenich's New York Fine Fragrance Center in 2008. Together, they have shaped the olfactory identities of major brands across prestige and mass-market categories.