Armand Co

The Armand Co. was an American perfume and cosmetics concern based in Des Moines, Iowa, active from the 1920s into about 1950. It marketed a broad range of scented toiletries under the Armand name—perfume, talcum, face powder, creams, and related vanity preparations—and was particularly visible during the 1920s and early 1930s. Fragrance references associate the company with such names as Beau K, Interlude, Pearls in Wine, Péridore, Taquine, and Too…. The surviving products and advertising suggest an accessible but decorative American toilette line: smartly packaged, feminine, and intended for the dressing table as much as for personal scent. The business seems to have declined after its late-1920s success and disappeared around 1950.  

The attribution “established by Carle Armand” occurs in some perfume directories, although cosmetics-history research identifies the Armand concern with Carl Weeks and gives an establishment date of 1916. This discrepancy is worth noting in a guide rather than presenting either version as unquestioned fact. The related Carle Inc. name appears to have been a short-lived associated company or marketing identity, launching Cytherea in 1930 and Interlude in 1931. Cytherea—an epithet of Aphrodite—would have implied a romantic, classical, feminine perfume, while Interlude suggests a more intimate, perhaps evening-oriented fragrance.  

Armour & Company of Chicago, Illinois, should be treated as a separate firm from the similarly named Armand Co. Armour was the large Chicago meat-packing business whose Department of Soap and Toilet Requisites developed Luxor, a perfume and cosmetics line. Luxor was in use by the 1910s and became the name of Armour’s cosmetics-manufacturing business around 1919. Its products included cold cream, rouge, face powder, perfume, and other toilet articles, presented in the fashionable, commercially polished style of the 1910s and 1920s.  

Luxor was also affiliated with Krasny, a cosmetics line introduced in 1927. The Luxor names—such as Encharma (1918), Floriana (1922), June A’Bloom (1922), and Sylvan-Lilac—show an emphasis on romantic fantasy, floral imagery, and a lightly exotic or theatrical appeal. The relationship between Armour, Luxor, and Krasny was therefore corporate and manufacturing-based; it does not indicate that the Des Moines Armand Co. was “also known as” Armour. Keeping Armand/Carle and Armour/Luxor/Krasny as two distinct groupings will make the guide more accurate.

The perfumes of the Armand Co: 

• 1909 Bouquet Armour 
• 1919 Roses of Paradise 
• 1919 Perfume of Fresh Roses 
• 1919 Azalea of Armandes 
• 1920 Armand's Bouquet 
• 1923 Peridore 
• 1923 Mad Cap 
• 1923 Ambre Royale 
• 1924 Pearls in Wine 
• 1926 Taquine 
• 1926 Eau de Cologne 
• 1927 Beau K 
• 1930 Gardenia 
• 1930 Lilac 
• 1930 Lily of the Valley 
• 1930 Sweet Pea 
• 1930 Narcissus 
• 1930 Carnation 
• 1933 Old Colonial 
• 1934 Symphonie 
• 1935 Interlude 
• 1946 Too Lovely For Words 
• Evening Star 

The perfumes of Armour and Co: 

• 1900 Royal Flower Bouquet 
• 1907 Liberty 
• 1909 Lilac 
• 1909 Sinbad Turkish Bath soap 
• 1909 Violet 
• 1909 Bouquet Armour 
• 1918 Venetian bath soap 
• 1919 Bouquet Glycerine 
• 1920 La Richesse 
• 1920 Mayfair 
• 1922 Floriana 
• 1922 Karnak 
• 1922 Luxor 
• 1922 Rose 
• 1922 June A Bloom 
• 1922 Floriana