Turbulences by Revillon (1981)

Turbulences by Revillon, introduced in 1981, is a fragrance that wears its name as a declaration of character. Created by Christian Bastard Lafitte for Dragoco, it is a fruity floral woody chypre built around a vivid green-aldehydic opening, a generous floral heart, and a mossy, powdery, ambered base. Revillon was already a name synonymous with luxury long before it entered perfumery. Founded in Paris in 1723 and later known as Revillon Frères, the house became internationally famous for exceptional furs—especially the lavish, beautifully finished pelts associated with couture, wealth, winter glamour, and evening dress. Its first perfumes of the 1930s extended this same idea of luxury into scent: perfume became the invisible equivalent of a fur stole, a sensual finishing touch that could be worn anywhere. 

The name is French. Turbulences means “turbulence,” “upheaval,” or “disturbances,” and is pronounced, in simple terms, toor-byoo-LAHNSS—with the final s softened rather than sharply hissed. It evokes moving air, restless water, emotional excitement, speed, and the delicious instability of a life that is fully being lived. It is not the name of a passive or demure perfume. In a fragrance context, Turbulences suggests movement and contrast: green freshness against warm skin, flowers stirred by wind, bright fruit swept into a darker, mossy trail. It promises an effect that is energetic and expressive, but still elegant enough for a venerable French fur house.

Revillon’s own description positioned Turbulences for “today’s young women—both active and sensitive”—a very apt statement for 1981. The early 1980s were the beginning of a decade marked by ambition, self-invention, visual boldness, and competing ideas of femininity. Women were increasingly visible in professional life, while fashion moved toward stronger silhouettes: tailored suits, pronounced shoulders, sharply cut jackets, and polished accessories. Yet this was also the era of the New Romantics, with their theatrical color, historical fantasy, and club-world glamour. The result was a culture in which a woman could be disciplined and romantic, visibly powerful and intensely feminine, sometimes all at once. Fashion historians identify power dressing as a defining 1980s theme, while noting that the decade opened with sporty dressing and softer New Romantic influence. 

For such a woman, Turbulences could have felt wonderfully modern. Its title suggested that confidence did not have to mean calmness or restraint; it could include passion, sensitivity, unpredictability, and appetite for experience. A young professional might have worn it as an expressive signature beneath a tailored blazer, while a more romantic wearer could have understood it as a scent of drama—flowers, movement, and a little danger. The name captures the exhilarating sense of being in motion: a woman stepping out into the fast-changing world of the 1980s without losing glamour or sensuality.

Olfactively, the word becomes a compelling image. The perfume begins with a green, fruity rush, made brisk by wild mint, mandarin, peach, and aromatic accents of cumin and pepper. This is the “turbulence” at its brightest: air moving through crushed leaves, fruit skin, cool herbs, and spice. Then the fragrance opens into a radiant floral heart of ylang-ylang, jasmine, Bulgarian rose, iris, and related floral tones. These flowers do not sit still in a neat bouquet; they seem caught in a warm current of air, alternately fresh, spicy, creamy, and powdery. The The underlying oakmoss, Virginia cedar, tonka bean, musk, ambergris, and amber give the composition its gravity—like a dark, richly textured fur lining beneath a silk dress.

Turbulences therefore followed several important currents of its day while retaining a more classically French construction than many lighter, cleaner 1980s scents. The early decade welcomed assertive florals, aromatic green notes, spice, strong projection, and substantial bases; Turbulences clearly belonged to that confident atmosphere. Yet it did not abandon the older chypre ideal. Its oakmoss, woods, ambergris effect, and floral structure connected it to the grand French tradition of citrus or green freshness over flowers, moss, woods, and sensual warmth. A chypre is fundamentally defined by its dry, warm accord of citrus, oakmoss, patchouli or woods, and labdanum-like ambered facets; Turbulences reimagined that architecture with fruit, mint, spice, and a fuller floral presence.  

In this sense, it was not an outlier, but it was more distinctive than a straightforward fruity floral. Its green aromatic opening and rich mossy-woody foundation gave it an old-school backbone, while its peach, mandarin, ylang-ylang, and radiant flowers made it feel lively and accessible. Rather than smelling like a minimalist 1980s “fresh” perfume, Turbulences seems to have offered a deliberately abundant, feminine contrast: polished yet restless, floral yet green, powdered yet alive. Surviving descriptions consistently emphasize its 1981 release and a mossy, woody, floral character, while contemporary note listings also point to its green, minty, spicy, floral, and warm woody structure.  

 

Fragrance Composition:

So what does it smell like? Turbulences is classified as a fruity floral woody chypre fragrance for women with a green aldehydic top note and a rich, mossy, woody base. It begins with a green fruity top, followed by a radiant fruity floral heart, layered over a feminine, woody, powdery base.

• Top notes: peach, fruity accord, Calabrian bergamot, Sicilian mandarin, caraway, wild spearmint, cumin, green accord 
• Middle notes: Grasse jasmine, tuberose, Florentine orris, Madagascar ylang-ylang, lily-of-the-valley, Bulgarian rose, Jamaican nutmeg, Indian carnation, Malabar pepper, French clary sage
• Base notes: Ceylon vetiver, Massif oakmoss, Virginia cedar, Indonesian patchouli, Mysore sandalwood, ambergris, Tibetan musk, Madagascar vanilla, amber, Venezuelan tonka bean 

Scent Profile:

Turbulences opens with a lively green-fruit impression: not the soft sweetness of a simple fruity floral, but fruit seen through bright air, crushed herbs, and a flash of spice. Peach supplies the first suggestion of plushness—velvety skin, pale golden flesh, and a faintly creamy, almost lactonic softness. Because peaches do not yield a useful natural essential oil in the manner of bergamot or rose, the peach note is generally built as an accord from natural and synthetic materials. This is an advantage rather than a compromise: it allows the perfumer to recreate not only the fruit’s sweetness, but also its fuzz, juiciness, and delicately floral skin. The broader fruity accord amplifies this effect, bringing a glistening, pulpy brightness that gives the perfume immediate movement.

Calabrian bergamot gives that fruitiness its elegant, bitter-green outline. Bergamot from Calabria, on the southern Italian coast, has long been prized for its exceptional balance of sparkling citrus, floral sweetness, and softly bitter peel; it is finer and more nuanced than an ordinary lemony citrus note. Sicilian mandarin adds a sunnier, sweeter effect—ripe orange segments, warm peel, and a gentle candied glow. Their Mediterranean radiance is interrupted, delightfully, by caraway: dry, aromatic, and faintly anise-like, with an earthy bread-crust character. 

Wild spearmint brings a cooler, leafier freshness than peppermint, suggesting crushed green leaves and sweet mint rather than medicinal sharpness. Cumin introduces a warm, salty, slightly animalic spice, while the green accord supplies the vivid scent of snapped stems, wet foliage, sap, and leaves. Like the peach accord, a green accord is a perfumer’s composition rather than one literal extract; modern green materials make natural leaf and herb effects more brilliant, dewy, and enduring. This is the “turbulence” of the opening: bright fruit, cool mint, pungent herbs, and spice swept together in a gust of green air.

The floral heart blooms richly, but it is never merely soft or innocent. Grasse jasmine brings the warmth of one of perfumery’s most celebrated flower-growing regions. Jasmine cultivated around Grasse, in southern France, has traditionally been valued for its full, creamy, indolic character: petal sweetness enlivened by the breath of flowers opening in evening air. It lends Turbulences a living, sensual floral glow. Tuberose enlarges that effect with its waxy white petals, creamy sweetness, and almost tropical richness. Its scent can suggest warm skin, banana-like fruitiness, and the humid green breath of a flower garden at night.

Florentine orris introduces a striking coolness among these lavish blooms. Orris comes not from the iris flower itself but from the carefully dried and aged rhizome; Florentine orris, historically associated with Tuscany, is prized for its unusually refined, buttery, rooty, violet-powder character. It gives the perfume its poised, cosmetic elegance—a pale veil of vintage face powder, suede, and cool earth. Madagascar ylang-ylang contributes another kind of richness: solar, creamy, floral, and faintly spicy, with nuances reminiscent of ripe banana, custard, and warm yellow petals. Lily-of-the-valley provides a clear, silvery floral freshness. Because the delicate blossoms do not produce a commercially useful natural essence, their scent must be recreated with aroma chemicals and floral materials. These synthetics give the illusion of green stems, cool white bells, and morning dew, and they prevent the heavier flowers from becoming too dense.

Bulgarian rose brings a velvety, wine-tinged petal richness, with the lightly spicy, honeyed depth for which rose from Bulgaria’s Rose Valley is admired. Its continental climate and long cultivation tradition have made Bulgarian rose oil a benchmark in fine perfumery: full-bodied and fresh at once, less simply lemony than some roses and more lushly petal-like. Jamaican nutmeg adds a warm, nutty, camphoraceous spice, while Malabar pepper contributes a dry, sparkling pepperiness. The Malabar Coast of southwestern India has been revered in the spice trade for centuries, and its pepper has a vivid, fresh-cracked quality—hot, woody, and citrusy rather than merely harsh. 

French clary sage provides an aromatic, softly leathery herbal nuance, with hints of dry hay, tea, and warm skin. Indian carnation completes the floral-spicy weave. The scent of carnation is typically interpreted through an accord, because the flower itself does not readily provide the full fresh-petal aroma through extraction. Its constructed effect combines rosy petals with clove-like eugenol facets, allowing the perfumer to make the natural floral impression more vivid, spicy, and long-lasting.

The base settles Turbulences into its richly mossy chypre character. Ceylon vetiver, from Sri Lanka, brings a polished, dry-rooty earthiness. Compared with some smokier, more forceful vetivers, it can read as refined and woody, with dry grass, warm roots, and a faintly peppery mineral quality. Massif oakmoss—presumably referring to French oakmoss from the Massif Central—provides the perfume’s dark green shade: damp bark, forest floor, lichen, old leather, and the bittersweet dryness central to a traditional chypre. Modern formulas generally rely on purified, restricted, or reconstructed oakmoss effects for safety compliance, but the intended sensation remains that wonderfully shadowed woodland elegance.

Virginia cedar cuts through the moss with dry pencil shavings, clean timber, and a touch of smoky crispness. Indonesian patchouli follows with darker, earthier richness: damp leaves, cocoa, camphor, and fertile soil. Mysore sandalwood, traditionally the most revered Indian sandalwood, is celebrated for its exceptionally creamy, milky, softly spicy depth; it has a roundness and quiet persistence that distinguish it from drier woody substitutes. In a modern composition, sandalwood aroma chemicals may reinforce or recreate this effect, helping preserve its smooth, skin-like glow while extending the precious natural material’s presence.

Ambergris lends an airy, salty-sweet, skin-warmed radiance—less obviously marine than people expect, and more like sunlit skin, smooth tobacco, old paper, and a faint mineral glow. Genuine ambergris is rare, variable, and no longer a practical or responsible routine material for most perfumery, so its effect is usually recreated with refined ambergris-type aroma materials. These add lift and diffusion to the woods and moss without making the base heavy. Tibetan musk similarly evokes the historic animalic warmth once associated with musk deer; natural deer musk is now ethically and legally unacceptable, so the note must be interpreted with modern synthetic musks. These do not smell aggressively “musky” on their own. Instead, they create a soft, warm, slightly powdered skin effect and make the floral heart seem to cling to the wearer.

Madagascar vanilla rounds the base with dark, balsamic sweetness—vanilla pod, soft brown sugar, rum-like warmth, and a gentle tobacco nuance. Venezuelan tonka bean adds coumarin-rich notes of almond, new-mown hay, tobacco, and sweet wood. Venezuelan tonka has traditionally been highly prized for this dense, fragrant richness, which joins beautifully to vanilla and sandalwood. Finally, amber is not one single material but a constructed accord, here suggesting golden resin, warm balsams, dry woods, and a subtle glow of spice. Together, the moss, woods, ambergris effect, musk, vanilla, and tonka create Turbulences’ feminine powdery finish: a deep, soft, green-ambered trail in which bright fruit and extravagant flowers gradually disappear into polished cedar, dark velvet moss, and warm skin.

Bottles:

Turbulences was presented in a striking round bottle designed by Warner Schurk, its sculpted glass surface animated by raised, swirling relief that seems to set the vessel in motion. The pattern recalls eddies of wind or water—an apt visual expression of the perfume’s name—while catching the light across its tactile, almost frosted-looking contours. At the shoulder, an ambergris-blue metallic cap fits so closely that bottle and closure appear to merge into one flawless disc. This cool, silvery-blue finish gives the design a polished, slightly futuristic 1980s character, while the circular form and fluid relief retain a sense of softness and feminine movement.

Product Line:

The Turbulences range allowed the fragrance to be worn in layers, each product revealing a slightly different facet of its green floral chypre character. Used together, they would create a more enveloping effect: fresh and aromatic after bathing, softly floral over moisturized skin, then increasingly mossy, woody, and ambery as the perfume settled.

The Parfum would have been the richest and most concentrated expression. Applied sparingly to pulse points, it would open less breezily than the lighter forms and move quickly toward the heart of rose, jasmine, tuberose, ylang-ylang, carnation, and powdery orris. On the skin, its lasting impression would be deep and elegant: oakmoss darkened by patchouli, dry Virginia cedar, creamy sandalwood, warm amber, tonka, vanilla, and a skin-like ambergris and musk effect. It would feel plush, intimate, and distinctly evening-worthy—the perfume’s floral turbulence quieted into a velvety, lingering chypre trail.

The Parfum de Toilette, essentially the line’s eau de parfum, would offer a more expansive and wearable version of the fragrance. Its green fruit opening—peach, bergamot, mandarin, mint, caraway, and fresh leafy notes—would be more apparent, giving it a brighter first impression before the flowers unfurled. The floral heart would remain full and feminine, but with more movement and air around it than in the Parfum. Its drydown would still be recognizably woody and mossy, though lighter in texture: cedar, sandalwood, oakmoss, and amber warmed by a veil of vanilla-tonka powder. This would be the versatile signature version, suitable from daytime through evening.

The Body Milk would translate Turbulences into a softer, more tactile skin scent. The cooling green and citrus notes would appear only faintly, while the creamy floral and powdery woody facets would come forward: a whisper of ylang-ylang and rose over smooth sandalwood, tonka, vanilla, and clean musk. Applied after bathing, it would leave the skin scented with the impression of warm floral powder, lightly sweet amber, and a trace of moss rather than a fully projected perfume. Its purpose would be both sensuous and practical—moisturizing the skin while providing a gentle foundation that helps the perfume worn over it last longer.

The Bath & Shower Gel would make the fragrance feel fresher and more sparkling. Under warm water, the bergamot, mandarin, mint, caraway, and green notes would be most noticeable, blooming into a brisk aromatic lather with a subtle peachy sweetness. The heavier moss, woods, and amber would be present only as a soft after-effect on the skin, while the floral heart would emerge as a clean, lightly spicy impression of rose, jasmine, and carnation. Rather than the dramatic depth of the Parfum, it would give the luxurious sensation of stepping from a green, floral garden into a warm, scented bath.

The Soap would be the driest and most polished interpretation of Turbulences. Soap naturally emphasizes clean floral, citrus, and powdery notes, so its scent would likely suggest bergamot peel, green leaves, rose, and orris dusted with a trace of spice. The mossy chypre base would be restrained but important, preventing it from smelling like an ordinary floral soap; it would leave behind a refined suggestion of cedar, soft musk, and warm amber on freshly washed hands or skin. It would feel crisp, elegant, and very much in keeping with the line’s French luxury identity.

The Deodorant Spray would be the airiest and most functional expression of the fragrance. It would likely emphasize Turbulences’ cool green top—mint, citrus, aromatic caraway, and leafy notes—along with a clean floral suggestion and a gentle musky finish. The deeper tuberose, oakmoss, patchouli, and amber facets would be deliberately subdued, so that the spray felt fresh and comfortable rather than heavy. On the body, it would leave a lightly perfumed aura of green flowers, dry woods, and clean skin, designed to complement rather than compete with the Parfum or Parfum de Toilette.

In 1984/1985, Turbulences was available in the following formats:

• Parfum Presentation: Bottles (7.5ml, 15ml, 30ml)
• Related Products: Parfum de Toilette splash bottles (100ml, 200ml); Parfum de Toilette spray (100ml)
• Ancillary Products: Soap (100g); Body milk (200ml); Deodorant spray (150ml); Bath and shower salts

In 1990/1991, Turbulences was available in the following formats:

• Parfum Presentation: Bottles (7.5ml, 15ml)
• Related Products: Parfum de Toilette (25ml to 100ml)
• Ancillary Products: Soap (100g); Body milk (100ml); Deodorant (100ml)

Fate of the Fragrance:

Discontinued, date unknown.