International Perfume Bottle Association

Perfume News

Book Review: Antique Trader Perfume Bottles Price Guide Reviewed by Elizabeth and Frank Creech
IPBA’s very own PENNY DOLNICK has distinguished herself, yet again! As an author, Penny has contributed several excellent and valuable guides for perfume bottle collectors: Penny Bank Commercial Bottle Price Guide (8th Edition); Penny Bank Miniature and Tester Perfume Bottle Pocket Price Guide (3rd Edition); and Penny Bank Solid Perfume Pocket Price Guide (4th Edition).

penny dolnick book cover

Penny’s newest publication, Antique Trader Perfume Bottles Price Guide, is certainly among the most comprehensive perfume bottle guides ever published. Over 1,000 perfume bottles are clearly described and in excess of 900 high quality color photographs show every imaginable kind of perfume bottle in all their glory. The guide also includes Penny’s well informed tips on perfume bottle collecting and four separate appendices. That Penny was able to assimilate such a complete and beautiful array of perfume bottles and descriptions is an incredible feat. Her vast knowledge and experience is unselfishly shared on every page of this superb guide.

Penny thoughtfully introduces her readers to the International Perfume Bottle Association and the advantages of membership. She also takes the time to recognize each of her “Perfume Bottle Buddies” for their assistance and for contributing photographs of their bottles.

Each individual perfume bottle photograph, its accompanying description and valuation increases the knowledge and appreciation of the reader. And, taken as a whole, Antique Trader Perfume Bottles Price Guide is a top quality and comprehensive reference source for all perfume bottle collectors. It is also an enriching volume for lovers of beautiful things. For proof that the imagination of the human mind is limitless, one only has to look through Antique Trader Perfume Bottles Price Guide at the creative examples of the genius of the great perfume bottle designers!
Antique Trader Perfume Bottles Price Guide is published by Krause Publications, 200 East State St., Iola, WI 54990-0001; It can be purchased through any of the U.S. national book sellers.

Book Review: The Wonderful World of Collecting Perfume Bottles by Jane Flanagan • Review by Verna Kocken
The IPBA has a true friend in Jane Flanagan. If that relationship is symbiotic, so much the better! Jane has actively supported the club from the start to the finish of her new book, The Wonderful World of Collecting Perfume Bottles. She acknowledges

IPBA support and article contributions in her prefacing pages and ends by advising perfume collectors who have read her book to join the IPBA. (Tips and Considerations, page 280.) The very last page of the book is an IPBA application!
In her chapter "From Ladies and Gentlemen of the Club", she has reprinted articles prepared for and first published in the Perfume Bottle Quarterly. These are "classic" articles by Ken Leach, Helen Farnsworth, and Lenore Worth Hiers. Jane has done us a favor by pulling these articles together to visit or revisit.
In Jane's introduction, she tells us that her purpose is not to show the masterpiece presentations, but to engage the collector with bottles that he or she is likely to find- bottles that are available to everyone. She has featured advertisements and catalogue pages, which contribute to the sense of history of which dedicated collectors grow more and more aware. She has also devoted a chapter to late 1800s, early 1900s and a chapter for each decade from 1920s to the present. In so doing, she has created not only an overview of the bottles, but the "feel" for each decade.
For Mini collectors, nearly a 40-page section gives a colorful range of minis, both old and new. Jane's background as an interior decorator is demonstrated in the chapter on Vintage Vanity Vignettes and Toiletries. Her chapter on Perfume Scent Cards introduces a "new" vogue of collecting. Some of the classic perfumers: Guerlain, Bacorn, and the W&H Walker Company have chapters of their own. Tips and references for the new collector are rich within the pages. All together, Jane has produced an ideal book, beautifully illustrated, for the person new to collecting. It has color, variety, and scope. Congratulations, Jane!
The Wonderful World of Collecting Perfume Bottles, by Jane Flanagan is published by Collector Books, a Division of Schroeder Publishing Co. Inc, Paducah, KY. Copyright, 2009.

$11 Million for a Perfume Bottle!
belle haleine

As perfume bottle collectors most of us know the perfume bottle called Un Air Embaume by Rigaud. A lovely bottle with a pink patina surface treatment and frosted reclining nudes along the shoulders. This perfume was trademarked in 1915 and issued over a period of years.
In 1921 artist Marcel Duchamp took the basic boxed perfume bottle for Rigaud stripped it and gave it a green patina and a new label with his own face dressed as his alter ego Rrose Selavy. The new name on the perfume bottle became Belle Haleine, Eau de Voilette. By this point the bottle was empty and had been reincarnated into an object d'art. An example was included in Duchamp's 1961 exhibit. The value became attached more to Duchamp than to perfume house of Rigaud. More than one example was made; however, a total doesn't seem to be recorded.
February 23, 2009 an example of Belle Haleine that had been the property of Yves St. Laurent was auctioned in Paris at Christie's Auction House for $11 million dollars. YSL had added his own touches to the perfume presentation making it again more about him than either Duchamp or Rigaud, but yet this bottle will now enter the record books as the most money ever paid for a perfume bottle presentation.

Sources for this short review can be consulted at: ArtLovesMoney.com and toutfais.com

Perfume Library Available on CD
The fabulous perfume library of IPBA Archivist, Helen Farnsworth, is now available for purchase on CD. This archival material has been compiled by Helen over a period of 30 years and includes perfume catalogs, advertising, and a database of over 26,000 perfume entries on 597 pages. The database with worldwide coverage contains company names, presentation names, perfume names, trade names, line names, distributors, perfumers, locations and dates. The library is contained in a two-disk set at the cost of $25. This cost includes priority shipping.
For further information contact Helen Farnsworth at cwf8551@aol.com.

Research on IRICE by Helen Farnsworth, Archivist
Over the years Helen Farnsworth, IPBA Archivist, has answered many questions about perfume bottles, but the most frequently asked questions have been about IRICE. She has decided to write up a report on what is known about this company which we are pleased to publish on this website.
The company started as a jobber or importer of various vanity items in the 1920's in New York. The head of the company was named Irving W. Rice and he gave an abbrievation of his name to the company which appears on the distinctive silver and blue foil labels ever since - IRICE. The company still exists today in New York and every Christmas if you go to a drug store and look on the counter there will be a display of Irice atomizers. The company never made the items. They were importers and jobbers. So the perfume atomizers and bottles spanned a wide variety of qualities and countries. Irice brought in boxcar loads of Czechslovakian crystal before World War II. During the war, Irice used American companies and then after hostilities were over, the company began importing again, but this time from West Germany and the labels reflect this. Today most of the sources are in the Far East in Japan and later in Taiwan.
Irice is located in New York City at 15 West 34th St. and continues to supply vanity items and perfume bottles to America.

For a brief period in the 1930's Irice dabbled in commercial perfumes (that is, perfumes that came in the bottle) and had a very small line of these fragrances like Grape Cologne and Pineapple and a more high end bottle that is often today called a Victorian antique when found. This bottle held a perfume called Renaissance that was in a Irice bottle for the Scherk company. The bottle was in heavy pressed glass with a gilt frame and marble-like jewel on each corner of the frame. The portrait of a Renaissance lady completed the antique look, but the bottle is from about 1935.

Any collection of Irice items can be dated by the information on the labels or by carefully examining the parts of the atomizer. A glass tube in the atomizer means 1930's roughly, while by the time of the 1950's plastic tubing was found in the atomizer. Most of the porcelain flower decorated atomizers date to the 1950's. Time line on the labels can be determined by the country cited under the name "Irice." So it goes: Czech, American, West Germany, Japan, and finally Taiwan.

Most heavily collected and sought today are the Irice series called Little Drams or sometimes Stubby series. These were tiny perfume bottle made in Czechoslovakia with charms or dangles hanging from chains from the top of the stopper. A wide variety of animals and dolls have been seen. A cross-over collectible here is the 1939 World's Fair Irice bottle with the peristyle and hemisphere charms. Most other Irice perfumes are still in the category of inexpensive collectibles. To date very little has appeared in print about these perfume bottles and atomizers.
[Thank you Helen for this comprehensive report.]

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