Lightyears Collection
Vincent Roubert
(1889-1972)

Click on image to enlarge L'Aimant Perfume, created for Coty by Vincent Roubert

Vincent Roubert was one of the talented young perfumers attached to the Antoine Chiris business of Grasse. Roubert's career with Chiris began prior to the First World War and in 1912 he was credited with creating L'Or for François Coty, himself a former student of Chris's perfumery school. By 1919, perfumers at Chiris included Henri Almèras, Ernest Beaux, and Henri Robert, son of Chiris's technical director, Joseph Robert.

Michael Edwards (Perfume Legends,) suggests that Roubert and his three companions were all working on their "answers" to Robert Bienaime's (1912) Quelques Fleurs, which had made the first successful use of an aldehyde, giving it a new "modern" feeling that made it stand out from other perfumes of its day. For Vincent Roubert, this quest culminated in his 1927 L'Aimant for Coty which some suggest was now Coty's answer to Chanel's hugely successful No.5, created by Ernest Beaux.

Vincent Roubert was hired away from Chiris by Coty in the 1920's to become Coty's technical director and co-creator. While Coty had an incredible ability to create marketable perfumes, he lacked the technical foundation that Roubert had developed while studying and working for Chiris.

In the 1940's Vincent Roubert created several fragrances for couturier Jacques Fath.