We’re All Invited to the Discothèque 🪩
Season six of ‘Sex and the City’ delivered one of the show’s most iconic scenes. A socialite Lexi Featherston puffs on a cigarette frantically, by a full-length open window in a glamorous Manhattan apartment, after being told that she can’t smoke inside. “When did everybody stop smoking?” she asks. “When did everybody pair off? This used to be the most exciting city in the world… Now it’s nothing but smoking near a fucking open window. New York is over. O.V.E.R. Over. No one’s fun anymore. Whatever happened to fun? God. I’m so bored I could die.” A high heel on one of her strappy sandals gives, she loses balance, and… The episode is titled ‘Splat’.
What Lexi was lamenting was the once great, now lost New York party scene. The way it brought people together and brought out the good, maybe the bad, and definitely the fun. In that portentous moment, she yearned for the party that once was. Capturing the essence of great parties is what the luxury indie fragrance brand Discothèque was created to do. And fun is the first word I would use to begin to describe it. Created between Los Angeles and London, Discothèque’s founders, Jessie Willner and Hanover Booth, are on a mission to help people experience some of history’s hottest clubs and nights out from across the globe – through scent.
“We became obsessed with an earlier time than ours, when people were forced to live in a single moment, where the internet didn’t exist yet, and you had to actually go out to get inspired, you had to go listen to a DJ’s set to discover your next favourite song, or go to the club to see what everyone was wearing,” says Jessie.
Hanover says she has “always felt there is something undeniably magical about a night out — the anticipation, the electricity in the air and the way all your senses intertwine. Even the memories after, not just for the music or the people, but for the way all of it made you feel. With Discothèque, we wanted to bottle that feeling.”
If the best fragrances are evocative or transportive, Discothèque is achieving both seamlessly thanks to the impeccable interplay of the scents and the sensory and design ecosystem each one is located in. Take ‘Lola at Coat Check’ – maybe one of my favourite fragrance names on the market? – housed in a black glass bottle, topped with a cap mirroring the look of a disco ball but with sharp edges, and fronted by a metallic plaque with the name embossed. It’s luxe and tactile, evoking the mythical coat check girl and her blunt bob.
But the pleasures don’t stop there. Every fragrance from Discothèque comes with a story, a place, a playlist. ‘Lola at Coat Check’ smells like roses, sandalwood, and cardamom with hints of white florals. It also smells like 1992 New York, specifically the club Nell’s: velvet ropes, softness contrasted with edges, a hint of smoke. And sounds like the people who frequented Nell’s: Tribe, LL Cool J, Eddie Murphy, Jean Michel Basquiat, Dionne Warwick, Bob Dylan, and Debbie Harry, all of whom feature on the custom playlist accompanying each scent. Don’t you wish you’d been there?
“We loved the idea of scent as a portal,” Hanover explains. “These clubs were places where people lost themselves to music, where light and sound came together in a sense of euphoria. We wanted to recreate that as a way to channel that spirit into something wearable. Those legendary spaces weren’t just places to dance; they were cultural epicentres, creative melting pots where music, fashion, and hedonism collided.”
‘Baise Moi On The Dancefloor’ is the club Les Bains Douches in 1979 Paris; violet leaf meets cassis, orris, and cashmere. ‘Heathens, Cowboys, and the Santa Ana Winds’ is Los Angeles’s Helena’s in 1986 – sweet grasses and tea leaf mingle with woody notes on a base of musk and suede. Oh, and the fragrance sampler set is designed to look like a pack of cigarettes. It’s a “nod to those moments in the smoking section when you make a new lifelong friend – and just the tongue-in-cheek aspect that is Discothèque,” adds Hanover – it’s the kind of chic and pleasing touch that would make Lexi proud.
When Discothèque launched in 2023, it was with a range of candles. “All the candles pay homage to clubs that pioneered various genres in their cities. Each fragrance started with a club that held significance, whether personally or culturally. We picked years when the clubs were thriving and built everything around that time,” Jessie explains.
There’s Manchester’s Hacienda, London’s Kinky G, and Leicester’s Flaming Colossus. Jessie and Hanover used these locations as conceptual points of genesis and then worked to capture the essence of a night out in one of those locations via the scents. How did they pick the clubs? “Our research took us deep into club culture — we went through archival footage, old photos, and flyers, but our favourite part of the research came from talking to people who were actually there. We’d chat with friends and long-time ravers, asking a million questions, soaking up their stories, and figuring out which clubs had the kind of energy we wanted to capture. The ones that stuck with us, the ones we felt the most connected to, became our inspiration. Those stories became the foundation for each scent, shaping the notes and atmosphere, with a few creative liberties taken, of course,” says Hanover.
The decision to launch candles first was a strategic one. Jessie and Hanover wanted to establish the brand’s raison d’etre first to “immerse people in the world we were building,” Hanover says, adding, “Candles introduced our aesthetic and storytelling in a way that felt intimate and collectible, setting the stage for what was to come.”
While the scents and candles very much speak for themselves, Jessie states that “the visual aspect is a core part of Discothèque – combining fragrance with an immersive experience.” Jessie’s background is in graphic design. She’s solely responsible for all product design, illustrations, site design, and packaging. Each element is a labour of love, and no detail is left unattended. “It’s all like a shot straight from our soul; we don't outsource any design because we want each product to feel like a love letter from us to its owner. We want it to feel like you're walking through a vortex into our universe when you open the box. There are easter eggs throughout – surprises inside the bottle, under the cap, in inserts and playlists,” she explains.
Hanover adds: “From the beginning, we wanted Discothèque to feel like more than just a fragrance brand — it had to be an experience, its own entire world. Nightlife isn’t just about scent; it’s about atmosphere, energy, storytelling. Every club we’ve drawn inspiration from had a distinct mood, a specific sound, a visual identity that made it unforgettable.” Each product page functions like a destination in its own right, offering product details and then so much more: archival photos of clubs complete with a brief history, dedicated playlists, and short stories capturing the atmosphere of singular nights out.
Going beyond website copy, Jessie says they worked with their “wonderful friend Jessica Garrison, an erotic short story writer, to create fictional nights at each club.” Jessica’s words appeal to all the senses as she captures and recreates the sensations and sentiments of heady nights, like her fictive description of Paris’ Les Bains Douches, frequented by Iman and David Bowie, Mick Jagger, and Boy George, as represented by the 'Baise Moi On the Dancefloor' scent. “She found herself in an abandoned Parisian bathhouse with strangers, and him. Like a classical Renoir, the landscape dotted with iris sprigs and wild vines of jasmine, silky waters, twisted limbs, dripping lips, and crystal champagne goblets. Some were French, some were expats. Some were clothed, some were not,” the beginning of the short story reads. Do read the rest in your own time.
Marketing is essential for any brand but particularly so for a newcomer to a category as busy as fragrance. For Discotheque, finding an approach that felt natural and true was more important than simply getting the name out there. Jessie notes how “word of mouth has been the most incredible thing – people who love Discothèque have enthusiastically spoken about it, I think because the experience is so personal.” Hanover adds that they’ve “been lucky to build an incredible community organically, and that’s shaped the way we do things.” This is in large part because the “beauty of Discothèque is that it isn’t just for traditional fragrance lovers; it resonates with our favourite DJs, drag queens, old-school ravers – anyone who knows the magic of a great night out.”
“Instead of relying solely on typical influencer marketing,” Hanover continues, “we’ve leaned into working with people who genuinely embody the spirit of the brand. It’s less about polished ads and more about culture – music, nightlife, self-expression. Of course, we also use digital ads, but our focus is on creating something that feels like an invitation rather than a sales pitch. Discothèque is about experience, energy, and a little bit of chaos,” and the way that the brand markets should, and does, reflect that.
For a brand as visually-driven as Discotheque, Instagram has played a pivotal role in building and communicating the brand’s aesthetic identity. Instagram is “where we capture the energy of nightlife, the nostalgia, the mood, and the storytelling behind each scent,” Hanover says. Discothèque likewise uses digital ads though “the focus is on creating something that feels like an invitation rather than a sales pitch.”
Crucially, Hanover continues, “Everything we put out – whether it’s a campaign, a product launch, or even just a single image – has to feel like stepping into the Discothèque universe. At the end of the day, we’re not just selling fragrance; we’re inviting people into a world, and the way we show up online has to feel just as immersive as the scents themselves.” Last year Discothèque launched in Selfridges, the brand’s first move into physical retail and beyond direct-to-consumer sales, and it’s continuing to establish a number of touch points across the UK and Europe while starting to enter the US market.
Jessie and Hanover’s vision is set on a stand-alone space that can weave together all the sensorial elements of an iconic, unforgettable night out. Thinking beyond what a traditional store – and a traditional fragrance brand – can look like. It should feel like “stepping into the inside of our minds, with mirrored walls, neon fixtures, and a sound system that plays music from our favourite eras. Scent would be woven into the space, almost like an invisible track list. Shopping for fragrance should feel like an experience, and we’d want our store to be a place where people don’t just browse – they linger, explore, and lose themselves in the moment.”
Jessie says that the future of Discothèque feels “full of possibilities” with forthcoming collaborations and new fragrance launches. And Discothèque is discarding what a fragrance brand should do, in favour of what feels authentic, pleasurable, fun. Jessie and Hanover are embracing the options before them and thinking bigger and bolder about what Discothèque can be.
“Our ideas are constantly getting weirder and more exciting as we realise we don’t have to filter what we put out because now our customer expects us to do the things other traditional fragrance houses can’t necessarily get away with,” they say. Whatever does come next, I know I don’t want to miss out on an invite to the Discothèque – it promises to be an unforgettable night.
