Stained Glass
Heather- Apr 11
- 2 min read
Updated: Apr 13
The stained glass theme on House Germaine Fragrance packaging comes with a story. Let me back up a bit...
I founded this perfume brand and named it after my grandmother Germaine.
She's still living and still feisty. Her aesthetic leanings have shaped my own:
If you wear something old, put something shiny with it.
If your hair is not arranged, cover it with a scarf.
Put on a piece of jewelry.
If you're putting on makeup, sit down and enjoy the process.
Wear perfume.
Germaine is one branch of a sprawling family tree of French Canadians who settled in the wild, windswept high plains of western Kansas. I conjecture these were a proud and resolute bunch. Emma and Adrian, Dona and Nathalie, Germaine and LeRoche. Family names of Thyfault, Brin, Asselin, Saindon, Roy, LaNoue, Normandin, Benoit. They forged a society amid a barren tableau .
Besides fortitude, there is another quality which weaves the family fabric, a particular embrace of beauty... to create beauty wherever possible, to promote and uphold beauty where it exists. They left us an standing testament, an exquisite cathedral built with labor donated by parishoners.
Featured in my earliest childhood memories, this Romanesque Revival style cathedral rises above the flat landscape surrounding Damar, northwest Kansas, population 300. Situated on a gentle hillock at the west edge of town, it's contained joys and sorrows, weddings and funerals, baptisms and confirmations of my ancestors. My parents wedded here in 1975.
The vaulted ceilings, guilded frescos, and marble columns are grand. Within these walls even today, one feels permanency, entertains elevated ideals, and senses divine realms.
As a child, stained glass windows of saturated ruby, emerald, sapphire, tourmaline, and diamonds blazed with sunlight. I was captivated.
As part of the family fabric, woven of the same thread, I'm drawn to create beauty just because, if I can. There is something about fancy that sits well with me.
House Germaine Fine Fragrances presents so many opportunities to express this family heritage: To design fragrance, drop by drop, until a synergy emerges. To be quiet and aware of olfactory pleasure, to appreciate the interplay of line, heft, and mist quality when choosing the perfume bottle.
While designing the packaging, I spotted a mosaic graphic reminiscent of stained glass. It was an easy choice. It's a small reminder of those early moments, captivated by color and light. It feels authentic. House Germaine is woven with the fabric of family, rooted in the fertile terroir of people carrying within them a deep appreciation for beauty and grandeur.
When you wear a House Germaine fragrance, every step of its creation took care and intention-- drawing from imagination and crafted with these hands. I look forward to keeping traditional perfumery alive and well and sharing every new fragrance with you.
-Heather
2025
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