Exhibiting Amouage Perfume bottles at the National Museum of Oman
In February 2023, following a collaboration between the National Museum of Oman and Amouage [1], our Exhibition Design team received a collection of 5 historic perfume bottles dating back to 1983 & 1931 CE from the first release of Amouage Perfumery called Amouage Gold (men/women), as well as the Lily of the Valley bottle by René Lalique that holds Amouage’s “Muscat-Paris” perfume, a scent created for the opening of our Fragrant Journeys exhibition on November 2022 in Bayt Greiza.
The Design Process
The bottles were to be displayed in the National Museum’s “Land of Frankincense” gallery; to showcase the tale and history of fragrance in Oman.
After studying the objects and its delicate patterns, form and the different materials used (crystal, gold and silver), I then examined the gallery and the location of the newly-placed temporary showcase (that would be used to house the items), and took inspiration for the display method from within the gallery’s environment.
Through careful consideration of the visitor path, view points, reflections and ambiance; I divided the showcase display into 3 different forms for the different set of bottles: Amouage Men’s Gold, Amouage Women’s Gold, and the Lilly of the Valley bottle.
First, the Men’s bottle takes its inspiration from the Omani dagger, and has an elongated rectangular form, while the Women’s perfume cap was inspired by the dome of old Omani mosques, and has an abstract cubic form. The third, Lilly of the Valley bottle, had both a — thin — linear form and a circular base. I have also taken into consideration how the overall shape of the latter matches Ahmed al-Toqi’s photograph of the Frankincense tree in the background of the gallery, which I tried to subtly match.
All of those 3 sets had a ‘special’ crystal version of the perfume bottle, which influenced me into matching the heights between the different bottle sets. And for selecting the plinths (base), the colours of the bottles were highlighted beautifully with our museum’s opaque plinths. The Lilly of the Valley bottle, however, proved tricks as it did not contrast well with the opaque plinth; hence why I opted with using a dark grey plinth over the opaque plinth to enhance its beautiful transparent shape — additionally, the base was placed in a 90 degree angle to subtly differentiate the Lilly of the Valley bottle from the Amouage Gold sets.
For the lightning, even though this display showcase has a built-in lightning system, it was difficult to use in this specific gallery as there wasn’t a socket in an optimal ground outlet to hide the wiring, compared to our other galleries. Regardless, galleries in the National Museum are built well for the future thanks to the plug-and-play railings across the ceiling of the gallery, which had perfect spots to add 4 spots lights all around the sides of the showcase. While single spotlights usually create harsh shadows, the gallery already had multiple secondary light sources around, as well as an indirect sunlight environment that helped in creating a pleasing ambiance for the showcase.
The whole process was done on-site alongside our amazing Conservation team that insured the cleanliness inside of the showcase as we tested several plinths. Finally, I took into consideration the location of our bi-lingual captions (which usually take time for reviewing) using older caption as place-holders to finalise the exact positions of all the plinths, and double checked everything using a tape measure.
It was a thrilling and fascinating experience to work on exhibiting these historic perfume bottles from one of the most prestigious companies in Oman, one that has successfully left an aromatic presence around the world. And I’m delighted to see this work being admired by the local and foreign visitors of the National Museum.
Acknowledgements: Sincerest thanks to Ms. Noora al-Balushi, Head of Exhibition department at the National Museum, our colleagues from the Conservation Unit, and the technical workers who helped clean and set up the spot lights.
[1] Amouage is an independent high perfumery house founded in the Sultanate of Oman in 1983 to be ‘The Gift of Kings’. An internationally acclaimed and award winning brand, it has 12 standalone boutiques around the world, as well as a highly selective network of approximately 1000 of the world’s finest department stores, perfumeries and airports.
