The Life and Fragrances of Isabel Toledo: What She Wore for Studio 54, Diana Vreeland, and More

Isabel Toledo’s Midtown studio functions as a visual history of her remarkable life—a sort of creative’s fairy-tale romance that’s inextricably intertwined with her husband, Ruben Toledo, whom she began dating as a teenager. Ruben’s sketches for her clothing line cover the walls. Tiles encircling the staircase and adorning the powder room, painted by Ruben, are called The Isabel Collection. Hula Hoops, a favorite pastime of Isabel’s, hang delicately from the ceiling like mobiles. A towering cactus forest attests to the Toledos’ green thumbs. The nipped-waist tea-length dress she wears is her own. Why shouldn’t her fragrance be, too?

“It’s a whole other world, but the same,” says Toledo of being approached to design her first perfume, which made its debut this week. Rather than creating just one, she decided to make two, which she calls her “north and south. My moods change; I love being able to dress my character,” she says. "It’s the same thing as making a dress: One is easy and simple—you don’t even have to think about putting it on—and the other is more complex.” After nearly two years of research and testing, she created the olfactory equivalent of those two garments. Crystal Honey is a light, tropical fruit–driven social scent, to be worn near the ears. “It’s pretty, friendly, and easy to react to.” And, as its counterpoint, Kuba Rose is a mysterious blend of Italian bergamot, jasmine, and tuberose. “It’s a lover’s scent,” says Toledo. “Ruben really reacted to it.”

Though it’s more scientific in nature than her usual creative undertakings, making a fragrance is just “another way of speaking," Toledo says. "We’re always making something—it’s second nature.” And like all good art, it had to be personal. “Perfume,” she explains, “is a way of stopping time. You smell a beautiful scent that makes you remember something.” With this in mind, we asked Toledo to walk us down memory lane through her own scent history.