The Mission Chinese Food founder has teamed up with the forward-thinking men's care brand for a multi-sensory project that's nothing short of an experience.

Danny Bowien usually comes home smelling like onions and chilies, but a new collaboration has him aligning himself with a different kind of aroma. The chef and Mission Chinese Food founder is the latest to collaborate with Hawthorne, an up-and-coming men&#39;s care brand by Brian Jeong and Phillip Wong. The childhood friends founded their brand with the concept of making grooming a more individual experience, using a questionnaire and artificial intelligence to personalize each product for each customer. Eliminating the need for one-size-fits-all drugstore products that probably aren&#39;t actually best for everyone, all with natural ingredients and an affordable price tag, the company has truly helped to bring men&#39;s grooming and skincare into the individualized, high-tech age. And what better way to show off the evocative qualities of a tailor-made product than by creating a multi-sensory project alongside one of today&#39;s most promising culinary names?

Enter Botanic and Woody,&nbsp;the new fragrance that Jeong, Wong, and Bowien developed in collaboration with master perfumer Olivier Gillotin, who&#39;s built a long career making olfactory masterpieces for the likes of Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein, and Tom Ford. The scent mixes flowers like North African blue chamomile, rose, and ylang-ylang with Haitian vetiver and Moroccan sandalwood to create a compelling argument that floral scents shouldn&#39;t fall in a gendered stereotype. But that isn&#39;t the only revolution going on here, as it also highlights Bowien&#39;s personal change of preference from cologne to earthy scents, a development of sophistication that Hawthorne&#39;s founders helped to foster. Obviously, a scent that results from melding the minds of a culinary expert, a forward-thinking men&#39;s care company, and a seasoned nose is nothing short of an experience. Bowien, Jeong, and Wong opened up to&nbsp;L&#39;Officiel USA&nbsp;about their experiences collaborating and just what feelings the new fragrance creates.

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What first sparked your interest in fragrance?

Brian Jeong: The Perfect Scent&nbsp;by Chandler Burr and my subsequent conversations with the fragrance house, Givaudan.

Danny Bowien: I was really into cologne when I was younger.&nbsp;Tommy Hilfiger was my first cologne. Hawthorne opened me up to this more recently because I started using soaps and lotions they gave me with very earthy fragrances. It got me thinking about my fragrance more, especially since I come home smelling like onions and spicy chilies on most days.&nbsp;

How did you end up coming together for this collaboration?

Phillip Wong: It all&nbsp;happened serendipitously. Similarly, with the rest of our collaborations, we never try to force the issue. Once we started the framework of this fragrance, no one&nbsp;but Danny made sense for such a dynamic and colorful scent.

DB: I met Phil and Brian from Hawthorne through my friend Lauren Devine, actually at Mission Chinese Food in Manhattan. After I first met them we wound up crossing paths a lot because there&#39;s a lot of overlap with people we know and places we hang out. So I look at this as a merging of two worlds. It naturally made sense for us to work together.&nbsp;

If your fragrance was the star of its own movie, which actor would play the starring role?

PW: 1991 Keanu.

DB: Jaden Smith.

What color does it smell like?

PW: Acid Tie Dye.

DB: Purple.

If you had to place Botanic and Woody in an iconic decade past, which one would it be?

PW: Spring in &#39;90s NYC.

DB: Maybe the &#39;90s, or now.&nbsp;It&#39;s very current.

What item from your wardrobe would you compare it to?

BJ: My lavender Opening Ceremony X Vans leather Old Skool - a distinct and elevated, yet still comfortable take on an otherwise unremarkable (in the best way possible) shoe.

DB: My black Telfar thermal halter top.&nbsp;It&#39;s super comfortable and I can wear it every day.

What genre of music do you think Botanic and Woody most aligns with?

PW: More of a colorful playlist than a genre. Aphex Twin, Sade, Caribou, Philip Glass, Toro Y Moi, Jai Paul, and Yves Tumor.

DB: Modern R&amp;B, like Blood Orange.

If your fragrance had a night out on the town, what drink would it order at the bar?

PW: A mezcal negroni.

If you were to relate Botanic and Woody to a book, what would it be? Why?

BJ: The short story &quot;Winter Dreams&quot; by F.Scott Fitzgerald. Both may provide superficial entertainment to most, but deeper, they have subjective themes that lack uniformity across all readers.

DB: Harry Potter. I&#39;m reading [the books]&nbsp;for the first time with my son, but it&#39;s such an inescapable piece of culture that I feel like I already know them. It&#39;s like becoming more familiar with something I already know.&nbsp;

If your fragrance had a soundtrack, what three sounds would play once you spray the scent?

PW: A&nbsp;flutter of hummingbird wings, fireworks, and a harp strum.

DB: Windchimes, a woodpecker, and waves crashing.

If it wasn&rsquo;t called Botanic and Woody, what would it be called?&nbsp;

PW: It was originally codenamed &quot;King George&quot;&nbsp;by our perfumer, Olivier. I thought it was a nice mix of grandeur and curiosity. That or &ldquo;Serenity Now.&quot;

DB: Woody and Botanic

 L'Officiel Nose: Danny Bowien x Hawthorne

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L'Officiel Nose: Danny Bowien x Hawthorne

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