Earlier this year, while I was in New York doing one of my perfume crawls, I walked into the Granado store in Soho and immediately felt the need to take out my camera. The store has that effect. It is almost too charming to resist, like a Disney gift shop for adult women who love perfume, soap, color, tiles, tins and the fantasy of an old-world pharmacy. The colors feel deliberate. The shelves look composed. The soaps, bottles, tins and gift boxes sit in perfect order. Nothing appears accidental.
A Real Heritage House
Granado is one of Brazil’s oldest beauty houses. José Antonio Coxito Granado founded it in Rio de Janeiro in 1870. The early business centered on pharmacy, medicinal plants, remedies, soaps and colognes, with ingredients connected to Brazil’s botanical landscape.
Granado says Coxito Granado used around 300 species of medicinal plants and adapted formulas to Brazilian needs at a time when European imports still shaped much of the beauty and pharmaceutical market. Emperor Dom Pedro II later awarded the business the title of Official Pharmacy of the Brazilian Imperial Family.
Who Owns Granado Now
In 1994, Granado left the founding family’s hands. Christopher Freeman, an English former banker, bought the company from the Granado family and became its modern owner. In 2004, he also bought Phebo, the historic Brazilian soap and fragrance brand. That brought two of Brazil’s best-known pharmacy and perfumery names under the same group.
The next major shift came in 2016, when Puig bought a minority stake in Granado. Reuters reported the stake at 35 percent, with the deal designed to support Granado’s international expansion. Freeman remained in charge, while Puig gave the company something very useful for its next chapter: a global fragrance partner with experience, distribution power and luxury credibility.
That ownership structure explains a lot about the Granado we see today. The brand still presents itself as a Brazilian heritage pharmacy house, but it now operates as something larger. Granado is a privately controlled beauty group, backed by one of the most important fragrance companies in the world. It is using its archive, stores and perfumes to grow far beyond Brazil.
Beyond the Pretty Packaging
Granado has also grown through acquisitions. The company owns Phebo, which Freeman purchased in 2004. More recently, Granado acquired Care Natural Beauty, a Brazilian skincare and makeup brand founded in 2018 by Patrícia Camargo and Luciana Navarro. Premium Beauty News reported that the acquisition will help Granado move further into clean beauty, skincare and makeup, with plans for 28 directly owned Care stores and 35 kiosks by 2028.
This is where the pretty packaging stops being the whole story. Granado has factories, boutiques, acquisitions, investor backing and a carefully built international retail strategy. It has around 100 boutiques in Brazil and a growing presence in Paris, London, Lisbon and New York.
The U.S. story is moving quickly too. Granado opened its Madison Avenue store in January 2024 and its Soho store in December 2024. It is now also sold at Nordstrom, where the current selection includes eau de parfums, eau de toilettes, eau de colognes, discovery sets and body products. That matters. Nordstrom puts Granado in front of the American beauty customer who may not be planning a perfume crawl, but will absolutely stop for a beautiful bottle and a strong gift set.
The Perfume Strategy
For Brazilian consumers, Granado may still live in memory as pharmacy, soap, powder, body care and family bathroom nostalgia. For American and European consumers, the entry point is increasingly perfume.
Granado’s visual identity may be nostalgic, but the fragrance work feels very current. The line moves across eau de parfum, eau de toilette and eau de cologne formats. The scents sit between mass-market fragrance and high niche pricing. The packaging gets your attention first, but the perfumers make you stay.
In the bottles I bought, Quentin Bisch appears on Citrus Brasilis, Apotecario and Rosa Sublime. Benoist Lapouza created Fervo Intenso. Granado is using fragrance as one of the main ways it will travel internationally.
My Bottles
That is why I chose the perfumes I did. Fervo Intenso immediately interested me because Lapouza is also the perfumer behind Kilian Angel’s Share, one of the most famous boozy gourmands of the past decade. Here, the alcohol reference shifts from cognac to cachaça, placing the warmth inside a Brazilian frame. Fervo Intenso is an amber spice fragrance with pomelo, orange and bergamot, a heart of cachaça, cedar and iris, and a base of cacao, myrrh and sandalwood.
Citrus Brasilis, by Quentin Bisch, takes a brighter route. It is built around mandarin orange, lemon and bergamot, with jasmine, kumquat and mint over musk, violet leaves and patchouli. Apotecario, also by Bisch, turns directly toward the pharmacy fantasy with black pepper, cardamom and bergamot, then leather, black tea and cypriol over myrrh, tonka bean and patchouli. Rosa Sublime, again by Bisch, is an oriental floral with nutmeg, cassis and davana, a heart of rose, geranium and jasmine, and a warm base of saffron, amber and sandalwood.
Granado also sent me Flora Magnífica and Madrepérola. Both show another side of the house. Flora Magnífica is a woody floral musk with bergamot, green leaves and nectarine, then rose, jasmine and magnolia over coconut flower, musk and sandalwood. Madrepérola is a woody floral spicy fragrance with black pepper, olibanum and lemon, followed by orange blossom, tuberose and ylang-ylang over sandalwood, musk and tonka.
I could not find perfumer credits for Flora Magnífica or Madrepérola, which is worth noting. When a brand clearly uses perfumer names as part of its international fragrance credibility, missing credits stand out.
Who Granado Is Really For
Together, these six perfumes show the range Granado is trying to build: Brazilian freshness, pharmacy-inspired aromatics, polished gourmands, modern rose, tropical florals and musky woods.
They also clarify who Granado may be best for. This is a wonderful gifting brand and a very appealing house for casual perfume wearers who want something beautiful, polished and memorable.
For serious collectors, Granado may not always feel strange or challenging enough. But that may also be the point. Granado is not trying to be difficult. It is trying to be desirable, easy to understand and beautifully made at a price that still feels sane.
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