Friday night’s Victoria Beckham spring/summer 2025 show smelled like her memories. If showgoers suddenly thought that the air smelled a little humid yet romantic, with the faintest hint of vanilla (and maybe David Beckham), they wouldn’t have been wrong.
The fashion designer and poshest spice scented the runway with her latest beauty creation, a perfume called 21:50 Rêverie. Like her others, her fourth perfume is inspired by a specific moment in Beckham’s life. For example, Suite 302 immortalized a weekend anniversary trip taken by the Beckhams to the Ritz Paris. San Ysidro Drive captured the family’s move to Los Angeles and is named after their street address.
21:50 Rêverie embodies another core memory in Beckham’s life: when she and David were in a remote area of Java. Sitting down to dinner at the late hour and surrounded by vanilla vines, the smell of the wet jungle, and thousands of tealights, Beckham had a bit of a spiritual awakening. It was at this moment she realized the far-reaching lengths of her dreams and ambitions, which included starting a label of her own.
“My stories are pretty lame [in comparison],” perfumer Jérôme Epinette laughs. Having worked with Beckham on all her previous fragrances, Epinette always encourages Beckham to “tell me your memories [and] stories.” To crystallize the Java trip in perfume, the two decided to stick with the same woodsy DNA of their other scents, and to create their most sensual one yet.
Victoria Beckham in the ad for 21:50 Rêverie.
They started with “the most loved ingredient in the world,” Epinette says, matter-of-factly. “Vanilla.” Moving away from the more gourmand-y, vanilla scents that have been trending, Epinette wanted to pull out the more green, animalistic notes of vanilla from Madagascar, likening it to be “almost inky” in nature. Deep plum, tonka bean, cedarwood, Javanese vetiver, and elemi (a spice also from Java, with a peppery feel), give the fragrance more of its mysterious elements. It’s a woodsy, subtly sweet scent that almost oozes with warmth. If you’re craving a vanilla scent that doesn’t smell anything like David Beckham baking a cake, Victoria Beckham Beauty has a new perfume for you.
Kathleen Hou is ELLE’s Beauty Director. Previously, she held the same title at New York Magazine’s The Cut. She’s appeared in publications such as The New York Times Magazine, Vogue India, Forbes, and Allure. She was also a co-founder of Donate Beauty, a grassroots beauty donation project started during the COVID-19 crisis, which donated over 500,000 products to over 30,000 healthcare workers across 500-plus hospitals.