It’s so good to be bad

A fresh, fun approach and the release of an innovative new fragrance marks an unparalleled moment for House of Herrera – and women the world over.

or three decades, legendary designer Carolina Herrera and her dynasty have defined and embodied elegance, celebrating the multi-faceted lives of women through clothing and scent. So it’s no surprise that the brand’s latest fragrance, Good Girl, captures the new dimensions of femininity in a powerful, paradoxical and utterly compelling way. Led by Carolina Herrera de Báez, creative director of House of Herrera Fragrances and daughter of the fashion doyenne, Good Girl represents what it means to be a woman, encouraging you to embrace your bad side as well as your good. Sweet and sophisticated with a sexy edge, the perfume offers the best of both worlds, so we sat down with Carolina Herrera de Báez to discuss her ‘bests’ in life.

GLAMOUR What’s your best childhood memory? Carolina My childhood was very happy, almost like a fairy tale, and I had this secret detective club called The Mysterious Boot with my best friend and whoever we allowed in. Our office was in a tree house and I have great memories of us solving mysteries of the house – and creating our own mysteries to solve. Like if two of our dogs fought and we found a little blood, we would already have a whole theory of what happened that had absolutely nothing to do with the dogs! What’s the best fashion advice your mother has ever given you? Always look at yourself in the mirror before leaving the house and never overaccessorise. I constantly have her voice in my head saying, “Don’t look like a Christmas tree.”

And the best life advice? You should always cultivate a personal inner world that has nothing to do with the externals of perfume or fashion or whatever industry you’re in. That’s been really helpful – it keeps me grounded. What’s the best thing you’ve learnt from being a mother? Patience. And also that you can’t make your children be who they’re not, because you can kind of see who they are from very little. I have two daughters Olimpia, 11, and Atalanta, eight, and a son Miguel, 10, and they’re all very different. I’ve learnt how to not make them extensions of myself and to cater to each one individually. What’s the best thing about working with family? You can be very, very honest. With family, you never lie because you know that they’re always going to tell you the truth no matter what. When was your best beauty moment, a time when you felt the most beautiful? For me, it’s not ever one moment, but when I’m most happy. It can be work related, it can be personal – it doesn’t matter. It’s just those moments when you are in bliss, that’s when you’re always at your most beautiful. For some reason, there’s a correlation between happiness and beauty. What is your best Carolina Herrera fragrance? I love the private collection, and Good Girl is really good, but it’s hard to choose my best – it’s like saying which one is your favourite baby! There have been so many fragrances in the last 20 years that each one has a part of me in them, but the 212 will always be special to me as it was the first one that I produced. And that name comes from the area code for New York City. What’s the best thing about New York Fashion Week? The Carolina Herrera show, because it’s the only one I go to, although the energy during New York Fashion Week is palpable, because there’s so much going on and there are so many people. It’s a great time for New York. What was your best look at this year’s Carolina Herrera show? I loved everything, from the checkered dresses to the black chiffon, which can be worn with heels and flats. But most of all, I liked the black long tuxedo for its versatility and sex appeal.

What’s your best source of happiness? It depends. It can be anything from watching a great movie and being blissful with my children and husband to having a successful moment. It isn’t ever one specific thing – it’s random. It can even be eating a delicious hot dog! What’s your best confidence booster? When you’re feeling good, your confidence is always up. I’m confident when I’m happy, content and am around friends and family, the people I love. I’ll tell you what isn’t a confidence boost: when you’re around a lot of people you don’t know and you get a load of compliments. That’s a total nonconfidence boost because I don’t ever believe it. Or like these people who have Instagram accounts with thousands and thousands of followers and they just get compliment after compliment – that would be a total confidence downer for me because I’d think it was fake. What are the best notes in fragrance for confidence? That is very particular, because the beauty of fragrance is that it plays on our sense memory, and that is different for every person. I don’t think there is one note for confidence – it varies on each person. For some, it’s not flowers, but citrics or honey or cinnamon. It’s usually things that bring you back to great moments in your childhood. For me, it’s jasmine, because it’s a very comforting note that reminds me of my childhood and my mother. I only have good associations with it, and that’s what I love about Good Girl – it’s based on jasmine and tuberose. Model Karlie Kloss is the face of Good Girl. What’s the best thing about her? I love her in general. She’s a very hard-working woman and she does it so well, and everything she does, she does with the same passion, always giving 100%. I like that she has these organisations, like Karlie’s Kookies and Kode With Klossy, and is so young yet knows what to do with her success. I think that’s really important and empowering to girls and women, which is why Karlie is the perfect Good Girl who in the end turns out to be this role model who can be good or naughty. She has taken her well-deserved moment of glory and has turned it into something positive, which I think is a perfect example of what everybody should do, not just models. Men, women, celebrities – we should all give back.