From Polish roots to a global empire. An excerpt from ORA Issue 02.
The history of the house does not begin with a blueprint or a grand inheritance but with the quiet rattling of a ghost in a family attic. While many would have looked at a dusty notebook from a long-gone Polish perfumer and seen only a relic of a life lost to time, Erez Zielinski Rozen recognized a dormant spark. He understood that a legacy is not a museum to be guarded but a fire to be fed.
Today, Zielinski & Rozen's hand-signed bottles and raw, archival aesthetic are found in approximately 40 monobrand boutiques and showrooms, from Paris and Milan to Amsterdam and Ibiza.
ORA: Your great-grandfather was a perfumer in Poland. When you opened that vault of formulas, what did it smell like and what did it feel like?
EREZ: I found a small notebook that belonged to my grandfather at my parents' house, among my mother's family belongings. Inside there was very little writing, but there were several perfume formulas he had written. Even that small fragment was enough to spark something in me. It did not feel like discovering a business or a brand that I had to continue. It felt more like finding a trace of a life that once existed.
ORA: How did that discovery influence you to start the brand?
EZR: I do not feel that I inherited a brand. What I inherited was a spark. The notebook was not a blueprint. It did not tell me what to do. It simply reminded me that someone in my family had once lived a life connected to scent. Everything that came after is my own journey.
ORA: The name Zielinski is an Eastern European Jewish name. Why was it important to carry it forward?
EZR: The name Zielinski comes from my mother's family. They were originally from Poland and arrived in Israel after the war. My father's family name is Rozen. When my wife Lea and I created the brand, combining the two names felt natural. It was not a marketing decision. It was simply a way to bring both sides of my family story into the work that I do.
ORA: What does Jaffa give you that you can't get anywhere else?
EZR: The flea market in Jaffa is where everything began for us. Our first store opened there sixteen years ago and it still represents the spirit of the brand. What I love about that place is its imperfection. It is noisy, chaotic, and full of different cultures and languages. That kind of environment feeds creativity. Our fragrances were born in that atmosphere.
"A fragrance belongs to whoever connects with it."
ORA: You hand-sign almost every bottle. In a world of mass production and AI, what does that gesture mean?
EZR: For me it is a small act of presence. Each bottle carries a moment of human attention. It reminds me that behind every fragrance, there is a person who created it and another person who will experience it.
In the full interview: the 24 hours in Paris that became a collection, the fragrance created for Teatro alla Scala, why he opened an art gallery with no perfume in it, the role his wife Lea plays as CEO, and which American city smells like Zielinski & Rozen.
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