EXCLUSIVE: Ciara and Russell Wilson Release Fragrances, Discuss Collaborating

“I just got home from football practice,” said Russell Wilson in a Zoom video call, sitting alongside Ciara.

The power couple — Seattle Seahawks quarterback and the one-name, Grammy award-winning entertainer — have teamed to offer two fragrances, out Nov. 17. It’s their first beauty venture, created in partnership with manufacturer Hampton Beauty. They call it R&C The Fragrance Duo.

“We wanted our scents to be able to be very strong individually but also be stronger together,” Wilson said.

That aspiration is represented in the physical shape of the perfumes, which wrap around each other like puzzle pieces and link via magnet to create a larger, unified structure. The duo worked on the project “in the thick of quarantine” this year amid the coronavirus pandemic, Ciara said.

“This was something, I can say, made us smile,” she added. “It gave us something to laugh about.”

“We had several date nights all around fragrance,” chimed in Wilson.

Ciara was pregnant at the time.

“Her nose was crazy,” Wilson said.

“I was like, ‘I have a dog nose,’ Ciara went on, laughing. “I’m like, ‘I can smell something way around the corner.’ I think I kind of had a little edge up on the process. I was able to truly smell, really smell.”

To bring the project to life, the two worked with perfumers Catherine Selig and Linda Chinery of Takasago International Corp., a fragrance producer. Ciara offers notes of pink peppercorn, peony and sandalwood, while Wilson combines black tea, lavender and musk, among others. Fans — Ciara has 26.5 million on Instagram alone — will be able to purchase the perfume exclusively at RandCFragrance.com for $90 (50 ml each).

“I like scents to be distinctive,” Ciara said. “I want it to be memorable. I always think about the feeling that I get when I smell someone that smells so fresh….You remember that scent. It leaves a mark on you.”

“For me, I really wanted to put out something sexy,” Wilson said. “When you walk in the room, I think you want the man to bring a presence without overdoing it. That’s kind of something I’ve always wanted to feel.”

A portion of sales from the product will be donated to the couple’s Why Not You Foundation, a nonprofit working to fight poverty while advocating for education and children’s health.

“We really loved them as a couple and love their passion for everything they do,” said Lori Mariano, managing partner at Hampton Beauty. “We were very excited to collaborate with them. We were very much like-minded in our visions to bring this to market through an e-commerce platform.”

Consumers today are more engaged than ever with e-commerce during COVID-19, she said.

“We felt that it was an ideal time [to launch], not to mention we’re going into the holiday season where we anticipate there to be a lot of robust consumer shopping online,” Mariano said. “Ciara and Russell have a really engaged fanbase and community that they speak to all the time so, we’re very excited for them to learn about the brand. And through our marketing efforts that we have planned, for them really to get behind the brand and hopefully convert their enthusiasm to sales.”

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