Fragrance can be a person's presence in their absence, says model Edie Campbell. "It's quite powerful," says the British "it" girl model chosen to front the next chapter in the Opium story, in which the enduringly popular and strikingly original oriental fragrance by Yves Saint Laurent is recast for a new generation as Black Opium.
Where once Jerry Hall reclined on a lacquer chaise longue, Campbell runs through Shanghai in equally striking campaign imagery. The shoot by photographer Daniel Wolfe included a pre-dawn session in the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel. This behind-the-scenes shot, exclusive to Viva, shows why Campbell was chosen to embody the Yves Saint Laurent mix of elegance, freedom and subversion. She defines the anything but stuffy heritage brand as "kind of cool without trying too hard".
The description suits Campbell herself who, in a few years, has gone from being an art history graduate of London's Courtauld Institute to scoring three Vogue Italia covers in 2013 and the title model of the year at the British Fashion Awards. Along the way she has been a favoured Chanel model, chopped off her long blonde hair in favour of a black rock'n'roll shag and picked up a stack of lucrative contracts.
It began in 2009, when Campbell was spotted by Lucinda Chambers and shot by Mario Testino for a British Vogue feature on bright young things. With a mother, Sophie Hicks, who was once a British Vogue fashion editor, Campbell is well connected. She is as passionate about horseriding as she is about fashion and says her all-time favourite fragrance is the smell of horses and cut grass. Campbell says she associates scent with friends and family. Here are a few more of her views:
