According to Chanel, five bottles of number five are sold somewhere in the world every minute. Fitting since it's named after Coco Chanel's lucky number. The iconic designer came to Grass during its golden age, searching for the world's finest and most expensive perfume ingredients.But over the decades, farms began to shut down as the French Riviera became a luxe real estate market and cheaper flowers were grown abroad in places such as India and Egypt. >> Would Chanel number five really smell that differen ...

What has it been like to watch the decline here in Grasse. It's very sad. It was a pity to see this evolution, but we couldn't do anything about it.It's how it went. So, we had to hang in there for many years. Joseph Mul is the 87-year-old patriarch.How often are you in the fields. Every morning, 7:00 a. m.Is he still the boss. Yes. >> [laughter] >> He'll always be the boss.Joseph's daughter, Colette, runs the office. Her husband, Fabrice, oversees the fields. Who's done the most picking here.We all picked ...

This is the rose centifolia, nicknamed the May rose because it blooms in spring. Cultivated in row after pink row, it is a flower worthy of a serenade. >> [music] >> Piano notes play over speakers.Farmers say the vibrations help the buds [music] bloom evenly. 12 of these roses go into a bottle of Chanel No. 5.But the real star is this tiny white flower, jasmine. It opens at night and is harvested as the sun comes up. 1,000 jasmine flowers go into a bottle of No.5 giving it the floral scent that has sat on g ...

Starting at dawn when the jasmine flowers are at their most fragrant, each one is picked by hand, too delicate for machines. The harvest ends before the midday heat can damage the petals, which are kept covered in wet cloth to stay cool. Workers line up to weigh what they've picked.4,000 jasmine flowers equal just 1 lb. The blooms are then rushed to an on-site factory where their fragrance is extracted using a 150-year-old technique developed in Grasse. You have to work really fast.>> Yes. Because what happ ...