Paco Rabanne’s rebrand kicks off with a new name and makeup line drop

For many, when you think of Paco Rabanne, you think of the cult-fave perfume line. So it makes sense that as the entire brand gets an upheaval, the decision to move forward further into the beauty industry has followed. The Spanish fashion house has dropped its first name and picked up a bunch of marketing tools. 

It’s quite a controversial move, seeing as the label was known as Paco Rabanne since its inception in 1966 by Francisco Rabeneda Cuervo. It was only this February of 2023 that the designer Paco Rabanne passed, and the house’s Instagram account said, “We are grateful to Monsieur Rabanne for establishing our avant-garde heritage and defining a future of limitless possibilities.” He stepped back from design in 1999, and the brand found more commercial success in its Lady Million perfume which remains a best seller.

Now going by the name of Rabanne alone, a press release states that the decision was to make the brand “simplified and more international in spirit, the name change to Rabanne represents a pivotal moment for the Maison as it celebrates a decade of remarkable growth.” It’s not the first brand to drop one of its names, however, with Christian Dior changing to Dior, and Yves Saint Laurent to Saint Laurent in 2002. It feels like an industry-wide move in which houses have shifted toward a more minimalist approach over the years, but parts of this are now being turned over, so Rabanne is slightly late to the stripped-back party.

The beauty line will undoubtedly bring the Space Age flair the label does so well to the industry. The appointed makeup artist Diane Kendal (who also works as the creative director of Zara’s beauty sector) has been announced as the global beauty creative director – an entirely new role created just for her. The label will be rebranded to merge fashion and beauty under one vision, with an additional visual identity and logo. Rabanne will now be written in a minimalist style lowercase typesetting and will be rolled out over the next 12 months. 

The new monogram and typography design will draw from its first-ever fragrance, Calandre, launched in 1969. Currently owned by the Spanish luxury Puig, the new makeup line will be launched this September. This beauty venture is following a trend that seems to be spreading in the fashion industry, in which beauty is being adopted by bigger houses. Dries Van Noten and Stella McCartney launched their own beauty lines last year, with a more affordable price tag to open the consumption to a wider range of consumers.