Maria Candida Gentile graduated in Pharmacy from the University of Florence in 1982, then took a diploma in perfumery from the High School of Perfumery in Grasse, in Provence, in 2001, studying in the ASFO laboratory in Grasse with Carol André. In 2002, she worked in the Aveda Research and Development Department and in 2003 became a Mâitre parfumeur, the first Italian from her school to win this accolade. She started creating perfumes in 2005 and in 2009 created her own line of six perfumes (it now numbers eighteen) using natural raw materials. In the same year, Michael Edwards included her line in the perfume bible Fragrances of the World. In 2010, the neuroscientist Luca Turin described her as the only nose with the ability to create perfumes with her heart, as the great French perfumiers used to do in the forties and fifties of the last century, comparing her to Jean Guerlain. In 2013, her perfume Lady Day won the Fifi Award in New York. In 2016, she received a nomination from UCLA in Los Angeles for her perfume Elephant and Roses.