The clearest example#
Bleu de Chanel arrived in 2010 and effectively started the entire blue fragrance category. It’s still a benchmark and it goes anywhere — office, dinner, a wedding, a Tuesday.
The EDP and the Parfum are smoother. They also project less and cost more. The newest L’Exclusif is good in cold weather and hard to find. The EDT — the cheapest and oldest of them — does the most work.
Same story at YSL. MYSLF gets criticised because the flankers all smell nearly identical, and the sensible response isn’t to compare them for an hour. Buy the EDP and stop.
What a “blue” fragrance is#
Worth naming, since half the market now sits in this category.
Fresh, aromatic, sometimes faintly aquatic, and built for mass appeal. The point of the category is that you can wear it to work and then on a date without changing. That’s the whole proposition, and it’s a good one.
The dependable ones:
- Bleu de Chanel EDT — the original and still the reference.
- Versace Dylan Blue — incense and citrus. It didn’t start the movement, it finished it.
- Prada Luna Rossa — clean, modern, slightly metallic. The Carbon flanker reads like Dior Sauvage but easier to be around.
- Y by YSL — apple, sage, amber. Refined and extremely popular.
- Burberry Hero — woody and simple across all five in the line, and the darker end gets richer.
Popular is not the same as complimented#
Here’s the uncomfortable one. Y is among the best-selling men’s fragrances in the world, and it’s entirely possible to wear it for years without a single person asking what it is.
That’s not a criticism of the fragrance. It’s a warning about the metric. Best-selling means lots of people bought it, which means lots of people are already wearing it, which is precisely why nobody notices yours. If you want to be asked, popularity is the wrong signal to follow.
The scent people actually stop you about tends to be Terre d’Hermès — considered a masterpiece within a year of release, and the fragrance that revived the Hermès perfume house and made Jean-Claude Ellena’s name. It has an oddity to it; some people get a rotten-orange note and can’t unsmell it. Most don’t, and it’s the closest thing on this list to a signature scent nobody else in the room is wearing.
Buy blind or test first#
Almost everything above is safe to order without smelling. Crowd-pleasers are crowd-pleasers precisely because they don’t surprise anyone.
The exception is anything built to divide opinion. The purple Uomo Born in Roma flanker from Valentino is heavy and light at once, lavender and coconut together, creamy and tropical and strange. Get your nose on it first. Not because it’s bad — because it’s the kind of thing you either want immediately or never.
Pick by use, not by ranking#
- Buying for someone who isn’t into fragrance: Chanel Allure Homme Sport Eau Extrême. Four seasons, no learning curve.
- A signature nobody else has: Terre d’Hermès.
- Summer: Luna Rossa, the original.
- Getting dressed up: Dior Homme, specifically the 2020 version — the house keeps reshuffling it.
- Going out: Versace Eros Energy, sprayed generously.
A few small things to try:
- Check whether the version you’re about to buy is genuinely better or just dearer.
- If you’ve never been asked about your fragrance, consider that it might be too popular rather than too weak.
- Buy one bottle outside the blue family this year.
- Ignore flanker comparisons. Pick the one most people rate and move on.
