Top 5 Autumn Fragrances for Men

In a country like Bangladesh, there's either blistering heat or pouring rain. As for any other season, it's a hit or miss. Autumn or late autumn brings a romantic feel in the air, just like spring. When the leaves turn yellow and red, it's neither too hot nor too cold. On days like these, some of us want to curl up and read or watch something. Some of us may like to go out on long romantic walks, or just chill with friends with a cup of hot chocolate at your favourite coffee parlour. Many of us would still have to venture out to do our daily tasks or fulfil social duties. For either occasion, a spray of your favourite perfume would take you a long way. However, there are no "best" fragrances. What works for me, may not work for you, so take this list with a pinch of salt.
 

Here are some perfumes for men for the year 2022:

Burberry London

London for Men by Burberry is spicy tobacco, boozy, woody fragrance that is perfect for autumn and winter. A few years ago, I caught the scent floating in the air in a classroom on a rainy evening, and it smelled majestic. Although I owned the scent myself, smelling it on another was way better. The cinnamon and pine-cone smell in the fragrance makes it feel like Christmas in a bottle. The perfume also has a pipe tobacco note, but the spices in the fragrances make it smell more like port wine or spiced rum, although it has no boozy notes listed in the perfume. The leather in the fragrances makes it more rounded without making it leather heavy.
Launched in 2006, the perfumer behind this masterpiece is Antoine Maisondieu. For such a relatively affordable fragrance that smells expensive, this easy-to-please scent is a safe blind buy.

Dolce & Gabbana The One

Dolce & Gabbana The One EDT for Men was also launched in 2006, created by master-perfumer Olivier Polge, currently the in-house perfumer of Chanel, who took the helm as the head perfumer after the retirement of his father, Jacques Polge.

The One EDT is a perfect date-night and office scent. It projects for 3-4 hours and does not last longer than 6-7 hours, but I think it serves the purposes for exactly what it sets out to do.

Not too overpowering for a spicy-oriental fragrance, this smells like rich tobacco and woods. Ginger and cardamom are the main players in this fragrance. If we had cigar clubs here, this would go well with the setting of smoky walls, and leather chairs, while pairing a good Cuban with a single-malt smoky Islay scotch. Between the EDT and EDP versions of this fragrance, the latter is more rounded and lasts longer, but I like the unique rugged-yet-classy feel of The One EDT. Masculine yet unisex, this is a great scent to cuddle with your loved one. You will thank me later.

Dior Homme

If you are feeling metrosexual, Dior Homme by Dior is your poison. Puns aside, Dior Homme was launched in 2011, created by master perfumer Francois Demachy, and it has since gotten many more flankers, namely the Intense and the Parfum versions.

While many of you might want to try those out or even the Sport or L'eau flankers, I find the OG does it for me. Iris-heavy, this straight-up smells like lipstick or my mom's vanity bag. Imagine if your romantic partner plants a kiss on your shirt. If that had a smell, it would smell like this! Unlike the others mentioned above, this has great projection and longevity. This floral musky scent is more unisex than masculine, especially due to the lipstick smell. This is a white shirt scent for me when I am feeling a little down or insecure and need to play dress-up to pull myself up. Not for everyone, and not a safe blind buy whatsoever. Please note that I have not sniffed the recent Dior Homme Original or Dior Homme 2020 yet so, I cannot vouch for those. I love to wear it on Fall weekends when I hang out with my friends at a club or a café.

Encre Noire A L'Extreme

Encre Noire A L'Extreme by Lalique is a smoky woody fragrance that was launched in 2015. Created by Nathalie Lorson, this is a classic woody masterpiece. An easy crowd-pleaser and an easy blind-buy, this has cypress, vetiver, incense, and sandalwood as its main notes, giving it a warm, creamy, woody, smoky complex scent perfect for autumn evenings and on special occasions. This too is a relatively affordable fragrance but one that smells rich and luxurious.

To me, this smells like a carpentry shop where carpenters have been sawing Canadian oak to build furniture. One can wear this with a suit and tie but also casually, with jeans and t-shirt. Because of its price point, it can be daily office wear or to classes in university in cooler autumn months or in monsoon and winter. It is a flanker of Encre Noire, which is also a very unique dark and mysterious fragrance. One can also try Encre Noire Sport, which is usually my summer go-to for office and casual wear.
Ladies, a great gift to get for your partner!

Pure Malt/Pure Havane

Pure Havane and Pure Malt by Thierry Mugler are flankers of the original A*Men or Angel Men. I find these to be better than the original as they are relatively easier to wear and crowd pleasers, but you will not be another Dior Sauvage or Bleu De Chanel or Acqua Di Gio or One Million-wearing person, lost in the crowd. These are very unique and you probably will not find any other fragrances that smell like these.

Keeping up with the theme for our autumn/fall list, these two are also sweet, spicy, fruity, and woody fragrances, except one, smells boozy, while the other of tobacco. As the name suggests, Pure Malt smells of a heavily peated smoky single malt scotch with peat, malt, and whiskey as its notes other than vanilla, coffee, and cedar. Pure Havane is a tribute to Cuban cigars, which has honey, tobacco, vanilla, and cacao, among others in their notes. Both can be worn interchangeably in the autumn or winter months.

One should go easy on the sprayer as both are quite potent as their predecessor. Pure Malt is hard to find these days, but Pure Havane is still widely available. These are casual wear scents but you will not be reaching for them quite often for their lack of wearability. So, decants are the way to go rather than getting full bottles, as it should be the case for all of them, before purchasing the full bottle. Pure Havane was released in 2011 and created by Jacques Huclier, while Pure Malt came out in 2009. A bar, café, or restaurant would be an ideal setting to wear these.

Honourable mentions 

Viktor & Rolf Spicebomb

Spicebomb by Viktor & Rolf is exactly what the name (and the bottle) suggests — a grenade of spices. Launched in 2012 and created by maestro Olivier Polge, this has cinnamon, pink pepper, saffron, and paprika listed among the number of spices used but when you smell it, you might get more spices such as nutmeg and cardamom, and other garam masalas. Despite being a "spicebomb" it is actually a cold-spicy fragrance, apparently due to the pink pepper.

I have a reformulated bottle that I got way back in 2016 which was allegedly milder, so I can imagine what the original formulation might have been. Nowadays, many prefer Spicebomb Extreme which has more tobacco and leather, which are somewhat muted in the original despite being listed as base notes. A similar scent to this is One Million Privé. The best time to wear Spicebomb would be a rainy or cold evening when you are out with your friends. I think it is a bit casual for dates or formal gatherings.

La Nuit de l'Homme

La Nuit de l'Homme by Yves Saint Laurent is also a date-night fragrance like many of the ones as mentioned earlier. Although this has been ruined by reformulations over the years, the scent is still the same. The projection is weak, with a sillage for anything between 30 minutes to an hour, and it lasts for only about 3-4 hours or so. However, this is more of a stay-at-home scent to wear around your partner or right before a date.
Launched in 2009, Anne Flipo, Dominique Ropion, and Pierre Wargnye are the perfumers. If you want to smell good at home, for yourself, or your partner, this is a scent to go with. This is also a spicy woody scent with cardamom as the main player. This doesn't really deserve a spot in the list anymore because of the sillage and longevity, but it still has a sensual scent and this is more of a tribute and honourable mention to once-was of a great fragrance.

Aunik is a fragrance connoisseur and loves giving unsolicited compliments on perfumes, researching, and collecting perfumes. Ask him for perfume-related help or help him with fragrances at @aunikarnolddhali@gmail.com