YSL Y Elixir (1/3) · Brotherhood Of Scent

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YSL Y Elixir (1/3)

After yesterday’s failed attempt with BDC EDP, I thought I’d go with a DNA I can trust, so today I wore Y Elixir.

The fragrance is pretty simple: lavender, geranium, frankincense and oud. In the opening I got lavender and geranium, a classic Y-style opening but much more simplified. It smells amazing, very much like Y EDP with less sweetness and a touch more class. The opening is very soapy, almost like a body wash. After around 10–15 minutes the resinous sweetness of frankincense started to come through, along with a somewhat pronounced “oud.” I don’t know if it’s just me, but the more it dried down the more of a caramel popcorn-like smell appeared.

On their website YSL describes it as:

“Y L’Elixir, a highly enigmatic, intensely rich fragrance for men. Clean lavender, fresh geranium, leathery oud.”

In reality, the profile feels like a mature, deeper take on EDP, but then Le Parfum and EDP intense already exist. This one doesn’t bring anything unique to the line. It feels a bit left out, similar to SWY Parfum. The oud, which is meant to be the headline note here, is just alright. It doesn’t last as long as the florals and aromatics, and it doesn’t smell much like oud at all but more like a generic woody scent. Definitely not the high-quality oud they advertised. Overall, the profile is disappointing for something carrying the “elixir” name, especially from one of the top three best-selling designer lines.

I thought maybe the performance would make up for it, but boy was i wrong. It projected for about 2 hours, and by hour 5 or 6 it was a skin scent. Yes, a 6-hour elixir. For context, my Y EDP lasts 6 hours now only because I stored it incorrectly, otherwise it used to push 8.

But hey the price wouldn’t be that bad then, right? £130 for 60 ml 😐. Yikes. For that money I could get a 200 ml bottle of Y EDP at retail.

Overall, it’s a disaster from YSL. A forgettable release with disappointing performance and an unjustified price tag. I’d rate it 6.5/10. Only a very small percentage of people would pick this over EDP, Le Parfum, or EDP Intense.

Tomorrow I’ll be trying Dylan Blue. Hopefully my streak of disappointing fragrances doesn’t carry over.

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