Bleu de Chanel L'Exclusif

What the house declares

Chanel puts sandalwood “in majesty”: it brings depth and intensity. The leathery, resinous notes of cistus labdanum give the fragrance its mysterious character, and woody ambery notes bring contrast and vibrancy. The house does not divide these materials into top, heart and base.

The listed materials

Wikiparfum lists the same materials: cistus labdanum, a woody amber accord, leather and sandalwood. It classifies the fragrance among aromatic fougères with a leather facet, while the house calls it woody ambery-aromatic; the family adopted here is the house’s.

A darker sandalwood

Olivier Polge wanted to make the sandalwood, usually a creamy material, darker and smokier. Chanel adds that the woody notes, the signature of the line, are accentuated here and give the fragrance a warm dimension, which the leathery and ambery notes make more mysterious.

What the label declares

The house’s ingredient list names many natural oils. Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes, a synthetic woody material, comes right after the fragrance, ahead of linalyl acetate, bergamot oil (Citrus aurantium bergamia), Virginia cedar (Juniperus virginiana) and patchouli (Pogostemon cablin).

Sandalwood appears twice, as santalol and as Santalum album oil. The list also declares lavender (Lavandula), peppermint (Mentha piperita), lemon (Citrus limon), bitter orange peel and orange blossom (Citrus aurantium), geranium (Pelargonium graveolens), jasmine and rose.

Vanillin and coumarin round out the base. Three colorants, a violet, a red and a yellow, tint the fragrance, and butyl methoxydibenzoylmethane, a UV filter, protects it from light.