Paradigme is the masculine fragrance Prada draws from Paradoxe in 2025. Marie Salamagne, Bruno Jovanovic and Nicolas Bonneville compose it in reverse: the house announces the base first — Peru balsam, benzoin, guaiac wood — before a heart of double geranium and a top of Calabrian bergamot heightened with musk.
Calabrian bergamot and musks occupy the top, and Prada presents them last: in its inverted pyramid, they are what lights up the whole once the base is in place. The citrus note is bright, the musk airy rather than animalic; neither seeks to last.
The heart carries a double geranium extract, Bourbon and rose-scented. The ordinary geranium of masculine perfumery is green, minty, somewhat metallic; by doubling the raw material and emphasizing the rosy facet, Prada draws from it a full-fledged floral note. It is the tipping point of the fragrance, and the one on which opinions diverge.
The base brings together three balsamic notes that move in the same direction. Peru balsam is vanillic and smoky, benzoin resinous and sweet, guaiac wood dry and almost tarry. Together they form the warm foundation that the house announces first, and which holds the sillage well after the bergamote has faded.