By Man (1998)
by Dolce & Gabbana

Not your usual opening: pepper and a green nutmeg given a weird sort of buzz by hediones pretending to be jasmine… and yet it’s an enjoyable accord. Coming off the top notes to the heart notes, the lavender rather than the artemisia dominates the middle of the fragrance, which I find unfortunate. I was looking forward to the aromatic woodiness of artemisia and hoping it would overwhelm the lavender there… it didn’t. No wormwood, just lavender. I am forced to dismiss the middle accord. The base comes across weakly to me. I pick up leather and amber, and I might like it if I could smell it better… I can’t tell if the weakness is my problem or the fragance’s. I don’t get enough wood in the base to be sure that it’s there. In spite of my description, I think I will give this fragrance a bit of a break… It’s a skin scent that doesn’t happen to do anything for me, but I can recognize that it performs its skin-scent attributes quite well.

I’m not really a big fan of musk scents and By Man is no exception. Its longevity is okay but it tends to stay quite close to the skin. Also, the bottle is absolutely tacky – even if I loved this scent, there’s no way I would add a bottle like that to my fragrance collection.

[Original submission date: 30 October 2006]

BY Man is proof positive that designers can put out top-notch fragrances. Unfortunately it's also proof positive that unless a fragrance sells well, the quality is meaningless and it will be discontinued, it's fans relegated to praying the bottle they just spend $150 on eBay isn't a fake (as many are).

BY is a combo of spicy oriental with some fougere elements as well. There's lavender in there, but it's overlaid with sandalwood and amber with a blend of spices. The drydown isn't a traditional 'leather', but rather it's very 'leathery' in its texture. Sillage and longevity are superb. Whenever I wear BY I'm struck with how out of place it is amongst designer fragrances from the same time period. It's a shame that D&G's gamble didn't pay off.

The most economical way to sample BY is to purchase a mini. If you decide to go for a bottle be careful because even reputable sellers are being sold fakes. Remember, you get what you pay for and if a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is!

Now this here is a nice lavender type scent but it is a little on the musky side. To me, I smell musk, tea and lavender. Not a bad combo. The scent carries nicely and last for the whole day. Glad I have this one.

After all the praise from this site, I bought 100ml off ebay. Got it well at only $230au. Trully magnificent. However, Black Code is similar in one way. I think it's the guaic wood note that's present in both, and to me it stands out. But with the rest of it, it's abit of a maze and really seductive.
I'd buy this over Black Code if money wasn't an issue, but because of the price difference, i'll stick with black code once my 100ml runs out.

This is a sweet, powdery, spiced leather. Maybe let's say you're wearing a leather jacket and you've been baking cakes all day, this is how you'd smell. Something like that. I don't get all the "animal" and "sex" references, but honestly, I don't see any male fragrance as "sexy" anyway. I suppose that's due to my straightness.

Whatever, the point is that this not only smells great, but the sillage AND longevity are outstanding. I happen to be wearing this now and it's still detectable 14 hours later.

The serious downside to this is the price AND, even worse, the fact that you cannot get samples as far as I know.

Blind buying really is up to you, perhaps you can get a mini for a more reasonable price?