By Grace Kim

The single signature scent has stopped standing alone. Five perfumers and executives interviewed for the original report agree: consumers now build fragrance wardrobes, not one-bottle identities.

Francis Kurkdjian, perfumer and artistic director of Maison Francis Kurkdjian, said he never believed in the model. "People cannot be summed up in one scent, as everyone's personality evolves throughout life," he said. Note what he did not say. He offered no sales figures, no portfolio numbers, no timeline. The claim rests on intuition.

What is a fragrance wardrobe?

It is a collection of scents mixed, matched and worn by mood or routine. Erwan Raguenes, a perfumer for dsm-firmenich, puts it plainly: "Think of it like a clothing wardrobe, where you choose different scents depending on how want to feel or express yourself that day."

Walter Johnsen, vice president of product development for Interparfums, extends the analogy. "You probably wouldn't wear the same outfit to the gym, a wedding, the office and a beach vacation," he said. One scent for work, another for evenings, one for summer, one for winter. That is the claim. Nobody quantified the average number of bottles per consumer.

Size is not the point, cautions Nina Blazevski, fragrance development manager at Maesa and Being Frenshe. "The goal isn't to collect the most fragrances. It's to curate a few scents that feel authentic to you and fit naturally into your life," she said. A wardrobe can be small. The industry benefits either way.

Who drives the shift?

Olivia Jan, senior perfumer for Givaudan, dates the momentum to Gen Z shoppers who treat fragrance as daily self-expression rather than fixed identity. The shift is no longer generational, she said. Consumers of all ages now build wardrobes for occasions, moods, seasons and times of day.

Blazevski names the mechanism. "Social media has also made fragrance more accessible and given consumers a stronger understanding of notes, families and layering," she said. Jan agrees. Social media encourages "discovery, experimentation and conversations about fragrance that weren't happening at the same scale a decade ago."

Johnsen pushes back on the death narrative. He calls this an expansion, not a shift. "I don't think signature scents disappear. Most people still have one fragrance they instinctively reach for—the one that feels like home," he said. "The difference is that today, it shares shelf space with several others rather than standing alone." The skeptic's read: the signature scent survives, but the industry now sells you five bottles instead of one.

What does layering mean now?

The term has changed. Layering once meant matching products within one collection — shower gel, body cream, perfume from the same line, Johnsen said. Consumers now use it to describe wearing different perfumes together to create a unique scent.

Jan calls layering one of the biggest trends today. "It reflects a broader desire for personalization and allows people to tailor their scent experience in the same way they curate the rest of their beauty and wellness rituals," she said. Adjustable intensity, adjustable longevity, adjustable expression.

Kurkdjian designs his fragrances to stand alone. He still permits the practice. "It's not up to me to judge how people should wear them; it's about everyone's freedom to experiment with scents," he said.

Is fragrance now wellness?

The identity function has widened into emotional function. "Today we express our personalities differently than we did 10 or more years ago," Kurkdjian said. "Perfume still expresses our identity, but we are now comfortable showing different facets of the same identity."

Jan frames the stakes for perfumers. "People aren't just choosing scents based on how they want to smell; they're choosing them based on how they want to feel," she said. Fragrance now serves emotional expression, not only personal style.

Johnsen closes with the industry's anchor claim — and its hedge. "At the end of the day, consumers don't buy trends—they buy emotions. They buy memories, confidence, aspiration, comfort and joy," he said. The methods of discovery will keep changing, he said. The emotional motive stays constant. If he is right, the wardrobe trend will deepen: same emotions, more bottles.