The Tamesis
Diesel’s creative director Glenn Martens is obsessed with objects. His Fall/Winter 2026 show featured 50,000 memorabilia items from the brand’s shows, parties, window displays, events and offices. His show invitations are often made from Murano glass from the brand’s native Veneto region, fashioned into butt plugs or bananas. Now, the brand has added another special item to the mix – a bottle designed to resemble a pierced orchid for its new women’s fragrance “Only Desire”, which will be launched online and in Diesel stores worldwide this month.
Sandrine Groslier, global president of L’Oréal Group’s luxury fragrance brands, said: “Diesel is a business worth around $1 billion in the fashion industry. This means that the potential for fragrance is huge and we want to seize it.” fashion business Only. “We hope the fragrance will have broad appeal and appeal to many women.”
At L’Oréal, fragrance continues to thrive. In its first-quarter 2026 financial report, the company’s Luxe division, which consists of luxury skin care, cosmetics and fragrance brands, grew 5.6% year-on-year. “Fragrance remains a prominent growth engine,” the organization noted.
And there is still potential for growth. Although already weak or oversaturated, the fragrance category is still expected to grow 8.1% to $94 billion by 2027, according to Euromonitor.
It has been 15 years since Diesel and Loverdose launched a mass-market women’s fragrance in 2011. The fragrance was subsequently launched in three different versions, but its popularity has not continued since then. But with the help of its licensor L’Oréal, the brand hopes to tap the potential of this growing category. The brand’s previous women’s fragrances, such as Loverdose, D and Fuel For Life, are still sold on Diesel’s website, but within the broader business they have lost steam.
Since Rosso founded Diesel in 1978, the brand’s brand spirit has been to attract a wider range of consumers at accessible prices. In the 1990s and 2000s, the brand entered the high-end market with denim products, but by the 2010s, Diesel lost its luster and women’s fragrances also declined.
Since Martens took over Diesel in 2020, the focus has been on what he calls “alternative luxury”, with a strong premium positioning in the market and priced under £3,000. Only Desire is priced at €75 for a 30ml bottle – strategically aimed at broadening appeal as the brand revives its fragrance business. “What we see today is that fragrances under €100 are really the fastest growing category,” says Groslier.
