Learn Hardcore French: Marie préfère les jeans bleu foncé, mais son frère aime les couleurs plus claires. - Marie prefers dark blue jeans, but her brother likes lighter colors.

In French, with verbs of preference like préférer, aimer, adorer, détester, you normally use the definite article (le, la, les) to talk about what someone likes in general.

Marie préfère les jeans bleu foncé.
→ She generally prefers dark blue jeans as a category.

If you said:

Marie préfère des jeans bleu foncé.
This would sound like she prefers some dark blue jeans (in a specific context, among different choices), not jeans in general.

You also cannot drop the article the way English can:

❌ Marie préfère jeans bleu foncé.

So les jeans is the natural, general statement in French here.

Why is jeans plural in French? Can it be singular?

Yes, French has both a singular and a plural:

un jean = one pair of jeans
des jeans / les jeans = several pairs of jeans

In writing, the usual singular is un jean (without s), and the plural is des jeans (with s).

So in the sentence:

les jeans bleu foncé = dark blue jeans (in general, several pairs or the type in general)

Why is it bleu foncé and not bleus foncés to match les jeans?

This is a classic color-adjective trap.

General rule:

A simple color adjective agrees:
- un pantalon bleu, des pantalons bleus
- une robe verte, des robes vertes

But when the color is expressed with two words forming one color idea, like bleu foncé (dark blue), French school grammar usually treats it as invariable:

des jeans bleu foncé
des chemises vert clair
des yeux bleu pâle

So in the sentence, we keep bleu foncé the same for singular/plural and masculine/feminine.

(You might sometimes see people write bleus foncés in real life, but the standard rule taught to learners is: compound color adjectives like bleu foncé stay invariable.)

Why do bleu and foncé come after les jeans?

In French, most adjectives of color go after the noun:

une chemise bleue
un pantalon noir
des jeans bleu foncé

Only a limited set of very common adjectives (like grand, petit, beau, vieux, bon, mauvais, nouveau) usually go before the noun. Color adjectives are not in that group, so they follow the noun.

So:

✅ les jeans bleu foncé
❌ les bleu foncé jeans (this is English word order)

What is the nuance between préfère and aime here?

Both verbs can express liking, but the nuance is:

préférer = to prefer → expresses a choice/comparison between options.
aimer = to like / to love → expresses liking, without necessarily comparing.

In the sentence:

Marie préfère les jeans bleu foncé
→ Among possible jeans, she chooses dark blue ones.
son frère aime les couleurs plus claires
→ He likes lighter colors; it does not directly say he’s comparing them to something else, just that he likes them.

You could say Marie aime les jeans bleu foncé (she likes them), but préfère clearly puts her preference in contrast with someone else’s choice (her brother’s).

Why is there an accent change in préfère (é → è)?

The verb is préférer in the infinitive, but its stem vowel changes in many forms:

Infinitive: préférer
1st person singular: je préfère
3rd person singular: il/elle préfère

Pattern (present tense):

je préfère
tu préfères
il / elle / on préfère
nous préférons
vous préférez
ils / elles préfèrent

The accent changes from é to è in some forms to keep the same vowel sound in pronunciation. This is a regular pattern for verbs like préférer, espérer, etc.

Why is it son frère and not sa frère, since Marie is female?

In French, possessive adjectives (mon, ma, mes, ton, ta, tes, son, sa, ses) agree with the thing possessed, not with the person who owns it.

frère is masculine singular, so we must use son, regardless of whether the owner is male or female.

Examples:

Marie et son frère (Marie and her brother)
Marie et sa sœur (Marie and her sister)
Paul et son frère (Paul and his brother)

So son frère here means her brother, not his brother; context (we just mentioned Marie) tells us that.

Why is it les couleurs plus claires and not des couleurs plus claires?

Both are grammatically possible, but the nuance is:

les couleurs plus claires → lighter colors in general, as a type
des couleurs plus claires → some lighter colors (more specific, in a given set or context)

Because this sentence talks about what he likes in general, the definite article les is more natural:

Il aime les couleurs plus claires.
→ He likes lighter colors (as a general preference).

This is the same rule as with les jeans after aimer/préférer.

Why does claires end with -es?

Claires is an adjective describing couleurs:

couleur is feminine: une couleur
couleurs here is plural

So claire must agree in gender and number with couleurs:

Singular feminine: une couleur claire
Plural feminine: des couleurs claires

In the sentence we add plus (more), but the agreement stays the same:

les couleurs plus claires
- couleurs → feminine plural
- claires → feminine plural form

How is the comparative formed in plus claires?

French uses this pattern for the comparative of adjectives:

plus + adjective = more + adjective

So:

claire = light (in color)
plus claire = lighter
plus claires = lighter (for a feminine plural noun like couleurs)

To compare explicitly, you can add que (than):

des couleurs plus claires que ça = lighter colors than that

In our sentence, the comparison is implied (lighter than dark blue), but que is not needed because the contrast with Marie’s taste gives the context.

What is the difference between bleu foncé and plus claires? Both seem to deal with color.

They both describe color, but in different ways:

bleu foncé = dark blue
- bleu = blue
- foncé = dark (when used with colors)
  Together they name a specific shade, treated as one color expression.
plus claires = lighter
- clair(e) = light (for color)
- plus clair(e) = lighter
  It doesn’t name a specific color; it gives a degree of lightness for any color.

So:

Marie likes a specific shade: dark blue jeans.
Her brother likes lighter colors in general (any hue, as long as it’s on the lighter side).

Why is there a comma before mais, and what does mais do?

Mais means but and introduces a contrast:

Marie préfère les jeans bleu foncé, mais son frère aime les couleurs plus claires.
→ Two opposing preferences are being contrasted.

In French, you usually put a comma before mais when it links two clauses that could stand alone:

Je viens, mais je serai en retard.
Il veut sortir, mais il est fatigué.

So the comma before mais in this sentence is normal punctuation and works much like in English.