diff --git a/requests/models.py b/requests/models.py
index 245521dc..aaa50632 100644
--- a/requests/models.py
+++ b/requests/models.py
@@ -338,9 +338,9 @@ class PreparedRequest(RequestEncodingMixin, RequestHooksMixin):
         #: as this will include the bytestring indicator (b'')
         #: on python 3.x.
         #: https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests/pull/2238
-        try:
+        if isinstance(url, bytes):
             url = url.decode('utf8')
-        except AttributeError:
+        else:
             url = unicode(url) if is_py2 else str(url)
 
         # Don't do any URL preparation for non-HTTP schemes like `mailto`,
diff --git a/test_requests.py b/test_requests.py
index 8864b2d1..0d93893b 100755
--- a/test_requests.py
+++ b/test_requests.py
@@ -1507,5 +1507,13 @@ def test_prepared_request_complete_copy():
     )
     assert_copy(p, p.copy())
 
+def test_prepare_unicode_url():
+    p = PreparedRequest()
+    p.prepare(
+        method='GET',
+        url=u('http://www.example.com/üniçø∂é')
+    )
+    assert_copy(p, p.copy())
+
 if __name__ == '__main__':
     unittest.main()