Hi there Perfume Posse. Ambre Gris was a sensation, then it was not. The over hype killed it because people were expecting it to be better than Serge. Which meant that for a long time it was readily available on the discount sites. I was sniffing around for a backup bottle and surprise, it’s sold out in quite a few places, and now most of the sample/decant sites are sold out too. As I wear it sometimes as a morning wake up scent I thought we should take a little trip down memory lane. Come with me….
Ambre Gris by Guillaume Flavigny for Balmain 2008
Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Myrrhe, benzoin, pink pepper, cinnamon
Heart: Immortelle, tuberose
Base: White musc, benzoin, amber, guaiac wood (tree of life)
I love the thick, salty resinous opening that reminds me of the smells in a dockyard after work has finished for the day or one of the beeswax based waxes I do my table with 4 times a year. It goes on rich and lightly fizzy and has a honeyed sweetness that I find quite enticing. Amber Gris is also quite waxy like a candle that you’ve just unwrapped. Maybe the scent left on your hands after unwrapping.
Here’s where Ambre Gris gets a bit tricky though, the flowers come in and there is a moment of jarring. Immortelle and resins playing bully boys for top position and the immortelle has that awkward unreal desiccated plastic smell in spades here. Backed by the oft plastic smelling tuberose and for a short while Ambre Gris does quite sail as smoothly as it should.
Once we get through we find sweet vanilla and salty skin over white musks that continues to hum away for me at a low level for hours.It’s like the perfect meld of Ambergris the whale discharge and Amber the sweet resinous foody accord.
Very wearable and a perfect office scent. I find Ambre Gris good as a wake up and focus fragrance, that weirdness really snaps me out of whatever funk I’m in too. By the time it’s over my mind is alert and ready for action. The fragrance has by then become comfortable and while being very nice it is something I can have floating under my radar yet wafting softly to all around. Nice. There’s quite a bit of air in my 100mls so I must like it a lot.
Further reading PerfumeSmellingThings and TheNonBlonde
Parfum1 has $27/40ml
Posh Peasant has samples starting at $2/ml
Did you ever get caught up in the whirlwind of a fragrances hype? Which one?
Portia xx
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