Ambergris

Amber Absolute by Tom Ford 2007

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Post by Ainslie Walker

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I acquired today’s fragrance last week in the midst of my “whale excitement”, it has now become my “go to” fragrance of the month. Every time I wear it, there are positive comments. I find I get that with anything animalic, smoky or “mysterious”. It’s a fragrance many wouldn’t dare to buy off the shelf, as it may not seem instantly pretty, but once worn or smelt on someone else, the depths and layers come alive.

Amber Absolute by Tom Ford 2007

Amber Absolute Tom Ford FragranticaPhoto Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these featured accords in one line:
Amber, incense, vanilla, olibanum, labdanum, woody notes

As we would expect from Tom Ford, the box and the bottle is distinctive, mysterious and understated. It looks black, but held up to the light it’s actually a dark, dark amber colour. The label is gold-plated. I love holding the bottle in my hand. It’s cold, solid and sends a small shiver of excitement into me every time I pick it up.

Amber Absolute is delicious and sultry, warm and engulfing. In fact I would happily bathe in it! I love it as a winter scent. It makes me feel cosy, yet glamorous. There’s strength to it, akin to a sip of spiced rum. It’s a more old school kind of a smell, one of old wooden ships and incense…explorers on the high seas. It’s definitely unisex.

Amber Absolute Tom Ford schooner PixabayPhoto Stolen Pixabay

Amber Absolute makes a statement, whilst also crowd pleasing, with it’s coumarin and vanilla bean notes, though avoids becoming overpoweringly or generically sweet. I love that the notes remain savory, so to speak, and I think it’s amped up incense and old woody church/ship smell is behind this. It nods quite a lot to TF’s Sahara Noir…Olibanum/woods/balsamic…It’s this part that I think divides the love or hate for this fragrance. I don’t think many would remain on the fence about it. There’s dry salt air from go to whoa. It’s robust and full, a little goes a long way. During the dry down (8 hours or more, later) it gets a more leathery and animalic then tapers to sweet, powdery and a little smoky-vanilla. There’s treemoss and oakmoss, but not enough for it to stand out too much, just enough to let the other ingredients ride on their back.

Amber Absolute Tom Ford Humpback Whales National Marine Sanctuary FlickrPhoto Stolen Flickr

It’s good, really good. It’s not really doing anything too new, but doing it really well. That ‘niche’ colliding with ‘mainstream’ thing that TF does so well. That “smells expensive” thing he also always seems to nail. Marketed as the strongest, most concentrated amber, I rule out real ambergris is in the ingredients list, but it is an ‘amber’, that plays with the elements of raw ambergris.

Further reading: Bois de Jasmin and Olfactoria’s Travels

A little ode to Ambergris:
“It’s hard not to fall in love with ambergris. Here is a solid lump of whale feces, weathered down—oxidized by salt water, degraded by sunlight, and eroded by waves — from the tarry mass to something that smells, depending on the piece and whom you’re talking to, like musk, violets, fresh-hewn wood, tobacco, dirt, Brazil nut, fern-copse, damp woods, new-mown hay, seaweed in the sun, the wood of old churches, or pretty much any other sweet-but-earthy scent”

Floating Gold Christopher Kemp BookDepositoryChristopher Kemp’s Floating Gold: A Natural (and Unnatural) History of Ambergris $22 delivered from BookDepository

Sadly Amber Absolute has been pulled off the shelf and discontinued…the TF house says, fragrances, like fashion, (and whales) have their seasons…

Ainslie xx
http://www.ainsliewalker.com

A Whale of A Week!

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Post by Ainslie Walker

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It’s whale-watching season here in Sydney. As they migrate past the Harbour, people line the shore to catch a glimpse. I visited the cliffs at the entrance to Sydney Harbour last week and saw some. Amazing creatures, and a very Sydney experience.

Whale_watching Australia WikipediaPhoto Stolen Wikipedia

A Whale of A Week!

Also last week, I was lucky enough to smell a lump of ambergris. Ambergris is fecal matter (TURD) from sperm whales. It takes many years to form, lining the intestinal wall of the whale to protect it from the beaks of the squid it dines on. Debate surrounds how it is released from the whale -some say it’s vomit, some say it comes out the other end. Scientists say whale fecal matter is only fluids, so now it is believed the ambergris is only released when the animal dies, breaks down, or even explodes!! Lumps have been found from 15g to 420kg. The price for naturally found ambergris is extremely high, the odds of finding it, extremely small. Many countries ban the trade of ambergris as part of the ban on the hunting of whales- Australia of course is very strict-none is coming in and none is getting out!

Amber/Ambergris is a somewhat mysterious perfume ingredient. Is it a resin from a tree or is it really whale’s vomit/poop that’s been washed ashore? Is it a man made accord? I am curiously confused, and have had to investigate.

Ambergris ainslie

The word ‘amber’ was adopted into the English language in the 14th Century and referred to ‘grey amber’, now known as ‘ambergris’ (ambre gris). ‘Amber’ (Baltic/white/yellow amber) is fossilised tree resin, considered a gemstone, and appreciated for its colour and beauty since the stone ages. The term ‘amber’ was used to describe this substance in the early 15th century and was used more and more as ambergris use declined. Yellow amber and ambergris are both found washed up on beaches – ambergris floats, however, amber is too dense to float.

Ambergris is waxy, solid and flammable, and usually grey or black. When fresh it has a strong fecal odour. As it ages and oxidises, floating out to sea. I experienced a salty-fresh, dry marine blast, like sea rockpools, with animalic and fecal notes, something also very deep and earthy from the “lumps”. I then smelt from a bottle of ambergris tincture. It instantly reminded me of “Isocol” –isopropanol/rubbing alcohol, benzoin- but much deeper, earthy, smooth, cool and kind of ear-waxy,… still marine, dry, animalic and slightly fecal.

Isocol ainslie

Ambergris’ main use in perfumery is as a ‘fixative’ – allowing the elusive perfume notes, and especially quick evaporating top notes, to linger longer.
Nowadays, it is uncommon for large product houses to use real ambergris in perfumes. (Hermes and Creed claim they still do). Synthetics became available in the 20th century that are cheaper and easier to acquire. Perfumers now make “amber accords” from combinations of vanillin (synthetic vanilla), labdanum, benzoin and styrax (liquid-amber tree resin).
In perfumery, ‘amber’ describes a warm, powdery, sweet and mysterious base note. Classed as ‘oriental perfumes’ in English, and in French, “parfums ambres”. Shalimar is the best example of this sweetened genre, a more bold take is Serge Luten’s Ambre Sultan with its bay leaf twist.

Ainslie Walker x

 

Further reading and exhibitions:
Book: Christopher Kemp’s Floating Gold: A Natural (and Unnatural) History of Ambergris

Here’s a link to a (life size) whale photography exhibition currently on in Sydney. The exhibition is breathtaking, and really captures these incredible and rare creatures.

Side note: Dioressence was famous for using real ambergris in the past. Apparantly Hermes, Merveilles still contains it! Go have a smell!

Pheromones! AbdesSalaam Attar for La Via del Profumo

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Post by FeralJasmine

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APJ, I Believe in Pheromones!
In my remote youth there was a perfume called Pheromone. It was sold through little ads near the back of the Sunday paper magazine section, and it promised to make the wearer irresistible. It played heavily on the fact that most people had vaguely heard of pheromones but knew nothing about how they worked or even what they actually were. Some of the ad copy, as nearly as I can remember, indicated that the opposite sex would swarm around you without knowing why, and you would not be able to smell this elixir on yourself but you would know it was working because of the reactions of those around you. At first this sounded terribly appealing to a 13-year-old prone to a bit of puppy fat, but fortunately I had no checking account at the time, and when I eventually got one I had long since forgotten about Pheromone, which was probably distilled water and a little alcohol anyway.

Feromone pour Femme by La Via Del Profumo

Feromone pour Femme La Via del Profumo FragranticaPhoto Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica Gives these featured accords in one line:
Amber(gris), tuberose, civet, jasmine, vanilla

All those memories came back when I was browsing the website of La Via Del Profumo and came across Dubrana’s creation Feromone pour Femme. The website copy suggests that pheromones from animals may ” have been used by man since dawn of time for pharmaceutical purposes and to enhance one’s appeal and sexual energy.” Well, I don’t know about you, but my appeal can generally use a little enhancement these days, so I ordered a sample from Surrender to Chance.

The stated notes are genuine ambergris and civet, “perfected with a sensual accord of the perfumes of jasmine, tuberose, and vanilla.” I doubt that I have ever worn anything with authentic ambergris in it, so I put it on with happy anticipation.

Feromone pour Femme by La Via Del Profumo Lorando Labbe FlickrjpgPhoto Stolen Lorando Labbe Flickr

At first it seemed like a charming white floral, rounded out with some vanilla. The ingredients were clearly top-notch. I could detect the civet but it was subtle. I wasn’t able to detect ambergris as an individual note. I just noted that the florals seemed a little rounder and plusher than I had expected. After half an hour it was fading, which is short-lived even for an all-natural perfume, and I thought my curiosity about it had been satisfied. Nice, no big deal.

Then for the next ninety minutes or so, the scent played with me. It would reappear unexpectedly, then seem to be gone again. It would waft past my nose on a light breeze but seem absent from the wrist where I applied it. It would seem lean, then lush and even a little fatty. It was a will-o-the-wisp, leading me out into the unknown where I would drift around gradually losing my reason until I plunked down 212 American dollars for a 50ml bottle. If you think I would do that in my right mind, you don’t know how cheap I really am.

Feromone pour Femme by La Via Del Profumo Dove DeviantArtPhoto Stolen DeviantArt

Cautiously, I bought a tiny decant and sprayed it about a bit. Same experience. Now you smell it, now you don’t, and each time you catch a whiff it seems a tiny bit different. I’m fascinated. I don’t know if this is the effect of true ambergris. If I ever had a chance to talk to Dominique Dubrana, the perfumer/magician who made it, the only questions I would want answered are “Did I imagine all that? And if not, how the hell did you do it?”

I still don’t know if I will spring for a full bottle, but a larger decant is in my immediate future. This perfume perplexes me. I can’t figure it out. I want to keep trying. And please, somebody, tell me how sniffing solidified whale vomit (Ed: sorry FeralJasmine it comes from the other end) can pull me toward financial lunacy. It seems as blind and unreasoning as…well…love, I guess.

Feromone pour Femme by La Via Del Profumo Ambergris FragranticaPhoto & Following Info Fragrantica

WHITE/GREY Ambergris  
- Product which has a white or partly white coating and a light interior color. Normally pieces of this type are smaller in size (they have been in the ocean longer). The fragrance will have at least some sweetness
STANDARD Ambergris 
- This product is normally brown/grey or ash in color. It will have a good fragrance but still a little strong. Pieces can be larger. You can often notice some layers in the material.
LOW QUALITY Black Ambergris – This type can be very hard, firm or soft.
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I couldn’t find any other reviews sadly
La Via Del Profumo has €59/16ml and €161/50ml
I’ve ordered a tiny precious vial of pure ambergris tincture to investigate the ingredient on its own. I will keep thinking about it. Monsieur Dubrana, this thing isn’t over between us.

FeralJasmine x