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Coty Ambre Antique
Suzanne’s Perfume Journal

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A Conversation on Arabie

A More Affordable Olfactionary

Amouage Dia (pour femme)

Amouage Epic Woman

Amouage Gold

Amouage Jubilation 25

Amouage Lyric Woman

Amouage Tribute

Amouage Ubar

Aroma M Geisha Rouge

Ava Luxe Café Noir

Best of 2009

Bond No. 9 Brooklyn

Bond No. 9 New Haarlem

Capote, Truman & Evening in Paris

Caron French Cancan

Caron Parfum Sacre

Caron Tabac Blond

Caron Tubereuse

Caron Yatagan

Chanel 31 Rue Cambon

Chanel Bel Respiro

Chanel Chance

Chanel Coromandel

Chanel Egoiste

Chanel No. 5 (vintage)

Chanel No. 22

Chantilly Dusting Powder

Comme des Garcons LUXE Champaca

Comme des Garcons Series 7 Sweet Nomad Tea

Coty Ambre Antique

Coty Chypre

Creed Acqua Fiorentina

Creed Fleurs de Bulgarie

DSH Perfumes Quinacridone Violet

Deneuve

Donna Karan Black Cashmere

Estee Lauder Private Collection

Estee Lauder Private Collection Jasmine White Moss

Favorite Fall Fragrances

Fragrances for Sweden

Frederic Malle Angeliques Sous La Pluie

Frederic Malle Bigarade Concentrée

Frederic Malle Carnal Flower

Frederic Malle Geranium Pour Monsieur

Frederic Malle Le Parfum de Therese

Frederic Malle Lipstick Rose

Frederic Malle Une Fleur de Cassie

Frederic Malle Une Rose

Geoffrey Beene Grey Flannel

Gucci L'Arte di Gucci

Guerlain Jicky

Guerlain Parure

Guerlain Vega

Happy Solstice

Hermes 24, Faubourg

Hermes Caleche (vintage)

Hermes Eau des Merveilles

Hermes Hiris

Histoires de Parfums 1740

Histoires de Parfums 1828

Histoires de Parfums Blanc Violette

Histoires de Parfums Vert Pivoine

How I Store Decants

In Memory (w/mention of Lanvin Arpege)

Jean Desprez Bal a Versailles

Jean Patou 1000

Juliet by Juliet Stewart

Kenzo Jungle l’Elephant

L'Artisan Parfumeur Nuit de Tubereuse

L'Artisan Parfumeur Orchidee Blanche

L’Artisan Parfumeur Passage d’Enfer

L’Artisan Parfumeur Tea for Two

La Via del Profumo Balsamo Della Mecca

Le Labo Patchouli 24

Little Lists

Lorenzo Villoresi Yerbamate

Maitre Parfumeur et Gantier Eau des Iles

Message In A Bottle 

Miscellany 

Molinard Habanita

Mona Di Orio Nuit Noire

Montale Black Aoud

Montale Boise Vanille

Montale Intense Tiare

Montale Patchouli Leaves

More Roses (rose cookie recipe)

My Heart Has Skipped A Beat (summer smells)

My Perfumes Have Theme Songs

Nasomatto China White

Olivier Durbano Black Tourmaline

Ormonde Jayne Frangipani

Ormonde Jayne Perfumery Ormonde Woman

Oscar de la Renta Oscar for Men

Parfum d'Empire 3 Fleurs

Parfumerie Generale Bois de Copaiba

Parfums de Nicolai Sacrebleu

Parfums DelRae Amoureuse

Parfums Karl Lagerfeld Sun Moon Stars

Pascal Morabito Or Black 

Perfume Quotes - The English Patient

Profumum Roma Acqua Viva

Profumum Roma D'Ambrosia

Puredistance I

Recipe for Socca

Robert Piguet Fracas

Robert Piguet Visa

Sarah Horowitz Parfums' Joy Comes From Within & Beauty Comes From Within

Scented Reading

Scentuous Reading: One Hundred Years of Solitude

Serge Lutens Arabie

Serge Lutens Chêne

Serge Lutens Chergui

Serge Lutens Five O’Clock Au Gingembre

Serge Lutens Miel de Bois

Serge Lutens Tubereuse Criminelle

Serge Lutens Un Lys

Snow Days

Sonoma Scent Studio Incense Pure

Sonoma Scent Studio Jour Ensoleille

S-Perfume 100% Love {More}

Sweden Is For Lovers

T is for Taxes

Tauer Perfumes: Incense Extrême, Incense Rosé, Lonestar Memories, & Reverie au Jardin

Tauer Perfumes Vetiver Dance

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

The Intimacy of Scent

Thoughts of a Perfume Collector

Tightly

Unlocking an Unknown: Webber Parfum 6T

Vero Profumo Kiki, Onda, and Rubj

Viktor & Rolfe Flowerbomb

What I’m Lovin’ Now

Yves Saint Laurent Nu

COTY AMBRE ANTIQUE AND A PRIZE DRAWING

My perfume collection is small by the standards of most perfume aficionados, but one of my pride-and-joy purchases is the vintage bottle of Coty Ambre Antique I acquired last year.  Created by perfume pioneer François Coty in 1905 (or 1910, by some accounts), this fragrance has become, true to its name, an antique.  Finding a bottle is extremely difficult at best, even on Ebay, where one can often find a pricey vintage bottle of the equally sought-after Coty Chypre, but rarely the vintage Ambre Antique.  You are more likely to find one of the limited-edition reproduction bottles of Ambre Antique done in 1995, under the license of Coty, by a company called Private Perfumery, which produced 3,500 Lalique-designed flacons of the fragrance that were then sold at the exclusive Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman department stores.  And if you’re fortunate enough to procure one of those reproductions, you’ll likely have to shell out several hundred dollars.  By comparison, my vintage bottle was a steal.

There is not a lot of research or information available on Ambre Antique, at least not on the Internet, and I have had to make a point of studying photos of other vintage Coty bottles to determine the time period for my bottle.  I believe my bottle to be from the 1940s, and quite possibly earlier, as it is similar in style to some Coty bottles that were produced around 1935.  Considering that the fragrance I have is at least 60 years old, it is in remarkable condition.  While it doesn’t seem to have much in the way of top notes, it is every bit of what its name implies: a true, deep-bottomed amber.  When I first began wearing it, I was mostly attuned to its vanilla-y aspect: it reminds me of the golden French Vanilla ice cream that my mother used to serve at formal dinners.  Over time, as my nose has grown more adept at picking out perfume notes, I now detect a pitchy aspect to the scent—and by pitchy, I mean a dark, coniferous note (like pine pitch) which lends the fragrance more complexity than I originally perceived.  This is not to say that Ambre Antique is a complex scent—it isn’t—but neither is it as simple as I originally thought.

Finding a list of perfume notes for Ambre Antique is no easy feat either.  Reading from Luca Turin’s esteemed Dutftnote blog that ran from 2005-2006, he stated under a posting titled “The Ultimate Minimalist Fragrance” that “perfumers understandably take pride in achieving wonderful effects with as few materials as possible: for example, Coty’s Ambre Antique contained only four (natural) materials and smelled great.”  However, Turin doesn’t state what those four materials were, and it’s not clear where he got his information.  One of the blog’s commenters, a person named Octavian who also seems very knowledgeable about historic perfumes and perfume chemistry, lists the notes for Ambre Antique as
bergamot, jasmine, iris, methyl ionone, opopanax, labdanum, olibanum, patchouli, heliotropine, vanilla, vanilline, civet and ambreine.  I find this a believable list of notes: opoponax (also known as “sweet myrrh”) and patchouli both have an herbaceous quality and, combined with the sharpness of civet, could result in the resinous pitch note that I smell.

One of the things I like to do with Ambre Antique is to layer it with Serge Lutens Un Lys, which would probably strike some as being unbearably sweet—and upon the first ten minutes of application, it is.  However, as the two scents begin their drydown together, the Ambre Antique provides a deeper, darker base for the latter scent, and it’s a combination that works well on “scent-eating” skin like mine, where longevity tends to be a challenge with delicate scents like Un Lys.

Now!  I would like to make it possible for a lucky someone to try Coty Ambre Antique.  As a thank-you to my readers, I will be holding drawings from time to time.  This week I will be giving away a 1 ml sample of Coty Ambre Antique—along with a carded sample of L’Artisan Parfumeur’s Amber Extreme, a modern amber scent, for comparison.  To enter, drop an email to me at suz@eiderdownpress.com saying you’d like to be in drawing.  The drawing will close at midnight on Sunday, January 13th, and the winner will be announced (and contacted) early next week.  Drawing now closed.

Image: my own photo.

Posted by Suzanne Keller, 1/8/2008.