Reviews of Ambre Canelle (1949)
by Creed

Ambergris with a little bit of civet. Very strange. Very strong. More of an oriental barbershop than true ambergris. "Canelle" in Frehnch means "groove".

Smells purely like strong, old-fashioned, yellowish soap, which I've learned is because soap is (or was?) often scented with ambergris. A comfort scent, not of the usual gourmandy variety, but because it's evocative of a musty old house, perhaps one inhabited by a distant, elderly relative with interesting stories to tell. If you bathed there as a kid your skin would smell like this, and you would feel not quite clean but more imbued with the mysterious atmosphere of the place...

This is definitely in the line of Creed's miscreant scents - the black sheep, the ones that don't want to play by the rules, don't want to stay all nice and dressed up, minding their manners at the formal family luncheons held in the great dining hall of the Creed family mansion. In this group of misfits you've got: the festive lumberjack Baie de Genievre; the second cousin that lives in a cabin in the woods, Cypres Musc; the cousin that no one leaves alone with the children, Orange Spice; the straight-talking old codger Santal Imperial; the loopy young cousin Chèvrefeuille Original; and our current preoccupation, Ambre Canelle. Of these deviants, Ambre Canelle is the weird uncle. He's formal alright. He dresses up well, but there's just something a little "off" about him. He talks about government conspiracies and alien abductions. He brings his own utensils to dinner. He doesn't even seem to realize that other people try to avoid conversation with him, and then smile knowingly at each other when he suddenly stops a rant, makes a quick turn left, and walks away as if directed by voices they cannot hear.

There is stuff going on in Ambre Canelle that is interesting, amusing, and eccentric, but not altogether pleasant, and not something you'd want to have as your companion for any length of time, or in particularly sensitive situations, where your pride and reputation are on the line. I, like ipaid, get lots of jasmine - very indolic - with a massive whop of amber. But here the amber is drier than it normally seems. The overall effect is a dry, powerful, eccentric, sillage monster. Interesting, but odd.