Reviews of Douce Amère (2000)
by Serge Lutens Les Salons du Palais Royal Shiseido

“Sheldrake” and “transparent” probably don’t belong in the same sentence, but this could be the most transparent scent Christopher Sheldrake has done for the Serge Lutens line. The artemisia is crisp and clear, and its bitter edge stands as a perfect counterweight to the sweet florals and anise that share its space. Balance isn’t something I find often in the Lutens collection, so I’m very pleased to discover it here. Douce Amère is one of the few Serge Lutens fragrances that aren’t burdened by an enormous load of fruit syrup or other very sweet basenotes. This makes it an automatic object of interest to me, but I’m not sure it’s distinctive enough to be worth owning.

One of the best and gourmand oriental ever. On me, it's just divine.

Awesome oriental. Starts with a sweet, creamy fruity smell but before long a licorice / anise note that reminds me of Lolita Lempicka au Masculin takes over. Aside from both having anise, vanilla, and a fantasyland kinda vibe, LL and Douce Amere smell totally different; Lolita is more eccentric and in a way childlike with all its crazy off the wall green and boozy notes bouncing around. Douce Amere seems to me more sobre, mature and refined with its light woods and spices and a gentle sweetness that transports me to another world. The anise in Douce Amere isn't as over the top either, it has its say and then contentedly fades away into the heavenly vanilla cinnamon drydown. I love it and will probably save up for a bottle.

My favorite from the beige line. A mesmerizing composition that fluctuates between light and darkness . On my skin, like a diamond with intricate facets of gourmand and herbal notes. Powdery and strident;an enigmatic fragrance that draws me closer , taunting me with its beauty, but underneath a pentimento of a demonic, narcotic shadow. A ghost lover that I cannot live without

Today I went to the store intended to try the Serge Lutens perfumes. I tried pretty much, from Sa Majesté la Rose (too ladylike for me) to Daruta Noir (too sweet - syrupy and quite loud), from Fleurs d'Orange (nothing special to me) to Fleurs de Citronnier (the top notes smelled a lot like soap but the basenotes smelled nice), from Daim Blond to Cèdre and Ambre Sultan, I almost tried everything available there. I know that's too much to tried at once. The only thing really impressed me was this one, Douce Amere!
It's something sweet, warm and mysterious. Very interesting and sophisticated! I decided to purchased a bottle. I didn't remember reading a review about it, so as long as I got home, I searched about it and was really happy that it got good reviews :)

Very light for a Lutens. This wears easily and is mysterious and romantic.

Serge Lutens Douce Amere

Notes: Absinthe (Artemisia absinthum) , cinnamon, anise, lily, jasmine, tiare, tagette, marigold, musk, cedar (from luckyscent)

When I first tried Douce Amere months ago, I was expecting more of a spicy anise scent--even the notes would lead me to this expectation. So, when I didn't smell anise, I asked, "Where's the licorice they are talking about?" Finally, after several wearings, I realized that Douce Amere has a candy-like licorice top note that reminds me very much of black jelly beans. I happen to love black jelly beans as well as real black licorice, so the appeal of this fragrance is not lost on me. Underneath the licorice I smell vanilla and mixed soft woods.

In the middle part of the development, the licorice becomes more attenuated, less candy-like and more herbal. I understand the absinthe association more now--living wormwood foliage smells dusty, dry, herbal, medicinal, bitter, and only vaguely licorice-like. This is what I smell in Douce Amere, except that the absinthe is offset by sweet vanilla-like and coconut-like notes and some vague, unidentifiable florals. The woody note has become a bit more sharp at this stage. Although cedar is listed, it doesn't have the "cedar closet" or "hamster cage" type of cedar note. It is much more creamy, and mimics softer wood such as sandalwood.

In the drydown, vanilla, a tiny bit of licorice and mixed woods remain, continuing to give a sandalwood effect, which is sweet and only a tiny bit woody smelling to my nose. DA has a dusty and sweet powdery quality throughout the development, and overall is rather diffuse, especially toward the end. Other fragrances I would compare to DA are: Kenzo Amour, Kenzo Vintage Edition Peace (which is like Bulgari Black without the rubber), and most closely resembled by Keiko Mecheri Paname. All of these fragrances have a vanilla-powder sweetness with contextual variations, although Paname has a rather straightforward licorice note. DA is sweet, but the sweetness is offset by herbal pungency, resulting in an interesting twist on the oriental theme. I find Douce Amere to be more sophisticated than the comparison fragrances, but, in the grand scheme, it is not as sophisticated as other grand orientals such as Shalimar. I find the woody base notes to be very satisfying in Douce Amere, and for me, this is where many sweet/powder/vanilla/woody orientals fall short.

This fragrance starts with a wonderfully light anise note balanced against absinthe which gives it a magical gypsy charm. Light and minty with a strange twist of licorice makes this a charming fresh herbal and mysterious scent. However, as the fragrance dries down it goes through a complete change of character by the emergence of sweet cocoa warmth that moves up in the mid notes to neutralize the contrast of absinthe and anise and replace it with warm chocolatey anise mint accord. Yes, it is very much a Lolita Lempicka wanna be fragrance at this point - but ends up being a more subtle and complete chocolate/anise charmer than Lolita ever was. This fragrance starts out with mystery and contrasts and ends up completely blended into a snuggly licorice dust /chocolate warm comforting scent. A very sexy and mostly feminine fragrance but would be enjoyed by many men as well. I am tempted to buy a bottle for the lady in my life.

I may be way off here, but as a fan of gourmand fragrances, I don't find that Douce Amere is very 'gourmand', at least not in a traditional way (meaning, it doesn't smell like something you'd eat). Oddly, DA manages to be a fragrance of gourmand notes that ends up not being a gourmand. Regardless, DA is gorgeous and as of now it's my favorite Serge Lutens (having tried about half of them).

DA is driven by a contrasting accord of wormword/absinthe, anise, and vanilla. They are in perfect balance such that the vanilla never dominates or becomes too sweet. Cinnamon adds a touch of flair to the composition, and the strength of the wormwood makes it just sharp enough to keep it from being a gourmand (IMO). A cocoa note come into the picture deep into the heart and persists, adding a touch of sweetness to the base.

Though I like many SLs I've tried, I've only found a couple other to be worth owning... this is one I want to own.

There's a problem with Douce Amere in that it takes a full two hours to actually reveal the anise I was waiting for -- before that it had a sort of nutty, muddy aroma. Nice enough -- if you can wait!

Gah, the anise is a bit unnatural to me, almost... spacey and transdimensional. Maybe I'm used to heavier types of anise/licorice scents. Thankfully, it's rather tame, especially or a Lutens where everything else I've tried from them is heavy and syrupy. Overall, it's an oriental anisic woody fragrance. For a nice woody and sweet oriental fragrance from Lutens, I still prefer Cedre (which still ironically doesn't smell like cedar).

Initially its a blast of anise and some warm vanilla (I think). Afer a few minutes, the anise settles and takes a seat to the other accords. This juxtaposition of notes is quite enjoyable. I almost get a coconut note in the base, but I think its the blend of cinammon, vanilla, and anise. This is a great sweet scent for either gender.

Douce Amere sparkles from the moment the mist leaves the bottle and hits my wrist. This is a warm, almost nutty scent with a note that reminds me of the smell of fresh rye bread. Way into the drydown I get a kind of dry sawdust note (which is wonderful to me since I'm an artist and this is the familiar smell of my studio on occasion). There is also a note that reminds me of human sweat that I find very sensual. Through it all there is a cinnamon/nutmeg spiciness that makes this scent the perfect balance between masculine and feminine. I wasn't expecting to like this as much as I did when I ordered my first small sample (I have since ordered a larger decant), but I was hooked from the beginning. This is one of my top 4 Serge Lutens scents, along with MKK, Borneo 1834 and Un Lys. In my opinion Douce Amere is really underrated. Like its name implies, there is something beautifully melancholy and mysterious about this scent. I think it's a deceptively simple scent that wasn't meant to make a loud, assertive statement , but was meant to be quietly pondered. Definitely a romantic one in my book.

This has slowly become my favorite Serge Lutens scent. Douce Amere is sweet but it's not overly done like the other scents of the house. This one can actually be worn casually from day to day. The sweetness is counter balanced with the bitterness of the woody notes. While the sweet part is really smooth, the woodiness adds a bit of grit like a raw piece of bark. As others have mentioned, if you like Lolita Lempicka then this one's definitely worth a try.

I agree with what others have said below - it's very un-Lutens. At the same time, it's one of the more underrated gems from the house. An exercise in subtlety to prove that Sheldrake can do one, perhaps. It's kind of hard to put this one into a category, actually - for an oriental it has too little spice and amber, for a gourmand it's not that sweet, for a wood it feels too light. I get some floral in the drydown as well. The scent has okay sillage and decent longevity, but it comes and goes - you think it's gone, and then it returns to surprise you. Ethereal stuff.

Douce Amere is interesting, and I have to laugh at (and agree with ) VIBERT'S comment that "Sheldrake" and "transparent" don't belong in the same sentence...so true! For all the potentially heavy notes of milk and honey, musk, sandalwood, wormwood, cedarwood, vanilla - this one does possess a transparent personality! I find it to be gentle and bitter at the same time, and while others appreciate the balance here, it is a bit too woody for my personal taste. Douce Amere might please me more on a man...

After reading the reviews, my joy was beyond measurement when I ran into this Lutens shelf in Gum in Moscow. Alas... I can't figure out why people admiring this fragrance, to me it's a simple chocolate smell. I was going to buy it blindly, it was all there in the reviews, the comparisons to Lolita, the high reputation Lutens's fragrance gets among the members of basenotes, The matureness, the uniqueness... Well, forget the anise, Douce and Lolita has nothing in common beside being food-based-fragrance. And judging from the back of my hand, the dry down also isn't something to write home about. I know Koublai and I know Miel, which are, liking them or not, are at least fragrances that aren't like anything else, bold and uncompromising. After trying a number of this cool slim Lutens bottles my feeling is "don't believe the hype". From a niche perfumer I was hoping for more.

I like it, it would not be annoying for work. I work in a cube-farm where everything is scentless and grey. So (some) scents become amplified, cloying or embarrassing especially if some prissy uppper-manager goes by.

I smelled the anise on initial application, but that faded to more vanilla, cedar and chocolate. It seems discreet, sexy, something to please the personal wearer.
I don't know of any smell-alikes, but always like to know about them.

The first thing I smelled was the wormwood. What an intriguing note, at once bitter, aromatic, cold, and herbal. But then the sweetness began, giving a new direction to the fragrance… Not that I dislike this sweetening with anise—the anise is beautifully done, but I prefer that wormwood note and would rather have that one around a little longer. The anise in the opening of Douce Amère is kept at an intelligent and mature level of sweetness. It IS a bit similar to Lolita Lempicka, but Douce Amère is much more subtle, more refined, and easier to live with. The mid notes are an excellent accord of subdued cedar and wormwood with a touch of florals. This very good heart accord gradually develops a chocolate note—quite a refined and subtle chocolate that I wouldn’t call gourmand. The scent bases out with an excellent vanilla, musk, and cedar drydown. I hardly ever put “excellent” and “vanilla” together, but in Douce Amère, the vanilla is rich, refined, and its sweetness is deemphasized—it’s a vanilla I can love. Douce Amère is a sweet fragrance, but I don’t find the sweetness excessive. And I don’t really think of it as a gourmand even though it is creamy sweet and has a chocolate note. Everything about it tells me that I should love it, but I don’t. I actually find it a bit unsatisfying to me. It seems to be a little guilty of what we often accuse the designer fragrances of being—staying too safe. Douce Amère, to me, lacks an identity; it just doesn’t go far enough in any direction. I feel the wormwood should have kept a stronger presence to increase the contrast and add a little darkness, and the beautiful anise accord should have been a bit more exotically, nichely presented by counterpointing it to a more aggressive wormwood. I like Douce Amère very much—it’s an excellent fragrance and I’m pleased to give it a thumbs up—but, in judging it by niche standards, it’s too safe. I want more edge, more singularity in fragrances I spend my niche money on—there are a lot of “pretty” fragrances out there.

Wow...

When I first tested this I liked it. Now that I own it I absolutely love it. Being that is' from Lutens, it had great staying power. However it is an oriental gourmand. It is so unique yet so utterly delicious. I only wish that it had strong sillage because others should be able to enjoy smelling this absolutely wonderful scent. Perfect for a night out or a dinner date.

This beautiful scent has a cousin in the Malle scent Musc Ravageur. Both are for adults, both need a commitment. One cannot be ambivilant about the anise and enjoy wearing this. The drydown is beautiful as day becomes evening I don't worry about the scent mutation to chocolat and vanilla, it lingers, changes becoming darker, sexier , still retaining the absinthe. I would be interested in finding out if it's primarily brunettes who enjoy this, doesn't strike me a blond's scent, the reponse to it from workmates (not all men) is very positive. But I wear this for me.

Sigh. I have tried to like Serge Lutens fragrances. Who am I not to like a sophisticated, complex, carefully-composed fragrance by a giant name in the fragrance industry? But everyone I have tried--Un Lys, Chypre Rouge, Daim Blond, Miel du Bois, has an unpleasant component along the line. And I'm picky about fragrance--I want to love every moment, from the spill of scent when I open the bottle, to faint sniff left on my wrist when I slide into bed. And Douce Amere doesn't work that way. The opening is quite sweet--which I'd expect from something called "SweetBitter" (Douce Amere) Anise is bold; I'm not a licorice fan. Then comes, chocolate. Clearly, absolutely cholocate. I'm not a fan of food scents. Love chocolate, but passed the time in my life where I wear what I eat.
After the anise and chocolate dies down, a strong, sweet and spicy and lovely scent remains. Good for winter--on someone else.

The comparisons with Lolita Lempicka are justified - both have strong anise components - but I vastly prefer Douce Amere. It's not as sickly as Lolita and the creamy base adds complexity. I still think Douce is too sweet to wear, though.

After so many disappointments with gourmand scents (A*Men, HM, Rochas Man, New Harleem…), I was about to completely give up hope of finding one that I really loved. Then I came across Douce Amere and was completely blown away.

Douce Amere is a very creamy scent, which disguises itself as a gourmand when (in fact) it’s an oriental. I don’t think Douce Amere consists of chocolate notes but it definitely smells chocolaty, but without being so overwhelming (which is probably why I hated the ‘true’ gourmand scents, I previously mentioned).

With other notes such as vanilla, cinnamon and anise this is an utterly beautiful creation. If you don’t mind smelling like a sweet and creamy dessert then this should be right up your alley.

It’s definitely in my personal SL top 5.

I agree that Douce Amere is a relative of Lolita Lempicka, which I own. However, I found it very sharp on the drydown, with a little too much aldehyde. Though I found this quite interesting and very classy, I prefer the softer Lolita.

I loved Douce Amère from our first encounter. Anise is not even a note that I'm especially fond of, but this scent has made me love it. Its strangeness is partly what makes it so compelling; the sweet anise against the dry herbal astringency of wormwood in the top notes, resting sweetly on a bed of cedar, vanilla and spice.

A Lolita for grownups. This scent is sexy and mysterious and one that I reserve for the times when I want to wear something sexy. Anise is the prominent note and it also has a strong, powdery chocolate note. Absolutely outstanding scent.

This is my absolute number 1 favorite (so far it's the third one I've tested) of the SL collection. The anise is very strong at first but it turns into a scent both sweet and spicy. It's not like anything I've ever worn before. I get a lot of compliments when I wear it.

Smells nearly identical to Keiko Mecheri's "Paname" which I LOVE (it is in my fragrance top 5) but already own.

I would've eaten my wrist if I hadn't known any better! I think of cream filled pastries or a creme liqueur when I smell this, and there's definitely NOTHING wrong at all with that! My very first Lutens I've tested...this may be dangerous, because it has definitely piqued my curiosity with the rest of their offerings. Daim Blond?...Chergui?...OH BOY, I'm in TROUBLE!

Douce Amere is a very nice Oriental with the traditional Lutens touch. I always associate ‘purple’ with this fragrance. Douce Amere is a very mysterious and pretty thick. Anise and powdery coco take center stage in this blend. My only complain is that it’s a lot sweeter than it is bitter. Other than that, this is what Lolita Lempicka for men would be like if Serge Lutens re-did it.

Definitely distinctive. The absinthe in the fragrance adds a mysterious element that isn't common in many scents. It begins with a strong candy-like element, but quickly dies down to a mellower, more complex blend. Everyone who has smelled it loves it, but it wears incredibly close to the skin on me. For the price, a tad bit more sillage and lasting power might be nice.

Beautiful Anise based fragrance with a smattering of spices and a touch of vanilla. Absolutely Unisex!! A favorite on both myself and my hubby!