Armani Privé Ambre Soie (2004)
by Giorgio Armani

Herbal amber. Clove and cinnamon really comes out at first and gets to be ginger cedarwoods towards the end. The amber is just the stuff that binds all this together. Gourmandish and almost like a cinnamon and praline confectionery with cloves added.

I enjoy amber fragrances very much and to me, Ambre Soie is very different from any I've tried so far. On me, Ambre Soie starts off deliciously gourmand, with an almost boozy oatmeal cookie effect, complete with raisins, cinnamon and a hint of anise and clove. The spices in Ambre Soie are rendered so seemlessly, so dense and finely ground into a luxuriously silky "powder", that they create an indistinguishable mesh with the amber so as to make it impossible for me to discern one from the other. I received this during the whole discount store Armani Prive sale madness and for that reason, I occasionally overlook it, but it is really an incredibly gorgeous, luxuriously textured fragrance.

A rather sweet amber scent that strongly reminds me of Ambre Sultan but without the (sometimes annoying) herbal resinous undertones. It has pretty good longevity but fails to tackle the amber scent concept from a totally unique angle (which is, after all, what you’d expect for its hefty price tag).

There are currently many good amber scents on the market and I’m sure that one can be had for less than half the price of this.

[Original submission date: 10 April 2008]

Its a pretty nice sweet amber but there is a slight tart note maybe clove as another suggested that kinda kills it for me. I prefer SL Ambre Sultan though this isn't a bad amber.

Vegetal ambre, not sweet enough for my personal preference. (My favorite ambres are Ambre Extreme by L'Artisan and Ambre Precieux by Maitre Parfumeur Gantier.) This may be a better masculine ambre.

Armani Prive Ambre Soie

I have slowly but surely worked my way through all of the Armani Prive scents. I admire the intent to make high quality, read niche, scents under the Armani banner. On me for the most part they have been successful as I have enjoyed most of them. I have found all of them to be close wearing, long-lasting and well-constructed scents. Ambre Soie was the fourth of the Prives, created by Christine Nagel, in 2004. It definitely shares all of the genetics of its labelmates. At the top a stiff burst of ginger, clove and cinnamon start this with a spicy jolt. From there the amber begins to come in and of the three spices that start the scent only the cinnamon remains to combine really nicely with the amber. This is a sweet amber and in conjunction with the cinnamon it comes across as not too sweet and not as gourmand-like as some other ambers like Hermes Hermessence Ambre Narguile. As this moves into the base I get a nice bracing shot of cedar to add some clean lines to the amber and to finish things in a rousing style. Like all of the Prives there are better examples out there of the central note and style of these scents. Ambre Soie will not be my number one amber scent but it very likely will make my top 10.