Peruvian Ambrette

This is a top 5 player in the men's fragrance landscape of the 2010 decade. I agree with previous comments that it plays in the top league and it is crazy that it is discontinued and not more hunted by frag fans... Who usually like oud fragrances will love this fragrance I totally get why ambrette seed oil is used as a substitute for animal musk, and there's an oud ghost in this perfume. I find some similarity with the drydown of LM Black Oud. In spite of those qualities, this is the only frag of the Zegna Essenze line that on top of being discontinued (together with Haitian Vetiver), has a lot of leftover stock (unlike Haitian Vetiver) and is thus now hard discounted (now ~$50 online instead of ~$160 originally for 2.5oz), the reason why I could afford it. Get it while you can! This fragrance is a real gem. Especially at the current price. (That said, performance is below average (moderate/soft projection, 4 hours total longevity), and should have been better for a fragrance initially priced at $160...). I currently have 30-ish perfumes, and I can tell you that this one has entered my top 3 at the first spray. I love it! 30+, formal office meetings and nights out, fall/winter PS: this frag is discontinued, check "Strength" of the new Elements of Man line that unites musk with an oud background! Edit: I now own 200+ fragrances, and can tell you that this one is still in my top 10%.

Oh lordy this is nice! The opening is such a powdery, musky, amber which is so smooth and warm it really does envelop the senses telling you that this is a real special piece of work. PA has a wonderfully natural amber and not an overly musky ambrette accord because as it settles down it becomes all about precious woods. I'm pretty sure I detect oud in here but nothing like the Indonesian Oud in the same Zegna collection, this is a smooth subtle wood. That combination of lightly spicy cashmere and darker Guaiac wood give Peruvian Ambrette a sublime drydown quite like a creamy sandalwood vibe, not dissimilar to Armani Prive Oud Royal. So....a stunning woody scent to add to an already excellent line from Zegna. Truly, these fragrances cover every olfactory angle and do so with a simplicity and remarkable clarity. I think £108 (although still expensive) is quite good value for 125ml's of impressive fragrance. Longevity and performance are good but it's not the strongest juice in the world the drydown stayed close to my skin giving me a warm, woodsy glow. I love this...Will definitely consider adding it to my collection.

I am currently using my second bottle of this fragrance. It is a perfect office fragrance that has uniqueness and elegance. It is not complex nor evolve in such ways but well blended overall. Earthy, mineral like, clean musk, bitter, and smooth with iris. It actually has orris(iris root) in this and it is nothing like dior homme that has lipstick or makeup bag vibe, no! It helps the fragrance to be softer, enjoyable, and crowd pleaser. This is a perfect James Bond 007 type of a fragrance. Clean cut, expensive suit, masculine, gentleman over 35, mysterious, sexy! However, if you are heavily into complex amouage, zoologist, oud leather luxurious fragrances, you will find this one boring and linear. Lastly, performance was moderate on my first bottle but my current bottle is much better somehow. It lasts about 8 hours with 2 hours of solid projection.

Discontinued - fairly rare but you can still find on secondary market. Ambrette is a pricey material with very low oil yield. Cultivation in Peru is very small and considered to be top notch. Imagine this: you distilled alcohol from ambrette iris, and orris root (which is also incredibly expensive and takes 3 years to mature with specific harvest times), and you aged this ambrette iris/orris moonshine in guaiac barrels. Now pour this unsweetened brew over suede, and you have this stunner. This ambrette was extracted via solvents which means it doesn't carry a sweet or powdery nuances. It's boozy (like congac), earthy, nutty, medicinal and grainy. I think it's a reference fragrance for a top quality ambrette absolute. Incredible. ×××××××××××××××××××××××××× Scent 99/100 ××××××××××××××××××××××××××

in the opening i can smell very heavy ambrette. ambrette note is all over the juice then orris note is quickly coming up to make it moist/wet. i love this part. it's remind me Chanel N019 Poudre in dry down.very strong and long lasting woody note, even after shower, i can smell the woody note. sound like weird or too strong but actually not. it was composing with balance. the only wood base perfume i love the most in my entire collection. furthermore, it is because no civet and incense. (civet and incense are combining together will make the perfume too earthy, dirty and poopy vibe....and i hate poppy note)

Elegant fine suede, ambrette smoke, minerals, and a bit of spice. Iris just shows up later to soften things up, on a bed of sleek cashmere woods. It's a unique scent, that comes across as daring, artistic, and sophisticated. Like the rest of the Essenze line, Peruvian Ambrette is really well put together, well blended, and smooth. The suede and smoke combo is similar to the kind found in Resin Sacra. I love this one a lot more due to its darker undertones.

Peruvian Ambrette is a stunning fragrance! Zegna has to have this as one of their most underrated fragrances. Not many times in fragrances is ambrette such a focus as it is in this composition. A dry and arid feel of ambrette/guaiac wood/leather is presented, with a deep and dark complexity. My absolute favorite from the Essenze line. Layer this with Dior Homme Parfum and you will smell like the definition of a modern Casanova.

Peruvian Ambrette by Ermenegildo Zegna is very underrated fragrance from the Essenze Collection. This is very high quality ambrette seed fragrance with woody and orris root nuances.I also get some suede note as it was mentioned in the review below. Pretty good longevity with moderate projection. Too bad it wasn't a hit once it was released as it has been discontinued shortly after its launch.

A very nice fresh suede like fragrance with a unique musk and fresh earthy vibe. I got this at a amazing price and the quality is amazing ! This is for the 25 plus crowd, but is a very versatile and a mature sensual fragrance. A modern charmer this is without the sweetness or ambroxan other scents rely on. A masterpiece in my opinion 5 to 7 hours longevity, fair projection, good silage

To me, this is a mix of Armani/Prive Oud Royal and Dior Homme Intense. Seriously, picture those two together. You have smoky woods, spices, mixed with musk and thick orris root powder. Its divine. Very sexy, alluring yet professional, it dances between the dark and light...a true discontinued gem from Zegna. Essenze line is a true gem, trust me.

I can smell some similarity with dior oud ispahan but light n easy version. This perfume is of good quality and smells expensive anyway. The drydown is so comfortable n lasting 4-5 hours. Those who dont like this perfume probably are not familiar with oud. The real oud essence will cost you $2000 for just 5ml. And u may faint when u smell it.

It's goooooooooddddd!!!! Good good good gooooood!!!!.... I know, I know.... I'm not adding anything here (compared to my previous review) that can help anyone to understand this fragrance, but I had to externalize my feelings... Guys... $50/2.5oz online... rush while you can!! PS: have I forgotten to say that it smells soooo goooood?

Just tried a sample a nice SA gave me: It does have some resemblance to Acqua di Parma Oud with a strong leather note in the beginning. Good (not great) sillage and projection, I still can feel it after 8h, but a bit too close to skin.

Lovely woody perfume. Don’t notice any orris or suede. Very earthy and this makes one feels like being in the wilderness. Edit. After over an hour, orris showed up but not too prominent.

very cashmere forward, but has a spicy undertone (probably the pepper). super long lasting, so i find that, for this price, its quite a good deal for a european house. simply divine.

strong boozy wood in the opening, then its shift to delicate powdery musky scent in the middle, in the end i smell tiny spicy peppery and freshness

Very elegant and classy. I feel like I belong to some very exclusive group of people when I wear this fragrance!

It is a unique perfume, it has earthy woody smell in a mysterious way. I like to wear it with leather jacket.

The opening has Versace oud noir vibe, the dry down has a very nice suede feel. I love it!

Criminally underrated fragrance and I can see why, the opening is not the best in the world it is strong and medicinal boozy wood at the first spray and will knock your socks off but 5-10 minutes in it start opening up into an incredibly complex mix of "furry" textures that are woody, dry, spicy, clean, slightly vegetal and mildly animalic, sometimes "plastic", sometimes leather, sometimes buttery, kind of sexy and very dark and then leading to much cleaner soapy musk (and back again). An extremely complex scent when you bury your nose in that you will smell slightly differently each time but from a foot away it overall smells dry woods and light clean musk. This can be had from discounters currently for a mere fraction of what it once cost. If you like slightly more daring and complex very dark masculine scents, go pick a bottle up. If I had to pick something similar I have smelled myself I would say this smells like if a house like Prada decided to remix Amouage's Interlude Man, by taking some of the dry chocolaty incense out and introducing some clean musk.

To my nose, to put it simply, this is a niche version of Dior Homme/DHI. More specifically, it has the same vibe but higher quality ingredients. There is a leather/suede accord in this one that's not on the list of notes officially but many reviewers below smell it too. Unlike DHI, this one is more of a subtle scent that does not radiate and fills up the room but rather stays around you in 12"-24" bubble. Longevity is good and probably over in EDP territory. Really nice surprise from Zegna's Essenze collection that mostly contains freshies and this one was an odd ball and probably for that reason is discontinued. Still available at the time of this review. If you, like me, were looking for a niche version of DHI cause you found Dior a bit too pungent and designer-ish, do check this one out!!! Love the bottle too!

criminally underrated, such a beautiful smooth scent. opens up with this really great pepperiness that smells almost like a very clean oud accord--my mom mistook it for an oud scent actually. that peppery-top rests on a lovely musky bottom--but not musky like grandma musk--more of a dry, suedy-musk. its overall a dry, masculine scent that is a little to underwhelming in cold weather, but in early autumn it definitely shines. i like my cold weather scents a bit sweeter, heh. the accords seem to be misleading here, i get a definite suede throughout most of the life of the fragrance, some kind of peppery-oud accord (god knows) in the beginning, and a dry, smokey vetiver in the dry down.

Exotic, alluring, warm suede-like musk. Earthy and slightly sour but not in an off-putting way, although it’s surely not for everyone. One of the more unique executions of this genre I’ve stumbled on. It takes you to a far away place and is definitely worth trying.

It opens cold and dark, it reminds me of ink. Then it has a woody character with musky tones. Later in the base it's much softer, a soft powdery iris with a touch of sweetness, but still musky and woody. It also has a soft buttery leather quality. 7/10

Buy this now if you like it, it's being taken out of the line this year if not already, I confirmed that at a Zegna shop in December.

This is not to my liking. I have to assume that this is what Ambrette smells like...and if so, I do not like Ambrette. Opens dirty, earthy...possibly animatic. I get no similarity to Dior Homme (I love DH). No powdery goodness at all. The dry down bring nothing different except some wood mixed with Ambrette. Longevity is slightly above average...projection is average. There is no way I can recommend this. Gave my sample away to a friend. Huge pass in my book.

Opening is strong. It’s booze and wood. I wish I knew enough about alcohol to pinpoint which alcohol this smells like.

This one is heavy on the cashmeran. It starts out quite astringent and sour, which I'm not sure is caused by the ambrette or something else, but it's not the best opening if you ask me. It's woody, with some light smoky qualities, and perhaps a pinch of powderiness from the orris. The longer this sits on your skin, the better it gets, although only marginally so. It's not an animalic or hard scent to wear, but it can smell harsh and bitter at times. Almost as if there's some burnt plastic or leather accord. The sour aspect throws me off the most. It's just not pleasant. The cashmeran gives off this synthetic, woody quality which would perhaps be better suited if the blending was better. I also get an earthy aspect from time to time, as if I'm smelling patchouli, but it may as well be some type of musk or suede. All in all, I understand Zegna tried to do something else, but you will really have to like ambrette and/or cashmeran in order to appreciate this one. It's not unwearable, but some of its synthetic and sour components seem to be more of an acquired taste. 5/10

We are here to give our honest opinion about fragrances.no one can and should limit others(expert or beginners)opinions. Sometimes you should consider other reviews as a note for themselves...so you can easily pass and respect them,negative or positive which are rational. Amatuer or expert nose reviwers can easily chech-back their reviews after a while and see if anything changed about their nose and feelings about certain fragrances. So let's respect everyones opinion who really care about fragrances in this community. What you said is right in logic range and not in personal preferences.You can't like or love every fragrances which is something multifactorial and rooted in our childhood,places we were and many other factors.and not everyone can take fragrances as piece of Art so you can't expect everyone feel the same as you do.just respect to those and pass and try enjoying your journey into Fragrance world. Cheers.

Smelled it in Fenwicks aback of the usual rave and outpouring of voluptuous love and joy in virtually all the previous assessments and - flat. It just smells like dull, flat foggy air, misty air in a deep pine wood. Or on other tests (gave it 5 in total over monthly visits) a hospital-ward, that unnerving but clean yet ever so slightly medical/pungent smell. So disappointing. There's little to no sweetness, fruitiness, nor greeness, animalic-ness. It's like the mush of unsweetened baked-beans. Something is there but it's not properly tangible, and ever so slightly vegetal and pungent. Weird Niche strikes again. I was waiting for something to happen, some spice, some ambergris but - flatness. £110 per bottle(!) Cannot understand this, sorry. My rating: 2/10

As naturally occurring fragrance ingredients are becoming increasingly more common in modern day fragrances, perfumers a turning towards new synthetic or exotic organic substances to find a unique edge for perfume enthusiasts. This fragrance is one such attempt. According to Fragrantica. com 'Peruvian ambrette seed is obtained from very small yield of tiny seed by a multi-stage process, which makes it one of the most expensive and rarest ingredients in perfume industry`. To my nose this fragrance opens with a flowery slightly rose based opening and then gradually becomes a slightly darker musky base. It is definitely not a blind buy and a challenging fragrance for the those who dare to try new and exotic olfactory experiences.

Complex, medicinal, very dry and uber masculine. A beast mode fragrance for sure, it lasts forever and it projects like nothing I've ever wore before. Compliments galore every single time I wear it. After smelling the pure ambrette oil on its own I have to say the fragrance is true to the ingredient it highlights. The ambrette mixed with the oris and the smokiness of the guaiac wood is hypnotizing. You will not smell like everybody else, that is for sure. I heard Zegna relaunched this collection withou Peruvian Ambrette which I understand as it is not a commercial fragrance at all. Well, too bad. I need to get my hands on another bottle before it completely desapears from the market.

How this scent, given it's overall quality and performance has not been hunted down and hoarded by fans of masculine dry oud leather fragrances is quite a mystery. As Xerjoff Homme checks off all the boxes in almost all areas except price, Zegna Ambrette does much of what Xerjoff Homme does at an unbelievably low price. A steal in fact it must be said. There is nothing unisex about this scent. The opening reminding one of leather shoe polish leading into a balmy gasoline aroma for a brief time and ending in dry woodsy impression with a touch of sweetness deep down. If you like Xerjoff Homme or Knize 10, then this is right up your alley. Recommended for Winter and cool evening wear.

To echo Saeid Scent below" "We are here to give our honest opinion about fragrances.no one can and should limit others(expert or beginners)opinions. Sometimes you should consider other reviews as a note for themselves...so you can easily pass and respect them,negative or positive which are rationa" So true. Such a pity the second rate perfume hacks like Alfarom choose to ignore sage advice. As the saying goes " Luca Turin made Alfafom into a petrified speechless state when both met" . Then again Luca is a gentleman beyond compare as for Alfarom, an unknown hack in the fragrance world and easy to see why.

It's amazing how some folks get different interpretations. I hear warm and cozy and I'm like is this the same scent that I am sampling? It's starts off dark and cold with some dampness. Very strong sillage for the opening until the powdery dry down takes effect and mellows out the scent. I have a sample from Sephora and this is nowhere near long lasting. I would say 6 hours tops with average projection. I have not smelled anything like it but it's simply not my cup of tea.

Scented shoe polish that, depending on how it is picked up by the nose, deceives like leather and vice-versa. Don't get me wrong, it's a great construction, with quality ingredients and all this and thats, but the result is this: scented shoe polish. It is necessary to LOVE the smell of shoe polish so it comes to the point of wanting to flaunt it in the neck and arms. The potency is satisfactory.

jeffwithfrags, It's probably you. You are litterlly the only person who rates Zegna essenza frags has bad. I have just found another of your 'expert" reviews on Zegna. It's oke to have a different opinion but when it's 10:1 you must start asking yourself some questions. If it's 25:1 maybe you should consider a different hobby. If it's 100:1 than you can be sure to need a nose job.

Mellow, dull, but high quality musky iris. Which has some freshness with a toned down suede vibe which is very clean and pleasant but may seem a little flat. To some. It has an airy quality, a grey vibe, makes you feel like you're on the mountains, feeling the cool breeze. I can see people who love being minimal really enjoying this.

Wore it the other night. A friend asked "does anyone else smell hash?" haha, oh well, I love this stuff. The review below nailed how I find it too. Not too familiar with ambrette, but a dry pepper, suede-like musk and what seems like oud to me.

finaly i recived mine.. true @ mando like you said smell a bit closed to indonesia oud.. but for me on my skin its devlope 90% like amouage epic man in drydown i loved it.. problem here is longevity. silage good between 1 to 1.5 feet away..

Love at first sniff. Very dry, masculine and sexy. Amazing sillage and longevity. Two sprays are more than enough.

very smoky, Guaiac centered scent.