Amarige

(Review of an original formulation from 1994) How can you not like Amarige? Honestly? Sure, understandably it might not be your bag - but free yourself into liking something you may never have a desire to encounter again! It’s a liberation like very, very few, and very conducive to this big, wide, weird world of perfumery. Although, I suspect many are smelling/rating a reformulation that occurred in the early 2000s, and indeed modern formulations of Amarige are a mess. I have a couple big bottles from the original formulation even though I rarely wear them, but when I do I call back to a word I only just used: liberating. The character of Amarige smells like an aloof and carefree, joyous liberation from all constraints and stresses. Yes, there is a lot of overlap with Carnal Flower. Ropion and Malle seemed to have no compunction in releasing a very close facsimile of Amarige, but the key to Carnal Flower is tempered opulence and luxury, and careful attention to details as Ropion frequently displays superb mastery of. Amarige couldn’t care less about luxury or detail. In fact, its character seems to suggest that such things are distractions and weights to a true joie de vivre. So, don’t buy into most of what the echo chamber is selling (unless your nose cannot tell a difference); as an owner and longtime devotee of original formulations of Amarige and Carnal Flower I can say with strong conviction that they are sufficiently different. You get a sense of Amarige’s larger than life personality immediately upon the opening with its massive dose of lactones. Ripe and fleshy peaches scream yellow sunshine and sticky juices running down your chin. A watery and sour plum pairs alongside, accented by honeyed orange blossoms and violets. The fruity florals in combination with quick and sparkling aldehydes create a sensation that is so bright it is nearly hesperidic - and certainly blinding. But be of no doubt that the star of Amarige will launch itself into the air nearly as immediately: that big, green, heady, sharp, sweet, and almost violently happy tuberose. Every time I smell it I feel happy to the point of laughter and tears. It’s just such an outrageous character! Its emotionally-impossible-to-contain aromas are matched only by the force and speed with which it projects and sillages into the air. If you cannot walk with a big grin on your face today, do not wear Amarige; a dour look plus the way you would smell would make sense to no one who will be smelling you from many feet away. The floral heart layer shows more of a restrained character than the opening, but it’s the difference between a toddler screaming while laughing versus a toddler running around while laughing. While the tuberose settles in to its character, a citrusy green jasmine helps to keep the edginess while ylang-ylang does a significant amount of heavy lifting with its creamy, custardy, and tropical aromas. I should make note at this point, since I haven’t already, that Amarige is sweet, but it’s not sickly, syrupy, cloyingly sweet, rather a naturalistic very floral honey, pollen-like, and fruit-sugars sweet. It’s addictive - like we’re told sugar is, under today’s modern medical science knowledge, and count me hooked. The final dry down is a focus on musky, creamy, and floral sandalwood, the musks trying for a bit of white soapiness as well, and a good dose of earthy and vanillic tonka. Here is where we get the Ropion (most of us) know and understand as he achieves an impeccable balance and attention to detail without losing any of the puerile energy of the preceding layers. The base and skin scent take the volume and energy down another notch, but it is still far from quiet or docile. The sweetness keeps the activity level high while the sandalwood rattles and hums its vibrant, creamy, floral, woody character with the musks. Now for an admission, and no secret to those who have read my reviews of tuberose perfumes before: I’m a sucker for them. I have a bias. I cannot help it. What pushes me over the edge into dislike territory are sickly sweet qualities, lumpen density and lack of breathability, lifeless and deadpan deliveries, and too many gaps in the general accords or specific notes of an aroma chem in an attempt to be cheap with the formula and to not fill in those needy spaces with smart material choices. Amarige doesn’t strike out on any of those counts. Today is the day that I want to finalize my thoughts and my review on Amarige because I am in an elated mood, it’s a gorgeous summer day, and it just seems like a great moment to wear Amarige. I find myself beaming and gleaming right along with the perfume, and I’m just as happy as it is to be alive.

This is a perfume that I have come back to again and again and I had to acclimatize my nose to it again, but Amarige is really quite lovely and ultra feminine. So iconic and unmistakable, too. I have always loved it since my mom used to wear this back in the mid to late 1990's, along with Organza. I remember even stealing both perfumes from her from time to time to wear as a little girl! Such memories 🥰 Amarige makes me super happy when I smell it and it makes me think of both sunshine and the spring. It must be the ylang ylang and mimosa giving it that yellow floral burst of happiness! This perfume is equally white floral too and I can smell the bright orange blossom, creamy gardenia, sexy tuberose, indolic jasmine and very luscious and sweet black locust. For me, the black locust and the tuberose are really the stars here. The Brazilian Rosewood and the peach, plum, berries and violet are also prominent in this fragrance but never make the white and yellow florals take a back seat. It's very juicy, lush and sweet from the fruit and the rosewood gives it some character. The violet and the musk in this gives it that old world powderiness that is very nostalgic and pleasant smelling. I can smell the soft sandalwood in the background too but this isn't an overly woody perfume. It kind of smells like Amarige could be a white flower tree like a black locust tree that's heavy in beautiful white black locust flowers that are heavy in pollen and the bees are pollinating it and making honey from it. The tree is ripe as are the flowers and fruit nearby it. A beautiful young woman in a long diaphanous white wedding gown and cathedral length veil marries a handsome man under the tree. She throws her big white bouquet at the end of the wedding towards the women at the reception and jumps onto a horse with her husband, the horse galloping off into the sunset with the newlyweds riding it. Amarige is very bridal smelling, as its anagram of the French word "mariage" meaning "marriage" would have one believe. I got 10 hours of wear of this perfume on me and it had a sillage of 6 feet. Everyone that has passed by me have said that I smell incredible while wearing this and they always ask me what I'm wearing. A nurse at a hospital even thanked me when I sprayed it on! I love the bottle for this perfume too and I think it is just as beautiful as the liquid inside. I love the bright golden color of the perfume, the beautiful curves of the bottle and the lovely see-through white glass cap that looks like a ruffle of white chiffon or some other similar material. Luca Turin was for sure wrong when he said that this perfume was bad and shouldn't be worn near anyone. Nothing could be further from the truth! Amarige for sure is a juicy, syrupy and honeyed white and yellow flower concotion for the eternal goddess in all of us. White and yellow floral lovers, this is for you!

I love, love, love Amarige! This was my signature when I was in my early 20s. Grandma? No. My grandmother was clean and smelled good, but she didn't smell like Amarige. I'm sure I wrote before about my love Amarige. There was a magic between us. I wore it day and night and I got a lot of compliments. Even if I didn't, it would make no difference. I also grabbed a couple of critics, but I probably went with heavy hand that day. Worn in small amounts, just two sprays, it made wonders on me. Of course, it's a very complex fragrance and so full of nuances, it's warm and fresh, deep and luminous. On me gardenia and gentle true sandalwood popped out. I think it really bloomed on my young skin in springtime. Powerhouse perfumes are recommended for wearing in cold weather, but many floral powerhouses give their best in spring with lukewarm climate. After a few years I stopped wearing it. I think that the magic broke up. I blamed my own curiosity and fickleness, but now... many years later I think that reformulations broke it. Amarige has gone through many reformulations. The first biggest one I believe killed the sandalwood. What Amarige can you have without that luscious sandalwood? It was Floral-Woody and it became Floral-Musky. Not the same anymore, but still good. The box went from full border in colours to half vertical border in colours. I still kept Amarige in my collection. Other formulations gradually killed it. It became more and more musty and still beautiful! The last reformulation is due to the removal of Lylial. The box is now red with only a thin gold border. For some time I've seen both boxes in shops. I tried the new version and I almost didn't recognize my Amarige. It's not bad but much simpler, more blended, more modern and at the same time more flat, but it's a nice perfume, just not magic. Amarige was a powerhouse and very daring. It smelled like the sun in your face and it was a masterpiece. When you touch a masterpiece you broke a hardly found perfect balance. The formula leaks on different points. It's not like working on a drugstore bathgel. Now when I read what I suspect Gen-X reviews and some YT "influencer" just out of kindergarten talking about grandma's poo, it makes me a bit sad. For them. For sure they are not smelling the first original Amarige. Many reviews stemmed out of these videos. It seems like let's attack something. How do I attack a perfume in these sad '20s? It's OLD. Old as an insult. Ok, keep your expensive gummy glycemic tuberose if your mom is rich or stick to those sickening wannabe-L'Interdit-but-I-can't if you don't find yourself in silks. BTW poo/toilet is the indolic side of white flowers.When well done, is pure bliss and you won't even smell the toilet.

Dear Readers, What can I say?, I enjoy this perfume over the years and its part of my collection on my mantle and collective memories even though one experience is from someone's else's memories that hers is now mine, let me tell you why. Firstly, I was introduced to this perfume as a teen when a family member worked in a perfume boutique and when I smelled this in its bottle I was enrapture by its bright and warming floral's and to my delight my sister gave me a miniature bottle splash of it that I used until it emptied with use and to this day I still have it in my collection, The other experience Im sharing ,its origins come from when I worked as a nurse in a nursing home doing my duties in caring for my patients and there was one lady that was mute ,paralyzed and alone despite the room being wide enough for 2 more patients to be her roommates but she was the only one there ,alone in such a grey place. I remember she was my last patient for the night and when i was putting her to bed after her bath , I looked in her drawer for a comb for her hair and lo and behold my eyes were gazing upon a old friend, Amarige from Givenchy, a lotion, and vintage too, the same shape like the perfume bottle but all solid white and the cream was golden, I asked my patient was this her's, she could not speak but nodded a yes and I said Ma'am excuse my boldness but you have fabulous taste, would you like me to put some on you tonight?, and she nodded again of yes, and then I put on her skin and tucked her to bed, the fragrance was of garden of blooming flowers in that dark shady room that I even forgot how dreary it was and as I tucked my lady patient in ,she had her pale skin became a sweet pink and her eyes closed with a expression of she was seeing something and I know she was seeing and feeling a memory of a time that the perfume transported her there and a tear grew out of her eyes and I asked her if she was feeling good now ? meanwhile i wiped her tear off and caressed her light coffee brown hair and she nodded by my touch and in a whispery strained voice she said "thank you" with her eyes still closed as in still holding on to her memories of this perfume but answering me out of gratitude, and that night she slept soundly as my co-workers reported to me that she did not made any fuss that night and the room smelled gorgeous but thought it was the flowers from outside her closed window. Dear readers, it goes to show that perfumes do bring a joy even in the most dreary of times and this experience of the lady patient is now my own as evidence of being witness of the power of fragrance and delighted to own a bottle of it myself Viva Amarige and the house of Givenchy!.

This is probably the craziest perfume story - Back in the 90’s if a woman did not wear Amarige, Dolce Vita and Paloma Picasso you were not considered part of the club at the hospital I worked in South Florida. I used to work with this woman, her husband used to buy her tons of fragrances, she used to wear different ones to work. I was a starving college kid who was working to take care of my younger siblings, I did not have enough money to buy these fragrances. One day I managed to purchase a small bottle of Amarige, I took it to work to show off to the ladies to let them know that I deserved to be part of the elite group (that was so childish of me, trying to fit in when I was simply a young kid) I left work, had to rush to school, I tripped on a rock, fell hit my head and hurt my hand, the perfume bottle broke right in front of me. I did not cry because I almost died, I was in tears because my perfume bottle broke. They took me to the emergency room to make sure I did not have a concussion, my only worry was my perfume (You can tell I was a nut back then, don’t worry I am still a nut just a different one now). The emergency room physician who took care of me was laughing at the fact I was more worried about a broken bottle of perfume instead of my head. Fast forward to one week later after my near-death experience, someone delivered a very large bottle of Amarige to my desk with a note stating “A beautiful girl shouldn’t cry over a broken perfume bottle, she is pretty with or without perfume”. The entire time I was thinking, Jesus wanted me to fall because he knew I deserved a big bottle of this juice. (see I told you I was a nut bag then) I never found out who left me that awesome gift, I had an idea it was either the physician who took care of me or one of the CT Scan technicians. If the person had identified himself, I would have married him on the spot and have his baby just so he could keep buying me perfume lol. Moral of the story – don’t try to fit in, stay just the way you are because later on you will fall into the right crowd. That vintage bottle is gone, I repurchased it not too long ago, I must say there is not that big of a difference except the vintage version was a little bit stronger and lasted longer on than the new one. This is one of the reasons I share my perfumes with other people. I give perfumes to strangers who later became friends, friends and family members. You never know the difference you can make in a person's life when you share the love of perfume.