Vintage Collection Ambra

Ambra is what it says on the tin - an amber scent of superb quality. There are a lot of listed amber-esque notes, but the overall effect is of a smooth, cohesive yet multifaceted amber scent. It is classic in style, reminiscent of a vintage-style spicebomb, but is much more muted and wearable for a modern audience than the heavy ambers of decades past. Ambra has a bold, spicy opening, amber-centric from initial spray, but lifted and brightened by fresh citrus notes. There is a green undertone to the amber here, with notes like hazy galbanum enhancing the pine nuance of elemi. Labdanum gives a dark, leather quality to the amber accord, anchoring it throughout and amping up the vintage element. As it develops, Ambra becomes dry, and more warm spice comes to the fore. I get nutmeg in particular, and some cardamom. The amber is balsamic here, slightly sweet and very smooth. The frankincense is soft but delicious, more balsamic than smoky. There is a slightly animalic, salty edge to it as it develops further, likely thanks to the ambergris note. It strikes the perfect balance of being airy and lightweight, yet rich. It is at its most warm and resinous as it dries down, with a lovely woody accord adding body and grounding it during its later stages. It becomes softly musky as it fades, with sweet amber remaining until final fade. Sillage and longevity are moderate. It is unisex in my opinion - a beautiful scent for amber lovers. As I find with ambers, it is a cold weather scent, but Ambra is a day scent that is light enough to be worn in mild weather. It is an EDT, but such lightness is not guaranteed. A beautiful lightweight amber scent, Ambra is a great modern interpretation of a classic accord, made from high-quality ingredients. It is a palatable take on amber without sacrificing the rich beauty of this classic scent profile. Much better than the other Villoresi scents I've tried so far. 4/5.

I bought this blind. After having smelt 1000+ fragrances and owning 200+, I wouldn't have expected to be so excited by a fragrance. And it happened again here. This one opens with a strong elemi note, supported by citruses. Then, the galbanum appears creating a masculine green bitterness, strenghtened by the green feeling of the labdanum resin. In the heart, a noticeable spicy incense note - olibanum, aka frankincense - takes the front stage and will lead the transition. Here it's not burnt/smoky incense, but the warm resin note. Then, it will transition through a soapy musk stage twisted by a - barely noticeable - animalic salty note (imho real ambergris tincture used in very small amounts). Then the musk fades out while a balsamic myrrh note fades in: first, with the help of the - subtle but present - salty note and a very subtle oud-y note, the myrrh develops its animalic side - what some people describe as a "coca-cola note". Then, it will be left alone to also express its - slightly feminine - vanillic base, present in most of amber fragrances. A complex blend in which nearly each listed note will be individually noticeable at its respective stage. I'm not afraid to say that this is the best amber/resinous fragrance I have ever smelt, sharing the podium with Rania J Ambre Loup (and Goutal Ambre Fetiche as close runner-up). This is majestic, luxurious feeling, a masterpiece. Highly recommended, worth every penny. Grazie Lorenzo, grazie di cuore! Fall/Winter evenings, 30+ Edit: I'm wearing it tonight. I feel elegant but not arrogant. I feel relaxed, but not melancholic. I needed that tonight, after this rough week.

"AMBRA" by Lorenzo Villoresi is one of my favourite creations by Mr.Villoresi — a truly stunning, dreamy, and poetic fragrance. Inspired by real ambergris, it feels unlike anything else: unusual, hypnotic, and completely its own. This is not a scent you encounter every day, and that is part of its magic. No one else is going to smell like this. There is something beautifully clean and almost soapy woven through the composition, contrasted by a dry sweetness that I absolutely love. It opens with a spicy, herbal brightness — sparkling and alive — before revealing a deeper, more mysterious heart. The ambergris accord feels divine: musky, salty, warm, and quietly sensual. Then come the resins, rich and enveloping, adding a powdery, meditative depth. The base is filled with woods and sandalwood, and I can sense the same DNA found in "Sandalo" by Lorenzo Villoresi. After some time, the fragrance develops an almost buttery softness — slightly heavy, yet still luminous, as though warm light is passing through amber-coloured glass. What moves me most about "Ambra" is its emotional quality. It feels spiritual, touching, and deeply comforting. Sweet, but never floral. Warm in a way that makes you feel safe and still. Wearing it is like standing inside a memory you cannot fully reach: blurred images, forgotten moments, fragments of something familiar that disappear the moment you try to hold onto them. Ambra feels like time stopping for a moment — quiet, golden, reflective. A fragrance made not only to be smelled, but to be felt.

Lorenzo Villerozi "Vintage Collection" Ambra Decadent and mysterious. Thank you to the lovely person who shared this unusual gorgeous fragrance with me. I love the terpenic opening, exotic, bitter, lemony pine needle smell as a result from the elemi and galbanum accord. The elemi note makes me curious, it is the prominent note in this fragrance, so very unusual to my nose, I smell it for the life of the fragrance. The frankincense, myrrh blends with the elemi. I enjoy the resinous labdanum, it is lingering in the background. I get a delicious whiff of animalic Ambergris. So seductive. It is salty while the myrrh is slightly sweet. Amazing! I love this fragrance from beginning to end, that is rare. Ambra lasts on my skin for about 6 hours and sillage is good, I think it is still noticeable after a few hours. Ambra belongs in my collection! The notes listed on the official website is: galbanum, cistus, elemi, cardamom, labdanum, myrrh, frankincense, pepper, carnation, nutmeg, ambergris

Very different on skin compared to the blotter. On card this opens airy, green and a little bitter with cardamom and galbanum. On skin it opens exactly like a cold, dark church, deserted after mass, smoky incense hanging in the air with some balsamic sweetness from the myrrh and elemi. The smokiness then subsides and the resinous qualities increase as the ambergris starts to stir, lithe and salty in the base, until a smooth, sombre, almost gothic amber-frankincense-myrrh accord has developed. I loved this. Ambra is the perfect balance between sweet resin and dry incense, my favourite in the genre. It's not so distinctive perhaps but fans of beautiful churchy incenses and ambers will feel very much at home with this one.

Lorenzo, I love you! Grazie di cuore. This is the coldest Amber yet the spiciest. One of my favorite when I want to feel like a Dandy, together with Cuir Mauresque. I also layer this with Alamut, but that's a story for a different chapter. Ci vediamo presto in Firenze.

This is magic in a bottle. I think it is the presence of real ambergris. Sometimes it comes through a little soapy, mostly just smoothly elegant.

Edit: I said below this didn't last or project. Then I bought Messe de Minuit by Etro. The two scents - Etro and this Villoresi - resemble each other greatly. However, in comparison to that drippy, nothingy wannabe not incense (nonsense?), this Ambra is a ballsy full throttle incense that could fill a church. While the Etro would struggle to fill a car. This is half the price of the Etro, bigger and bolder, and better in every way, so I want to upgrade my first appraisal. Original review: This a relatively straight-up-and-down amber. It's good - nice, warm, round. Just what an amber should be. It doesn't particularly last or project, however. Rather than give a reprise of views covered downpage, I'll try to add something of use to the perfumista just embarking on their journey, or the more experienced obsessive who already owns more than they can ever wear. I'll give you two 'reminds me ofs' - one will be helpful (I hope), the other will just be me showing off about how much I know and how 'fragrance special' I am. Here's the useful one: this is quite similar (but not identical) to Lagerfeld Classic - and you can get that for about £20 on Amazon and discounters. It's cheap as chips. The Lagerfeld develops in a more interesting, dynamic way; the Villoresi is marginally less powdery and more 'austere.' And if you're into vintage, you can also get cheap vintages of the Lagerfeld Classic (look for the name on the bottle as 'Lagerfeld' not 'LAGERFELD,' and the vintage won't say 'classic' on it). Here's the 'look at me! Aren't I smart!' comparison: The Writer by St Giles. The Writer is 'mustier' (in an entirely good way) than the Villoresi, although the Villoresi is itself fairly musty (in an entirely good way). The Writer also projects further and lasts longer than the Villoresi, and doesn't cost vastly more to buy. I'm not down on the Villoresi in any way; it's perfectly lovely, and I'm happy to own it. But it's really just one more amber in a crowded field of ambers, and it's less distinctive than the other scents I've mentioned.

Someone on the boards today asked for a fragrance that was discerning, zen, mature, pensive, reserved and serious. This was my suggestion, and I gotta tell you I think I nailed it. It is an extremely serious scent (I’ve often thought to myself, Lorenzo do you have no joy?) but it’s not severe. I wear a spritz to bed sometimes. It could also be good for meditating, or wearing to the office when you’ve got to be focused and in control. The cardamom is soothing, the galbanum and cloves mature, the ambergris is grounding and the myrrh wise, and then of course there’s the tricky elemi - thoughtful, but a little sad. A great scent overall for a particular mood.

The Ambra fragrance by Villoresi could rather be called Incensa since it comes across as more of a church incense fragrance. I like it and note that it is rich in resins perhaps first of all frankincense. There are hints of spices especially in the opening, and in the dry down vanilla comes to the fore. All in all it's a long lasting amber-incense fragrance that is unisex and with a reasonable price tag for the quality that you get.

Ambra, wonderful. It is what I thought Incensi would be like. It is the best "amber" (a very vague term) I have ever smelled. Incense and resins smells but warm and much less bitter than "Incensi". This perfume has a very authentic, antique, almost archeological quality to it. In comparison, Incensi feel more ecclesiastical. Edit: something unfortunately bothers me in the next day dry-down.

Great description by the reviewer before me. Exactly that. A cold amber. Usually ambers are warm, cosy, opulent, inviting, like a fire place. This is a great green cold amber like a great amber in black and white or white marble cold . If there is one in that category it is only this one. Totally due to the green herbs and cardamome in the opening.

The way the fragrance wafts around is great. Its nostalgic scent floats around like butterflies... It will be as if you are in a time warp. A perfume that lives up to its name. The opening is citrusy pine and cardamom with a peppery bitterness. Towards the middle, I smell mostly elemi, a mix of balsam and citrus. Then comes the scent of amber and it continues its life with pine. It has a quality texture and a very vintage vibe. Whoever I had it with smelled it, they said it was familiar and were confused as to what to compare it to. The only thing I was not expecting was that the citrus would stick to the fragrance to such an extent. Instead of a sweeter and deeper structure, it's an amber that bubbles to the surface with citrus vibrancy.

Received a sample from a kind fellow fraghead. It's nice but not my style: spicy incense that turns powdery. Performance, though, is very good.

"Vintage collection" indeed. Smells like the late 1970's. Myrrh, cloves, labdanum, sandalwood, stale smoke. My wife walked into the room and said "something smells old here." I'm not one for mall colognes, but this is not for me.

When I visit Quebec City, I stay at the hotel within Le Monastere des Augustines, in the heart of the old city. The Augustinian sisters have devoted themselves to caring for the body and soul, as is evident from its accommodations and amenities geared toward health, wellness, and most of all, quietude. There was a 'brume d'ambiance' named 1639, the year Hôtel-Dieu de Québec monastery was founded. This room mist contained not only various resins and coniferous oils, it had cardamom. I only have just a few drops of it, but whenever I smell it I immediately return to my time there. Lorenzo Villoresi Ambra opens with cardamom, and it reminds me of this 1639 room mist, but even more so, it reminds me of that stillness, that space carved out for reflection, away from what plagues me due to the attention economy in which we are so steeped. The opening of Ambra is also accompanied by a cool, bitter-green galbanum and a peppery, lemony elemi, with a kola-nut myrrh making its presence known not long thereafter. However, it is the ambergris that is at the core: here it has a cool salinity and a "levitation above skin" quality. A small amount of true ambergris tincture must be here, it has to be, it just has that vitality and "animal magic" that would be near impossible to produce with any facsimile. When it simmers down, it feels a bit warmer and even more enveloping due to the enduring labdanum and other resins, a fragrance to wear when one seeks time for stillness, to meditate. Wearing Ambra today reminds me of the importance of returning to my practice, as I know I've personally reached a tipping point taking in so much stimuli, information, that it has become a troubling din. When I was at St. Joseph's Abbey this past weekend, walking through the cloisters and entering the silence within its walls, I knew that a shift was in order, an important shift.

Ambra by Lorenzo Villoresi should switch names with Incensi of the same brand: not the stereotypical warm and sweet amber, but a parade of various incense. Then again, amber is essentially all sorts of balsams (sweetened by various...sweeteners), and "incense" is, essentially, also balsams; so it was only a matter of time before these two notes got confused. Smell good? 5/10 Smell Interesting? 7/10 In Short Tauer-esque "tangerine - soda water" at the beginning, when all the bubbles pops, only the "tangerine" and the slightly bitter incense remains. In Details A few seconds of strong, high-pitched herbal bitterness (incense?), which merges into a similarly high-pitched bubbling soda water (aldehydes?). But the soda water is flavored with a sour, sweet and dry tangerine (?). At the same time, a nose-tickling , rounded-soft- soapy, musky tone (myrrh?) almost steal the thunder. This opening is somewhat similar to that of Incense Rose by Tauer. In addition, a distinct " roasted ginger powder "-like cardamom squeeze in on the top, makes this party extra crowded. But the rounded musky tone slips away in a blink of an eye, the effervescent "soda water" lost all the bubbles in one minute; the remnants of these two, wrapped up with the remaining "tangerine" powder, cling onto a dried-herbal-roots-alike bitter incense , they hold it so tight that they're practically one scent. Maybe one cozy hug from cinnamon before we enter the indiscernible skin stage.

A rich and multifaceted amber fragrance. This undoubtedly leans feminine. It is a surprisingly classical structure, close to the oriental chypres of the decades past. If you were looking for a niche version of Estee Lauder's Youth Dew, Villoresi's Ambra would be the ideal fragrance. The first few hours are floral and resinous, with different facets of the various resins folding over one another, supported by a fresh, earthy herbs and indistinct florals. After a few hours it dries down in to a more recognisable (modern niche) amber fragrance which is heavy on the myrrh as a base note. As ever, this takes from and imitates other fragrances from Villoresi's collection. It has a stoney and cold element, like that of an old Church, which is more prominent in Incensi. In Ambra, it is beefed up and warmed out with more thick, robust, and sweeter notes. Incensi and Ambra would make for a good his and hers couple if you're looking for wearable oriental niche fragrances with classical/timeless structures. In terms of pure ambers, it can't compete with the clarity and success of Amber Absolute, but it's never too heavy or cloying which is a big plus point.

I wish I had more knowledge about vintage amber scents so that I can pinpoint my impression; but I don't. All I have is a generic impression of something from older times. Maybe Youth Dew, maybe a fantasy of memories overlapping. A lot of dry incense in this amber, ceremonial myrrh and spices, as always, spices. A handful of galbanum for even more vintage feel. I guess someone just had to do it. There's a special place in the ecosystem for intentionally vintage-styled fragrances. They work as a shortcut, as inspiration, as information otherwise unobtainable or ignored in our time span. Where would you wear it, though? Well that's the thing. It's olfactory information. Not a dress. Or a suit to wear. Is there someone you'd like to share it with? To inspire? Well that's the question.

Duran Duran Amber. Amber is like Oud: when is into a composition and the name is on the bottle, it smell just like the mentioned. I am joking. But there is a part of true. This perfume really smell like pure amber, but in a cold way. I like very much this amber cause Villoresi plays the fresh bitter metallic and humid salty luminescent aspects of the matter. Than here we have an underground amber in all the meanings of the word, dandy, underwold mystic, vintage, humid crypt, smell '800 and 80s as well. I notice a sort of dry coffee note as well. I can see a Dark guy in London, in Berlin, with some black make up wearing this scent and a long coat to go out into a New Wave Club. So maybe I should title The Cure Amber but it would sound too much healthy.

Ambra could possibly be the best amber accord I have ever smelled. Right up front you’ll smell the unmistakable aroma of true to form black ambergris. Musky labdanum and some empty boxes of incense left on a shelf for a week or two which permeates your closet and wafts into your face as you open the door but forget they were in there greet you on first spray. While it’s not listed I pick up on some florals shortly before the spice rack takes over. Black pepper and a breathy saliva laced tobacco note thanks to the ambergris help form a cedar plank meets labdanum core that is simply masterful. It’s amber without being sweet. It’s incense without being incense. All in all this is a perfect fragrance.

This opens with a slightly bitter green note. This starts out surprisingly soft, but give it 30 minutes and it seems to roar to life on the skin. I think I detect aldehydes at the beginning, though they do fade after about 30 minutes. Amber mixed with spices and powder wafting up. It's good. As time passes, the warmth of the Ambergris and Myrrhe become apparent, wrapping the wearer in their charms. I am particularly excited to be able to detect the ambergris which is quite prominent. This is definitely different than the average amber scent. Want.

Wow, I haven't smelled such a beautiful amber perfume in quite a while. From the initial first spray through its drydown I'm constantly reminded of its craftsmanship. The drydown is in a league of its own, here the spices really gets the spotlight whilst everything still stays toned down, demure with a stunning depth of myrrh and cardamon as was it partially taken from Arabie by Lutens. Wearing Ambra almost has a spiritual aspect to it, something deeper and more meaningful than just translating scent on warm skin.

very spicy amber. spicier than ambery, actually. very interesting, i kept sniffing what the hell it was that i smelled-- a cacaphony of different spices. It's beautifully done, a true composition, but too heavy for me.

Can someone sell me or swap with a decant of this and maybe some other LV creations? The shipping from Italy is outrageous

One of the best imitations of genuine ambergris.