Amaranthine

GLORIOUS!! To me, Amaranthine smells EXACTLY, and I do mean EXACTLY, like the sweet, heady, INTOXICATING smell of freshly bloomed hyacinth. Not sure why because hyacinth isn't listed here. One of my favorite times of year is when the hyacinth explodes into spectacular technicolor permeating the air with its DECADENT scent. Looking at the notes here, I now realize why I love that smell. If I had to describe the succulence and deliciousness of hyacinth, then I would say I smell everything listed here, especially the rose, sandalwood, thick, fleshy, luscious green (must be the palm leaf), and honey. Although there is no honey listed here, the milk and tonka bean lend that effect. YUM! Somehow, mixed together these notes exactly replicate that blissful hyacinth experience without screaming floral at the same time. It's just that fresh, creamy, edible, kind of sweet, oh so opulent green (not grass green), the kind you just want to bite into! It's brisk, it's a little strange, it's absolutely intoxicating as in 'What IS that heavenly aroma?!' Hard to describe, but what is even more incredible is that Penhaligon actually found a way to capture nature so perfectly without resulting in any synthetic or screeching chemical notes. I feel as though I have actually been placed INSIDE the hyacinth a moment just before it bursts into bloom! Upon drydown, the honey and sandalwood really warm this up to sublime perfection. Sillage is great and longevity is a good five hours, so far, and still going. I think this one would actually be good on my husband too, because of the green, creamy, slightly powdery, spicy notes underlying that seem to work well in unisex fragrances. Amaranthine reminds me of my time spent in Paris in the spring with my sweet hubby. It's funny because I was reviewing WHAT WE DO IN PARIS earlier along with AMARANTHINE, but I think out of the two the only one that really does make me think of Paris is AMARANTHINE! Just three words: HEADY, INTOXICATING, and ADDICTIVE!! Love, love, LOVE this!!

I am in love with this after buying a sample years ago. Finally caved and spent a bit on the discontinued bottle. There are certain scents in some of my perfumes that make me practically salivate and I want to smell like that all the time. I definitely get green banana that really reminds me of something. Maybe it's those old scratch and sniff banana stickers from the 1980's that were not very sweet smelling. Definitely a bit of rose that takes awhile for me to identify amongst the white flowers and banana. Like a commenter below I almost smell gardenia, but it's probably the way the jasmine and freesia mixes. I also feel something odd, like the absence of coconut, probably because of the creamy base with vanilla, tonka and cream. To me it is a very sensual perfume but simultaneously great for day or night wear. The musk is almost perfect. I love Amaranthine so much and it is discontinued, so I also blind purhased Sira des Indes so I could set up a rotation. I feel almost edible (but sexy edible, not foodie) when I layer the Sira des Indes with some Coty Sand and Sable (gardenia) and maybe some coconut. I've got a few things I like to mix together, just a suggestion since Amaranthine is no longer available (whhhhyyyyy???). I plan to try the PDR Amoureuse eventually if I can, but it is much more pricey than the ones I use more frequently and also TDC Aurore Nomade, but I'm almost afraid to try that one because I'm sure I will love it.

I love this but its not at all what I was expecting. I was expecting something a little more outrageous / risque but on me this is a simply a lovely floral, milky / musky scent - no more, no less. I can see no resemblance to the inside of a woman's thigh (bit disappointing actually as I was curious as to how they would interpret THAT particular aroma.....). This one is obviously all down to individual skin chemistry. Lots of narcotic floral in the opening -I detect tuberose with some green notes (most likely banana leaf) and a little spice. As the fragrance develops, this turns to a devine, creamy dream - think sweet carnation milk mingled with some spicy musk and floral blooms. It never turns sour on me - always sweet. I don't find it too intense and have been wearing it around the office - no-one appears to have been corrupted yet :-) Longevity is pretty good (6-7 hrs for me). To me, this is similar to the now discontinued Miller Harris Coeur d'Ete - they both contain a lot of similar ingredients / notes. I would say that Coeur d'Ete is more intense and actually a bit 'funkier' (if thats your thing). This is certainly one of Penhaligons better creations - fans of this may well also like Tralala as they have a similar milky vibe.

I was lucky enough to score a partial of this discontinued beauty in a blind swap and l’m feeling like I won the lottery. This is such a gorgeous ylang centric fragrance. You know the kind of milky plant sap you get when you cut the stalk of say a dandelion? That starchy, bitter green scent it has? It’s like they took that and added it to ylang essential oil and the sum of the two is this creamy voluptuousness. When I first put it on, I kept thinking of milkshakes and, even though it doesn’t smell of banana at all, there is something of that kind of tropical fruit creaminess. Every other fragrance I’ve tried that is supposed to be milky or creamy is a chemical nightmare but this one is gentle and natural smelling. It gets sweeter towards the middle but always in a tropical flower way rather than a chemical gourmand thing. After wearing it all afternoon and night, I woke up this morning feeling like a Botticelli Venus, suspended in a cloud of utterly relaxed, natural beauty. It’s a deeply strange and unique fragrance and while I deplore the idiocy that led to it’s discontinuation, I get that this might be a bit too sensuous and odd for most perfume buyers. Myself, I plan to savor every last drop.

Oh man I wish I hadn't fallen in love with this discontinued scent! It is a lush tropical flower fragrance with some unusual facets. I get ylang-ylang and jasmine and a jungly green smell (I'm assuming this is the palm leaf?) with some gentle milky undertones. There is a little tickle of spice from the cardamom, which I think smells so lovely with the milkiness. The combination gives an interesting juxtaposition of freshness and cozy warmth. Amaranthine smells very womanly and seductive to me, perhaps a little sweaty but not skanky, more like moist skin in a humid jungle. The longevity is so-so, granted my skin seems to gobble up fragrances pretty quickly. It did last a long time when sprayed on a lightweight scarf. I have a 3mL decant that I am hoarding, mainly spraying it on special occasions or when I need a pick-me-up. Someday I will probably fork over the money to get a FB on ebay. If anyone is selling a bottle feel free to hit me up in a PM!

More an olfactory journey than a straightforward perfume. For the briefest moment I smell citronella - and then it opens with green banana leaf and then blooms white and yellow flowers while tonka bean appears. It smells just exactly like breathing in from the centers of flowers – the jasmine, the freesia, the ylang ylang come out. Not just the beautiful sunny bits, but the live roots and life force pushing through. At some point it gets a bit snarly and animalic. Whiffs of ammonia and even rubber. But this phase is passed through as well. As though the perfume then finds religion or learns to meditate. It finally transcends to a sublime spiced creamy milk, cardamom and tonka bean flow. It’s like a socialite with a raunchy little secret. The dry down is spicy vanilla... Reminding me of a richer creamier Diptyque Eau Duelle. It has darkness within its flowery billows. Stays close to the skin. I love it.

Wow! Love it! I get flowers, spices and leaves with some creamy milk. I must be missing something cos it doesn't smell naughty to me lol I do agree about the similarity with Aurora Nomade but it's no where spicey or bananary enough for a similarity with Sira de Indes. Once settled I do detect something a little skanky and the milk goes off a little but thankfully that doesn't last. It's now softly indolic tropical flowers and steamy green leaves. The flowers dont dominate but are balanced with the vegetation and spices. I lived in the Far East for years and I can never forget the smell of humid jungle. The smell of decomposing vegetation basically. Nobody wants to smell like that lol It starts off quite potent but recedes to a skin scent quite quickly on my skin. This is a scent for a lazy summer evening. It will go well with the smell of my roses, ginger lilies and honeysuckle. Sister Mary x

A beautiful sultry greenery scent with a prominent ylang ylang note. I first tried it from a sample that a member passed down, and albeit its funky smell - I was reminded so much of how "someone else tried this sample on their skin" - I couldn't get it out of my head. Amaranthine really isn't the typical type of scent I'm attracted to, but so addictive I jumped on the chance when I could snatch a bottle. This is a sweaty scent done in the best way possible. If I try to break the notes down there's definitely the ylang, palm leaves, carnation and cardamom, and maybe some salty notes, but I'd rather comprehend Amaranthine holistically and enjoy its grand beauty. I'm still trying to figure out the best time and occasion to wear it since I usually gravitate towards something more clean and delicate. Warm spring days seem to have worked out okay - boyfriend hasn't complained ;)

"Sweet Vegetal Tropical Sap" Amaranthine is the milky ooze of life and fertility. This morning I used the final full spray from my bottle of Amaranthine. The moment felt so much like an ending, it felt like the last chapter of an anthology that you've enjoyed for years and come to know the characters as if in real life. Amaranthine contains so many memories for me. I don't want to let it go. If anyone has a bottle they do not love, or know somewhere to find a bottle, please send me a private message. UPDATE: I got a bottle off ebay! I'll always be on the look-out for another bottle, but one is being shipped to me right now, my precioussssss in on her way :-) (but please do let me know if you are willing to sell a bottle or know of where to find one because I'll empty this new bottle by the end of summer for sure.)

full of colours is right, this is wonderfull but weak and so close to the skin, it is intimate scent ! but there is a pure parfum version you can see it in the pictures with a little violet coloured bottle with silver at the top, like a fruit, it costs about 500 $ and 399 euros i think !! if i was rich i woul buy it, yes cause this perfume is really dangerous, it is like a liquorous milky venom, exotic it smells like tropical plants, imagine yourself in a very sweaty environment, heat and warm with very green smells of leafs of tropical trees, this is really mysterious and dirty very sensual but not provocative you feel like" une créature à part " you feel like you are not in the place, like if everything is moving but you , an experience to live !

Wonderfully weird concoction that only Bertrand Duchaufour can create. Sharp and pungent in the beginning, giving way to a milky green note. Ylang-ylang and neroli give it tropical and exotic quality. Floral burst provided by jasmine and freesia (some faint rose) and then there is this musky, ambery, golden pepper (which is actually not there but appears to be). Apparently the brief for this fragrance was to make something smell like a woman's inside leg!!! Go figure! Weirdly compelling and most certainly THE most daring of the otherwise rather conservative Penhaligon's range. Great concept perfume!!! 8/10

When I wear this I am transported to a lush elegant floral garden in the middle of a tropical rainforest drinking tea and eating creamy delicate desserts. It is light enough to wear everyday and lasts on my skin for 24 hrs. My skin tends to amplify most scents. Projection is poor but will last on the skin in a very intimate way. + After wearing this for some time I notice a high pitched note (freesia?) that bothers me sometimes. I still enjoy wearing it but i prefer to wear it less often so not to become annoyed with it. For some reason this scent reminds me of those banana hard candies

Gorgeous!!! Delicious concoction!!! I love, love,love it!!! So creamy, sweet; banana dessert, vanilla, beautiful lush flowers, amazing warm spices, rich and potent, dreamy milky sandalwood, oozing with sensuousness and yumminess. Aromatic and calming, musky and evocative, erotic. Very very sensual, exotic, moorish and - yes! - lickable!!!! Very long-lasting and great sillage!!! Load, loads of compliments!!! My husband particularly adores it!!! It's absolutely heavenly!!!!

To me, this is all freesia.Fresh, green, creamy and floral - this is a stunner! I'm with Sabel, can't stop smelling my wrist. Really lovely. It does remind me a little of Organza, another favourite of mine, that same balance of creamy white florals and fresh greenness - but I think this is a little fresher. For me, this is one to buy - and their bottles are so beautiful, too! Sigh ... bliss!

Amaranthine opens with sparkling fresh green notes that after few minutes became warmer thanks to flowers. In its heart i can recognize rose and carnation stronger that the others. Then the drydown is very sweet and it's like vanilla powder.i think taht condensed milk gives cremosity to the composition.i recomend it for who loves mistery and wants to be seductive...

since im an obvlious florientalgirl i love this one too! perfect for colder days this brand has amazing stayingpower, i did remember trying it and it stayed on my wrist for quite a while,im obsessed with ellenisia right now but amaranthine could be my next purchase, i secretly suspect they had enya as their inspiration to name it:)

the sl*ttiest perfume i have ever put on my skin can i say that? i am obsessed with it. i don't know much about notes and things, so to me it smells like the thickest part of spring. skin glowing and sensitive, the same temperature inside as outside. it's Good Stuff, and i'm sad to hear it's been discontinued!

This is a kinky perfume. Milky, creamy, ripe... lickable. A very very bad bad naughty perfume. This is the fantasi smell of a german milkmaids nipple sweat. I only like to Wear it in the spring, and in the summer, when it is not to hot. An interesting perfume experience. Probably not for Work.

This is gorgeous juice. A laconic, cool spicy, comforting tea scent by a genius perfumer. To be discontinued is nonsense! It's not like Penhaligon's has such a huge inventory. Oh well, I'll treasure my bottle.

I love this fragrance. It is such an interesting combination with the milk, banana and ylang ylang. The scent starts off very green and gradually becomes more musky spicy and milky. Beautiful perfume

I came across a 1 ml sample of this and gosh, it’s beautiful. Warm and spiced but lush and gently green. I’m not one for florals but this is the exception. I’m so sad this is discontinued.

Tropical milky oriental floral, a tad "milk gone bad" in a good way. Creamy yet fresh, subtle spice. Great refresher in summer heat.

I feel like I am having lunch with Indian friends in a green house of tropical plants. Spicy and Green, Lovely.

Amaranthine(everlasting). Bertrand Duchaufour. Recently I have been interested in narcissus as a note. Narcissus in perfumery seems to have more complex profile than some other “yellow “ flowers, I love to smell most of them in nature anyway. I was lucky to find the review on the basenotes by kantafox, where the experience of smelling the Jonquil (a type of Narcissus) oil is being described: the Jonquil oil is very expensive, so the review is precious too. I will partially quote this review: “0 min Dark spicy coupled with green herbaceous notes and crushed peach leaves. Strong aldehydic and raunchy nature. The floral note is very dark & overbearing & slightly animalic. 12 min Darker floral, almost eugenol note now more prominent, herbaceous crushed leaf note fading, animalic note becoming less intrusive. 1 hr Floral sustained now with powdery creamy note apparent almost cloying, herbaceous crushed leaf notes almost undetectable, spicy eugenol note softer now. 2 hr Jonquil now is velvety floral with powdery nuances, the dark characteristics have diminished & have been replaced by lighter notes, a slightly feminine musk with powdery notes. Creamy note still intact, spice note is non discernible & has become significantly cloying to me finish becoming clean. 3 hr The floral now a bright powdery note the cloying nature is owed to what has become a honeyed nuance. The body still maintains that feminine musk that was identified earlier, the aldehydic nature is still there but so much lighter that it’s more of an afterthought. Powdered doughnut covered in a sweet sticky syrup, they sound good in theory but you really don’t want more than one or two bites...” I wonder, if kantafox has smelled Jonquil oil or Amaranthine by Bertrand Duchaufour? Or is it too optimistic and flattering in regard to the mass produced fragrances of today(including Penhaligon's) to believe that such expensive natural ingredients as jonquil oil could be used for their production? Narcissus odor profile is: heady, narcotic flower with sweet, hypnotic green nuances. Scent of narcissus oil-strong & rich; reminds smell of dark green leaves with traces of hyacinth & jasmine. 1⁄2 ton of flowers yields 300 gramm of absolute, sourced from Nether/Grasse. May influence the nervous system: calms nerves and helps to release stress & tension, but in higher doses -headache and vomiting. I f Bertrand Duchaufour used all these natural materials from the notes above to mimic so perfectly Narcissus or Jonquil smell, then bravo, bravo. At the end (third day dry down on paper) I also smell sandalwood and...ginger? Amaranthine never smells synthetic in any familiar or unfamiliar way. I find nothing flirty or pretty or hypocritical here such as powdery vanillic sweetness, for example. It smells rather sincere, green and fresh with sweetness that comes solely from flowers, tiny honey. It's a stand alone fragrance, and remarkably stands out among other Penhaligons fragrances, with enough personality to get all my attention. Very lovely, indeed.

I wore this for a brief (but intense) moment in time several years ago. 7, to be exact. While perusing my treasure box of hoarded samples and decants, I came upon the 3ml I saved before swapping away my original bottle. It holds a special place for me, and connection with a particularly valued memory, but I let the perfume go because I was too young to wear the scent with confidence at the time. Through the years, whenever I've revisited my decant, I'm always struck by the profound strangeness of this perfume. It opens with a blast of something narcotic, and almost venomous. Combined with the overall tropical feel of this fragrance, I'm granted images of vibrant, poisonous foliage and assertive creatures who walk without fear because their flesh is permeated with toxins. None dare approach without permission, the screaming but beautiful neon pigment in their skin gives it away. This phase doesn't last, but the idea lingers for a time as the overall composition melts into something humid, and creamy. But it's a vegetal cream, other reviewers have identified it as a kind of "sap." Milky, slick, but slightly sticky as it dries. There are spices galore in this, from the prickly coriander to the minty medicinal cardamom. The anesthetic clove and peppery freshness of carnation. But they dust the sweet richness of heady flowers, and are smoothed and smothered in the very prominent cloak of green banana leaf. The dry down of this fragrance is *almost* completely disconnected from the scent you find on initial approach, and if I had not smelled the transition with my own nostrils I would never believe it was the same fragrance. It's so soft. Milky vanilla and tonka on a bed of natural musk with sandalwood offering calm support. Only traces of that initial dangerous opening remain, and they give depth and intrigue to a foundation which, in any other fragrance, could easily turn boring and insipid. Every single note...is present. At some point or another. And this is very rare to find, in my experience. I get the tea in the opening, I get the jasmine, and a hot rose. But they all combine and swirl together, some scents stepping in and others dipping out, seamlessly. I could not HANDLE this scent in my mid-twenties. I don't know if other people could handle it ON me, I only ever received one compliment and it was from a lover. From other reactions at that time, I think it may have frightened people. When I would offer up my wrist to let them see. But despite it's departure from mainstream appeal, this scent is a masterpiece. And I just tracked down a bottle. Because I need this, not only in my collection, holding dusted over memories, but as a real, living option for those days when I am not afraid to be beautiful AND dangerous.

I've been wearing this almost daily for several weeks. Started with a tiny little sample, went off and bought a 3.4oz bottle. But it's definitely an acquired taste. My first time trying the sample was a disaster. Out of 4 fragrances I tried, it was the only one that made me say, "absolutely not," and get up to wash my hands. But there is something exotic and seductive about the middle & base of this fragrance. It's worth a short wade through suffocatingly thick white florals and bitter green banana leaf. Amaranthine is sweet, and could even border on cloying, but those delicious spices and milk turn it into a soft and sexy treat. It comes down and sits close to the skin, but occasionally pulses outward, invitingly. I like the way I smell after an hour of wearing it and I like it all the way to the last traces. Word of warning, though. For me, spraying is a no no. It gives off the scent of mothballs. Bleck. I recommend decanting some into a dauber or a roll on. It's the kind of thing you only need a touch of on important places, not something to bathe in.

Soft, delicately sweet, fresh, clean yet surprisingly sensual. I don't get the tropical flavours that people have mentioned. For me, this is summer flowers like meadowsweet, heliotrope, or garden pinks (dianthus), warm apricots, balanced by greener notes (the tea is definitely there) and a hint of musk and nutty woods in the drydown, which is smooth and long-lasting. I'd defy anyone not to like this - deliciously relaxing and harmonious, but with something mysterious that keeps you awake and wanting more. I want it, but the price is scary. EDIT: Well, I bought it, and guess what, I realized I had confused Amaranthine with Artemesia (also Penhaligon). So the review above is actually for Artemesia. What an idiot, I'm really sorry if I've confused people. No wonder I was puzzled by all the references to tropical banana leaves, etc! To be honest I'm not keen on Amaranthine, I find it interesting, different, but too disturbing to wear. Artemesia on the other hand is fresh and soothing like a summer meadow .

The sandalwood here is very light more of a background canvas. The spices are most prominent to me and the tropical edge people mention, I wouldn't have noticed unless I read the description here. I find more a creamy sweetness from the sandalwood than anything fruity or edible. I can't imagine wearing this in the day; it's simply too lush, too sensual. I had been looking for something along the lines of Estee Lauder's Sensuous because I liked it but it always seemed flawed to me like something was unraveling as it dryed down. Oddly enough, because of the presence of musk it also reminds me of Sensuous Nude as well (although that hs no spice). This seems a much better choice than either. People who like Narcisco Rodriguez for Her may want to try this.

To begin with there’s a harsh greenish-woody note that quickly settles into a slightly indolic white floral. I don’t get much in the way of spices, mostly the jasmine and a soapy note. Oddly, after a half hour or so there seems to be a lot of sillage, redolent of harsh wood and what must be condensed milk (not something I indulge in since I can’t stand the taste and it gives me an upset stomach) but not much close to the skin. Eventually the white floral fades away into a faint sandalwood, with the whole thing lasting about 5-6 hours. Basically, Amaranthine is a white floral. There are quite a few perfumes in that genre that I like better, so am not sure why so many people seem to love it.

This is a beautiful scent quite unique, with the classiness of Penghalion's. Opening is big floral, i get some flowers which are not listed above (hyacinth, lily of the valley for instance), ylang ylang and a while later carnation seem dominating. Very fresh and herbal floral opening (banana leaf?) fades and honeyed milk with spices take place. But even in the drydown floral identity is always there. Except the opening, this is very much the same with L'instant de Guerlain with a little more spice. İt is interesting to see such variations about the sillage, as some fragranticans call it "close to skin" and the others "sillage monster", to me it is somewhere in between.

Amaranthine is really nice. It reminds me somewhat of Organza because it's essentially a lot of white floral notes warmed by some cozy, creamy notes. Personally I think I like Amaranthine more. I think this could be a lovely perfume to wear during months when there are a lot of cool, spring showers. It's also a warmer, richer alternative to the standard white floral perfume. Sillage is great, yet it's a light enough scent that it could be worn every day. Also, something about this made me feel it could be the shyer, quieter cousin of Dior Addict.

Top notes were very weak to my nose, I barely caught them at all. It has since bloomed to smell like a twin to YSL Cinema, albeit without the rich oiliness. Admittedly my nose isn't very sophisticated so I compared the notes and aside from Jasmine, Musk & Vanilla (in almost everything anyway), they have nothing in common. I cannot understand where this is coming from but I find them virtually indistinguishable. Of course I really like it but I already have Cinema so a purchase of Amaranthine would be redundant.

On me it is quite floral, typical Penhaligon's: elegant and a little strict, a Real Lady's scent. I want to like it so much, but it has a note (the same as in Lacoste pour femme, I think it is freesia) that I'm not fond of ((( But in Amaranthine this note isn't too nasty, so may be we'll be friends with this scent. I recommend this for those who's not afraid of freesia and want an elegant classic and modern scent in one bottle.

Big banana leafiness in this, though it's not in the notes. This is a super creamy ylang ylang milkshake, with lots of leafy greens and spices thrown in. There is something quite animalic about it. Absolute sillage bomb. But this is far too similar to Jean Patou Sira des Indes for me to bother much with it, and I like Sira des Indes better, it's a little less full on.

Fresh leafy and humid. Definitely banana leafy. It hovers and is not loud nor has extensive sillage. It kind of like a tropical garden in a hot house. I like it A lot but not quite a Love. It’s a beautiful fragrance and I just can’t decide if I want to keep or get trade off my bottle.

To me this fragrance is slightly too green due to the addition of the palm note and slightly too soapy due to the lactonic notes. I liked the spicy aspects of it, but can't look past the deep green base that I am not overly enjoying. It is a well balanced fragrance though!

nice blend of everything I like. Warmed, creamy flower notes with a tropical upbeat. There is a disturbing note though which kept appearing and disappearing during those 4-5 hours i spent with this fragrance. Not sure whether it is the cloves?

Ostara is like a better version of Amaranthine. While both are discontinued, Ostara is easier to find and cheaper (for now).

meraviglia floreale e verde, con accenti speziati. una vera chicca. bella la presenza di ylang ylang

it smells like body odour on me.Too bad!

Wow, they weren't joking! I'm definitely getting 'animal', but it's distinctly human - a wee reminder that we are mammals after all. I doubt Penhaligons would let them get away with a title like 'Mammal'! I wanted to get a sample of this because it sounded weird. I knew I might not necessarily wear it as it's a white floral and they don't seem to suit me (I really envy women who suit the big femme diva perfumes like Fracas) I do find Amaranthine weird because at first sniff I get all the flowers and it's super feminine, but it only took about 5 minutes for the animal to emerge. At first it felt like I'd rubbed myself in someone else's B.O. Have you ever bought vintage clothes, like a fitted velvet jacket, and been a bit frustrated because the previous owner's body odour lingers forever? But as this calms down, I get a chocolaty note and definitely the note you get from an old bottle of good quality jasmine essential oil. I think the polite term for this is faecal! The milky note reminds me of a visit to a recreated English medieval village (think it was Singleton in Sussex) where they'd re-created houses using original materials - weirdly enough they used layers of milk for flooring, which I suppose hardened into solid calcium or magnesium. The smell was slightly sour but comforting, made me yearn for the days before 'sick building syndrome'. In the dry down the animal notes calm down, and I'm reminded of 'beach skin' - a bit like the slightly cedary smell of sweaty skin at the end of a long hot day in the open air Later edit: Oh, ouch! Ammonia, serious levels of it. Not for me then..If anyone would like to swap if they have any samples from my 'I want it' list please email!

Well...I was really looking forward to get acquainted with this scent, as the description and reviews were intriguing to say the least. But when we did finally meet...oh, my!!! Sorry, folks, but the word that jumps to my mind is: disgusting! It rreminded me of a story, that I read quite some time ago when I was writing my final thesis on Napoleon at uni. Supposedly kinky young Bonaparte would send letters to his Josephine well before he was due home from a campaign or other occupation, telling her that he would be back in about two weeks, so Josephine was to stop washing down there. Now, smelling Amaranthine, I kinda got the experience he was looking forward to...unwashed Josephine plus some perfume. It actually made me nauseous. It is like smelling another woman's undies...and a woman's whose personal higiene is far from impeccable. I got what previous reviewers described as bum crack...yuck, gross! It does have some nice notes, but the overall experience for me was stomach churning. Important advice to eveyone: please do NOT blind buy this fragrance! I loved it by the sound of it, but in the end it was a torture to have it on the back of my hand even for a few hours. (Well...at least I gave it a chance.) BTW, I showed it to my husband and he found it smelly, too...

Amaranthine reminds me of a lighter, more transparent L'Instant de Guerlain. At first, it opens sweet and rather soapy, kind of like a tropical fragrance shampoo, then it dries down to a more natural, yet intoxicating leafy smell, reminding of a humid exotic greenhouse. It's somehow simultaneously very realistic and very artificial, plastic and nature, side by side. Amaranthine is probably at its best on warm spring and summer days, its lasting power is okay (around 8 hours) and the sillage is modest. It will not choke anyone around you. As a final note, do not blind buy this! Chances are there will be quite a huge difference between what you will expect by reading about it and what you will actually get.

The first thing i smell is a screeching combination of milk of magnesia and metal. Persistent and annoying, I almost didn't get to the gorgeous drydown! I was so tempted to scrub but I had hope that there was something beautiful hidden under the harsh opening, that I decided to stick it out. After about 30 agonizing minutes the hypnotic jonquil appears and leaves a bed of heady floral softness. Fantastic drydown, but the fresh hell you have to go through to get to it ain't worth it IMHO.

Milky grass is my initial impression of this. Creamy notes (burnt milk) and lots of greens, grass, leaves, and go figure what else..., possibly baby puke.. disgusting! Such a strange perfume. It has vomit inducing powers. I had high hopes for this one. Glad to sample it first. I hope I never encounter this scent near me. I cannot stomach this; it is one of these really bad smells where all the notes are off key.

Oh my...this smells like flowery,mossy hay on me. I get a "meatiness" feel to it as well. Like raw seasoned hamburger,milky flowers,and a salty ocean vibe. Feels like being with my Grandmother on vacation. Being familiar with most of the notes, I can sense the beauty in this when I delve deep. Unfortunatly it just smells awful on me.

A glass of milk with green notes and slightly floral, this phase is odd but wearable. But then a fetid, bad meat-like smell emerges and it is intense on me.

I am quite new to the fragrance world but I'm learning as I go and I'm still learning terminology. What I do know is that I have a very strong sense of smell and a great olfactory memory so once I know a smell, I know it...as I go it will become easier and easier to recognize notes. While I knew that I loved some of the notes in Amaranthine, I didn't recognize some of the others by name and wasn't sure how they would smell or which notes would be more prominant on my skin. With that said...without knowing some of these notes by name, what immediately hit me like a giant brick against the side of my head was strong green and it took me a minute but I thought on it and I was like PARSLEY this smells like parsley and I not only have a great distaste for parsley but I am also very sensitive to it...in the way that it gives me headaches. So I went and researched the notes in this fragrance to find that one of the top notes Coriander, is essentially parsley and/or cilantro...lovely. I also smell a strong sweet floral that seems a lot like gardenia to me but I do not see gardenia listed so that one I'll have to investigate more. Being that I've always been a big fan of heady floral/orientals and orientals with dark fruits/florals/spices I lean more towards the woody/balmy/spicy fragrances, so this green/tropical/spicy one was just a no go for me. I feel sad because I do like the middle and end notes but the top notes are soo strong and last long enough that I feel sick until that phase passes. I couldn't resist checking out the fragrance that was so notorious so I'll chalk it up to a beautiful bottle and a learning lesson, maybe one day I'll pick it up and love it. Tomorrow my other notorious fragrance will arrive, Tom Ford Black Orchid...I can't wait!

The moment I applied this, I was struck by how realistic an impression of a flower in bloom it offered. A warm, summery tropical flower, not so much the clear scent of flowers in spring. But there was an odd note that kept getting in the way of my judgment that this was yet another high-end floral fragrance. It was a sappy note, green but not clean, reminding me somehow of heat, sweat, muck. There was also something that registered to me as the musk of clean skin, with an overlay of dried perspiration from the heat or from labor. The combination was so disquieting I had to go check the list of notes, which I'm trying not to do nowadays, whenever I review a new perfume. Immediately I reaized it was the scent of banana leaves. Banana trunks, actually, banana flowers, any part of the plant except for the fruit. I grew up in a tropical country and bananas were everywhere, even in suburbian backyards, but this incredible scent was of a young girl's peramubulations off the beaten track -- of endless banana groves and the thatch huts in between, of artesian well water, unpaved mud-slicked paths, of sunlight on a tangle of vines, of Third World poverty. As for the musky skin note (oh yes, "animalic" -- I do get the reference in Scorpiosheep's review) it may have been the effect of the milk accord in combination with the banana leaf, and my own memory. The banana vegetation note will mean different things to many people: I can understand how Europeans would equate this with expensive and exotic, as the only banana plants they might encounter would be the disciplined, manicured ones decorating a corner at a tropical resort, and the musky animalic quality the result of their own recreational labors. I see how many would enjoy this perfume based on those images, experienced or imagined. After I had identified the note, I couldn't enjoy this fragrance much longer, nor get a good, objective picture of the other elements of the composition. It smelled too realistically of a world infused with frustration, uncertainty and unrealized dreams. EDIT: The dry-down IS to-die-for, though. Delicate and woody, almost no trace of the earlier accords. Such a strange, disjointed perfume.

This is that rare thing, a transparent oriental floral. I've worn it several times over the last week, in our cold and rainy weather, and I think it might be even more wearable in springtime, or for the evening at the end of summer. What Amaranthine reminds me most of is an orchid greenhouse I visited during a trip to the Big Island of Hawaii, where we'd gone to see the volcanoes. That side of the island lacks resorts and that "tropical paradise tourist spot" vibe. It's greeeeeen, sprinkled here and there with flowers, but less suntan-oil-and-bikinis-and-maitais, more plump Hawaiian grandmas in bright housedress-like muu-muus, gardening outside their modest houses. It's *real* in a way that Maui is not. And Amaranthine is *real* too - I smell the green banana and the freesia most strongly in it, along with a bit of orange blossom. It's not marine, but it is a bit watery, so that you think of, say, a light rain that lasts half an hour, and then goes away. There is just a hint of spice; to my nose it's far less than I expected given the list of notes. This dewy white floral eventually fades into a light, but sensual skin scent that is mostly wood and tonka bean on me, with a smoothness probably from the milky note, and there's the suggestion of warm, moist skin - not quite sweaty, but that humid breath skin seems to give off in a warm evening. It's beautiful.