Fortunately for perfumery, ambergris' distinctive odor is principally owed to just two chemicals, ambroxan and ambrinol, both of which are now synthesized.
The bloom and trail effect given by ambergris is replaced with ambroxan, however combining ambroxan and ambrinol does little to recreate a "real" ambergris odour. Those may thousands of other molecules, while perhaps only <5%, give a very distinctive and unique odour. It's like a rich leather bag that's been floating in the ocean for +30y - salty, marine, animalistic, musky and leathery all in one.
"Ambergris has been synthesized, but its synthetic versions are not convincing. They lack an indefinable something that is gained only after years spent at sea."
Probably a bit like synthesized truffle oil, good enough for most people but lacking richness for a trained delicate palate.
The scandal with truffle oil is how difficult it is to find anything remotely real even if you want to, because of the duplicitous wording on packaging and marketing copy.
I think the scandal with truffle is that even refined palates can't find it. Even the most refined restaurants that use actual truffle, are forced to add the fake thing, or most customers won't be satisfied with the dish.
Ambrinol is really disgusting (source: I have a small sample) and only makes sense mixed with the very nice ambroxide (IIRC, ambroxan is a commercial moniker for it).
There's a curious evolution about abroxan's rep. If I'm not mistaken it was Dior that first used the name instead of ambergris in the publicity materials. I guess they were trying to avoid the "they kill the poor whales to make fucking perfumes". But they ended with the "I can't stand that synthetic ambroxan crap, I must be allergic and everybody's wearing Sauvage now".
New perfumes use some other bullshit names like "driftwood", "marine notes" or just "amber" (a very different stuff).
Really interesting to read. So IIUC ambergris is _sometimes_ formed in the 4th (last) sperm whale stomach, is basically a constipatory plug of indigestible squid parts (beaks, quills, and eye lenses) which either eventually passes thru the whale’s anus, ruptures the intestine and kills the whale, or is (was?) harvested on rare occasion by whalers. And if you’re lucky you can find it washed up on beaches.
one of my favourite frags 'Kouros' by YSL uses ambergris (or synthesised)
shame that over time the formula has changed so much.
as per descriptions..it really used to smell like "sweat"/"heavy"...and has changed to much fresher and cleaner.
It's not ambergris that gives Kouros its characteristic pissy notes, but civet (also real oakmoss and strong aldehydes) ingredients all of which they toned down in the early 2000s and then completely removed in 2008 (Loreal era).
The Kouros you can buy these days (white instead of metallic shoulders), is heavy on coriander with barely any "musk" and bears little resemblance to the "scent of the gods" of the 80s and 90s. I still have multiple bottles from the 90s which are as good as ever, together with Kouros Fraicheur from the same era which is another Pierre Bourdon masterpiece. YSL perfumes from the 80s and 90s were legendary.
Up until not too much ago we also extracted musk essence from the anal glands of white belly musk deer. Another interesting thing is oud. It's a resin produced in aquilaria trees when infected with a specific fungus, and it can cost tens of thousands of dollars per kg. I think one of the first famous commercial Perfumes to use it was m7 by ysl, you can read an article on it on fragrantica: https://www.fragrantica.com/news/Yves-Saint-Laurent-M7-Revis...
Oud is exceptional. I highly recommend anyone wanting to explore beyond western perfumes to check out www.ensaroud.com - there's some really fantastic descriptions of olfactory notes too.
The perfume likely contains exotics, but the rest of the ingredients are mainly sourced from fermentation products, hydrocarbons (petroleum), or synthetic versions of plant oils/terpenes.
Readit News
Probably a bit like synthesized truffle oil, good enough for most people but lacking richness for a trained delicate palate.
There's a curious evolution about abroxan's rep. If I'm not mistaken it was Dior that first used the name instead of ambergris in the publicity materials. I guess they were trying to avoid the "they kill the poor whales to make fucking perfumes". But they ended with the "I can't stand that synthetic ambroxan crap, I must be allergic and everybody's wearing Sauvage now".
New perfumes use some other bullshit names like "driftwood", "marine notes" or just "amber" (a very different stuff).
https://thethaiger.com/thai-life/lucky-fisherman-finds-whale...
3 million Baht buys a quite nice house or condo in Thailand.
The Kouros you can buy these days (white instead of metallic shoulders), is heavy on coriander with barely any "musk" and bears little resemblance to the "scent of the gods" of the 80s and 90s. I still have multiple bottles from the 90s which are as good as ever, together with Kouros Fraicheur from the same era which is another Pierre Bourdon masterpiece. YSL perfumes from the 80s and 90s were legendary.
Alcohol Denat, Butane, Isobutane, Propane, Perfume, Ethylhexylglycerin, Alpha-Isomethyl Ionone, Citral, Citronellol, Coumarin, Geraniol, Hydroxycitronellal, Limonene, Linalool.
The perfume likely contains exotics, but the rest of the ingredients are mainly sourced from fermentation products, hydrocarbons (petroleum), or synthetic versions of plant oils/terpenes.
Coumarin came up on Hacker News recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40758767
The entire history of perfumes is fascinating, and like pigments/dyes, was completely transformed by modern organic synthesis, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfume#History and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfume#Synthetic_sources
I was surprised by how pleasant beaver smells. And how DELICIOUS they are.
How are they not extinct?
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