Dark Amber
Bath & Body Works (2012)

I enjoyed Dark Amber for years as both the shampoo/shower gel and the body spray. This is a sweet, highly vanillic amber with a boozy feel, the latter made even more deeply resonant by a strong fougère accord. The shampoo is great just by itself, or serving as an amber base for almost any other strong fragrance. Both the spray and the shampoo have a powerful, pleasant, and long-lasting scent, yet simple and general enough (amber) that it won’t conflict badly with most other perfumes.

I much prefer Dark Amber to the more recent B&BW release Smooth Amber. The latter is based on a modern woody amber aromachemical, and smells mostly dry and woody. In contrast, Dark Amber is centered on the old vanillic incense accord known as amber, and is much sweeter.

Dark Amber has both long-lasting freshness and persistent sweetness. Lilial is on the label, and the freshness strikes me as quite similar to the fresh aspects of fragrances like Terre d’Hermès Eau Très Fraîche, vintage Eau d’Hermès, Diorissimo, and others known to use lilial. “Dark” is almost a misnomer, in my opinion - “Deep” would probably be better.

Dark Amber is an excellent fragrance that many fragrance lovers have forgotten about. Very much worth sniffing, if you can find it.

So the longevity of this short lived...but then again we've come to expect that from Bath and Body Works, have we not?

The scent itself reminds me of those Christmas candles with the addition of lemon (bergamot). That said, when I smell this I want to gnaw my own arm off. Definitely a sweeter almost a boozey smell...but not in an offensive way. (Similar to Spark but a bit brighter at not as gourmand.)

Just wish it lasted longer.

Smells the best out of all the Bath and Body stuff I smelled while in store getting a few last minute things for the wifey. One or two other scents were ok, this one made me buy. Got 3.4 oz for $29.99, then got a matching full size body wash for free, $11 value. Ok, so now for the smell. It could be in the same family as say Pasha or Safari. I possibly detect something Curve-like to it as well. Very nice, got two compliments on first wear. Longevity is poor, only lasted on me about an hour or so, but man does it smell good!

This smells great for about 30 minutes then poof...all done..