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Douce amère 2000

7.7 / 10 290 Ratings
A popular perfume by Serge Lutens for women and men, released in 2000. The scent is spicy-sweet. It is still in production.
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Main accords

Spicy
Sweet
Floral
Gourmand
Woody

Fragrance Notes

AbsinthAbsinth AniseedAniseed MuskMusk LilyLily TiaréTiaré CedarCedar JasmineJasmine TagetesTagetes CinnamonCinnamon Tiarella

Perfumers

Ratings
Scent
7.7290 Ratings
Longevity
7.6211 Ratings
Sillage
6.4196 Ratings
Bottle
8.1182 Ratings
Value for money
6.646 Ratings
Submitted by Kankuro · last update on 02/08/2026.
Source-backed & verified
Interesting Facts
In 2005 a limited bottle collection of this scent was released with domino motifs.

Smells similar

What the fragrance is similar to
Paname by Keiko Mecheri
Paname
Blue Vanille (Extrait de Parfum) by Henry Jacques
Blue Vanille Extrait de Parfum
Confetto by Profumum Roma
Confetto
Vanilla & Anise by Jo Malone
Vanilla & Anise
Creations: MV3 by M∙A∙C
Creations: MV3
Theorema (Eau de Parfum) by Fendi
Theorema Eau de Parfum

Reviews

21 in-depth fragrance descriptions
ScentFan

336 Reviews
ScentFan
ScentFan
Very helpful Review 8  
French Intimacy
The French have a way of making love then, without washing, putting on their clothes and walking proudly about. Not all of them. Certainly some I’ve encountered at business meetings.

This perfume reminds me of passing by a recently-loved female native of that country—well perfumed, of course, it being France. Thus subtle Jasmine, Lily, Tiaré.

Douce Amére has nailed these women. The scent must be beguiling because hubby smelled a sample and promptly bought the Bell Jar for me, unasked. I am wearing the perfume now, at his request. He says it smells womanly.

It certainly does.

After the initial animalic assault, this well-constructed and only briefly off-putting perfume really does settle into the heady muskiness of unwashed perfumed bodies. Where’s the musk coming from? The Tagetes, I’d say, and a floral I’m not familiar with called Musk Tiarella.

This isn’t a loud perfume, though. Douce Amére almost turns into a skin scent, which is just as well since it suggests a woman’s thoroughly and recently kissed skin.

In short, it’s a bit dirty.

I, a bather and washer of sheets, rarely smell like this. Maybe I should. Maybe that’s why hubby bought me Douce Amêre.

Perhaps you need it, too.
Updated on 08/02/2021
1 Comment
MemoryOScent

37 Reviews
MemoryOScent
MemoryOScent
Helpful Review 6  
childhood nostalgia
Douce Amère is a strange one. I am not sure I like it but I love wearing it. Another one of those scents where what I smell has nothing to do with what most people will tell you it does. It opens with a thick, sweet exotic flower burst (it actually reminds me of datura) but from early on bitter notes are playing hide and seek with the flowers. As it settles on the skin everything becomes, stickier, creamier, less floral. The unforgettable smell of sweetened condensed milk becomes the centre of the attention but right there, in the end of of the sweet milk trail awaits one of the most cryptic, nostalgic, ironic notes I have ever smelt in fragrance: a rubber teat, a pacifier. I am sure I don’t recall this smell from the time I was using one but I remember being disgusted by it when I was watching my younger cousins grow up. The overly sensitive smell of the five-year-old that I was could not believe that they were sticking that thing in a baby’s mouth and expected to eat from this. And I remember my parents telling me that I was a cry-baby and wouldn’t go to sleep without my pacifier and I just couldn’t believe it! So annoying was that smell to me.

Now after all these years rediscovering the combination of sweet milk and rubber strikes strange chords. Douce Amère is way too sweet for my tastes but every time I wear it I get this nostalgic feeling of sheltered childhood. Soft clouds of fuzzy cotton wrap around me, I feel the warm sensation of snoozing in a dimly lit room knowing that someone is watching over me. I am not sure where these feelings come from but it almost feels like they are popping out the depths of my subconscious, right from the time I was actually using that bottle full of milk. The word “nostalgia”cannot describe exactly how I feel. The portuguese word “saudade” is the only word that explains this. A strong feeling of missing something that is part of you, is now missing and possibly can never be found again, filling you with a restrained sadness that will always be a part of you.
0 Comments
ClaireV

969 Reviews
ClaireV
ClaireV
4  
Anisic milk pudding
Douce Amère is not a simple perfume, but it wears like the simplest and sheerest of gauzes. It is a scent that reveals different layers over the course of a day – hazelnuts, smoke, Ouzo, cinnamon, licorice root, green leaves, all ending in a salted lily cream as unctuous as a bowl of ice cream.

It is more than a little offbeat. You’ll tie yourself into knots trying to figure out whether it’s a bitter tonic for your liver or a creamy, bready, vanilla-soaked gourmand, but either way, that persistent thread of sharp greenery marks it out as something unique. Douce Amère satisfies because it gives you all of the interesting parts of a full-on oriental and none of the stodge.
0 Comments
Pennantis

149 Reviews
Pennantis
Pennantis
1  
Tea and clean
This one starts off like a sweet herbal tea: soft, sugary, with a hit of anise that gives it instant personality. The amère part kicks in soon after — aromatic herbs, a little green bite, almost like a light bitter note.
Then suddenly it switches lanes: dry vanilla, a powdery vibe, and that “freshly washed skin” feeling. From enchanted potion to French soap in a heartbeat.
A mix of sweet, herbal, and clean that keeps shifting as you wear it.
0 Comments
8Scent
Njdeb

63 Reviews
Njdeb
Njdeb
2  
A discontinued (or so I hear) treasure
At first sniff, I get a pollen-like effect – a lightly sweet, somewhat powdery scent with a bit of a dry herbal quality. This floats atop the aroma of a blooming white flower (I pick up jasmine mostly). The white flower scent is definitely present, yet somehow softened, almost as if it were bleached by the sun.

As the perfume dries down, it develops more of a gourmand character. The sunny floral /herbal smell remains, but is now dusted with flakes of creamy chocolate just starting to melt in the warm air. The cinnamon and anise are not easily detectable to me, but do lend a delicate spiciness to the mix.

This fragrance is so well blended that none of the notes take over, but rather combine to form something unique and lovely. Sadly discontinued.
0 Comments
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Statements

49 short views on the fragrance
1
Sweet and sour, soft and incisive: a perfect balance. This scent makes me feel incredibly comfortable.
0 Comments
I get absinthe a bit in the opening, which I like. But it dried down to a soapy green-ish floral scent on my skin, and I do not care for it
0 Comments
8 months ago
Richly creamy, anise-flavored custard: delightful, if you enjoy these notes.
0 Comments
47
42
Honolulu flowers
Warm cream in winter rooms
Where cinnamon spice and anise green
Rest in musk cotton clouds
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42 Comments
44
44
Sweet-green fairy
With bitter absinthe breath
Floating on a powdery-soft musk cloud over Tahiti
Cinnamon-warm spicy heart
Beating gently to the rhythm of anise
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44 Comments
44
46
Bitter sweet whispers
Spice hops
Cinnamon/anise musk jumps
in the non-floral land.
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46 Comments
32
31
Sweet floral wafts
Absinthe spices it up strongly
a slightly bitter brew
warms the heart
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31 Comments
30
26
We drink Pastis,
play pétanque in the park,
stroll through the market,
enjoy the last rays of sunshine
and each other.
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26 Comments
4 years ago
24
17
SweetMemories - out of nowhere I smell your absinthe breath; your essence echoes bittersweet...
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17 Comments
20
17
Showered today with herbs that
I dry off with an old
musk towel
massage lice shampoo into my
hair wearing a poorly washed T-shirt
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17 Comments
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