Category: Sin and Salvation
Another woody, sort of piney scent (to me), but it's clean and full of light, too...like sunlight spreading across curved rafters and pillars of polished wood. If anything, it makes me think of sitting in a church, perhaps before a big ritual or holiday, in the hour or so before everyone else starts arriving; you're alone and you have time to savor the quietness and intimacy. Even though it's not a keeper for me, it's a beautiful image to evoke.
Category: Diabolus
In the imp: Strongly sweet and fruity.
Wet: Hellooooo Raspberry! It was incredibly strong and sweet, and, oddly enough made me think of 'generic candle smell'...that scent that most candles seem to have to me. I guess I've hung around a lot of berry-scented candles.
Dry: This was the part that has changed the most. I wore this every day for over a week, just because I *wanted* to try to like this scent, or at least give it a fair shake. Initially, it dried as pure raspberry -- sickly sweet and very 'childish', in that I felt like I was about 15 years too old to be wearing this scent. As the days passed, however, I noticed that there was more of a mingling of orange with the raspberry...that was actually a *lot* more pleasing to me. And today, I've noticed that the scent has grown sweeter still, like faint cherries, but unlike the raspberry, it isn't annoying.
Verdict: This scent just isn't for me. It's certainly not bad, and I would advise anyone who is initially put-off by it to give it a chance over time, particularly if you otherwise enjoy cherry-like scents. But there are other scents that I like a lot better.
I'll quit beating this dead horse (or imp) and put it away; perhaps I will think of someone else who would give it the love it deserves.
What I liked: The orange (when it briefly showed itself).
What I didn't like: The raspberry. Just too sickly-sweet for me.
Also, my skin just seems to eat up fruity scents. Waaah! So sad.
My very first BPAL order came today! I brought in the mail just a few minutes ago. I was excited, but made myself linger over the box, because I love to do so when opening any kind of present.
I had ordered six imps: Absinthe, Aeval, Aglaea, Agnes Nutter, Aizen-Myoo, and Akuma. (Yes, I meant to do that.) Agnes is not available as an imp, as I found out soon after I had placed the order, but whoever had packed my box had kindly substituted Al-Azif for it instead. Hee! Thanks for understanding my wacky system, whoever you are!
I received 3 frimps as well: Fruitcake (I have heard much talk of this scent), Tushnamatay, and Wrath. I love how Wrath is so cutely furious inside its vial, bright cherry red compared to the others.
Mmm, and the very sweet, faint scent that caressed the packing materials, as if to reassure me that these were not going to be like any perfume I had yet smelled. Lovely...
Thank you, oh BPAL dieties. I can't wait to embark on my explorations...what a wonderful way to celebrate the Solstice...
Category: Mad Tea Party
Now that I am re-visiting it for the review, this smells a lot better than it had initially. I remember it being rather shrill and awful; now it's more muted, more like a watercolor painting done in pastel colors than the garish melange of FRUT! FLOWERS! INSANITY! that I remember.
Even so, something -- possibly the pineapple -- is just not working for me. This one needs to go to a loving home.
Category: Ars Amatoria
This is a beautiful blend that manages to be sweet without been cloying, and a bit on the resinous side. It's a dark-brown sort of scent, melancholy and brooding, and subtly creeps up on you to gently fill your senses with its sweet air of loss. It has decent staying power and throw. Very, very lovely.
Limited Editions -- Halloween 2009
Like many, I also detected Roses WTF from this. Upon deeply huffing my wrist, however, I can figure out that it's just the way that the almond is interacting with the other components...it's almost like there's almond and orange extract, or orange rind, in with a caramely pastry of some sort. From a distance, that distinction blurs and becomes a rose-like scent. I actually love the way that this scent works, and therefore bought a bottle of it.
Limited Edition -- Halloween 2009 -- The Literary Vampires
At first whiff, it is a wet, resinous patchouli salted with clove and dragon's blood. There is even a slight sort of currant smell, that makes it almost pulpy for a second. Very lovely. This wears off in a flash, and is strong on clove. As dominant as this combination of scents sounds, it really doesn't express itself very much on me...it's more of an intimate scent to be experienced in furtive huffs. This is another one that I will probably end up trading away eventually, albeit very reluctantly.
Category: Limited Editions -- Samhain 2008 -- Sleepy Hollow Series
Initially, it's a very dry, smokey scent; it doesn't have the sharp tang of cordite that I was expecting -- it's more like the last traces of smoke after a flame has been snuffed or blown out, sans the wax.
This is very fleeting, however; after that, I swear that it smells like Axe Body Spray. LOL Not really my thing.
This does strike me as a very masculine scent, and I'd recommend it, along with Brom Bones, for anyone seeking out a late 'Weenie purchase for their male companions.
Limited Edition -- Anniversary Scents
To me, this is a smokey scent -- like smokey musk. There is a bit of herbalness...the sweet basil lurking just beneath -- but for the most part I seem to get black pepper, smoke, and dust, and if the dragon's blood is there it's acting like incense for once, instead of being ultra-sweet as it usually manifests for me. This is a manly scent, but one that I don't mind wearing...I think I can decently rock it. Smoke, stone, and iron -- very fitting for this phoenix!
Category: Limited Editions
Sort of funny...I got an imp of this in a swap from one person, and then a bottle in another swap, and for a while I thought I might have been lucky enough to have both versions of Libra, since they smelled so different!
In the bottle, it's a very sweet scent...fruit scents dominate, with florals sitting very humbly in the background. For a while I thought it was very sweet apple I might be smelling, but research revealed that the bottle is the 2007 version. So, I get to smell the sweet cherry and currant and plum, and it's suuuuuper nice there.
On my skin (and in the imp), however, things switch places. The fruit quickly retreats, and rose shoulders its way forward, with carnation acting as its adoring sidekick.
Thankfully, this version of rose isn't the kind that turns into MUA HA HA DIE on me, but it's still Rose Liek Whoa. It comes juuuust short of getting crazy a lot of the time...which, come to think of it, describes me rather well, too.
While not the sweet light fruity blend that I think I would have adored, this is still a pretty scent...not one for every day wear, but definitely one worth hanging onto and breaking out when I feel like basking in the wonderfulness that is Libra. (And we are quite wonderful, yes. *preen*)
Category: Limited Edition: Lupercalia
In the bottle, this blend is thick and sweet and pungeant. Throughout wearing it, I think that the amber, honey, and currant were predominant, as it was a very thick, sweet scent. When it dries, it gets light and powdery with just the hint of a sweet undertone. It has good throw and staying power -- it's lasted all day on me.
Verdict: This is another bottle that I'm glad I bought! It actually reminds me a lot of Aglaea, only without the slightly cloying air that that other blend had.This is sweet and sexy and mmmm yum.
I like the thick, sweet muskiness of this. To me it actually smells like oranges, but oh well! I like it.
Category: Picnic in Arkham
In the imp: HELLO I WILL BE YOUR CARAMEL SMELL FOR THE DAY
Wet: Still very strongly of caramel, mixed with chocolate...it was almost too overpowering, making me feel as if I had glutted myself on forbidden Halloween candy and eaten myself sick.
Dry: It morphs from the crazy 'wtf?'-inducing candy smell to something...else. I'm wanting to say 'musky', but I don't think that's the right word. Yet it doesn't smell like straight incense, or straight florals. To accurately describe it eludes me...but this is not to say that it is unpleasant, now. In fact, it's a really lovely odor.
Personally, I realized that the candy-like smell actually smelt a lot like the very dregs of burnt-out incense...I am wanting to say myrrh, simply because that's what I've burnt in my house before, and the 'memory' of smell that I have is from that. (And wouldn't myrrh be appropriate, in this case?) Once I realized this, I saw the perfume from an entirely different perspective -- that of smelling an area where a ritual took place, long after the fact, with just enough sweet, seductive malevolence to draw one's attention and keep it.
Verdict: It's a very interesting scent, which I find works on several different levels (especially since the obnoxious caramelness has toned down quite a bit in subsequent days of testing). I don't know if it demands bottle status in my collection, but the imp is definitely worth hanging on to.
What I liked: The caramel was okay, once it calmed the hell down. I like the ultimate end result. It seemed to have a little more throw than what I've been wearing lately, which was nice.
What I didn't like: Getting to that beautiful end result is a bit uncomfortable.
I will simply have to compare this to other 'incense' scents to see if I like anything better. It's not bad by any means, it just may be one of those scents that I'd only wear once in a while.
Limited Editions -- Halloween 2009 -- The Literary Vampires
I pretty much just get roasted chestnuts off of this. It's a rich, almost buttery sort of smell -- it's like going over to someone's house after they've been baking all day...all the smells of the various breads, cookies and such mingle together, into one warm, delicious celebration of carbohydrates. It's a very, very intriguing scent, though in my case I'm pretty sure I don't need a bottle of it. If I do ever swap my imp of this, it will be with a bittersweet and reluctant feeling.
Limited Edition -- Anniversary Scents
I get sweet, slightly lemony florals from this...and then it poofs away and dissipates. Even hard huffing at my skin doesn't seem to reveal much! Which is puzzling, because a couple of people commented on it smelling nice...so I'm wondering what they hell they were smelling! I suppose I'll hang onto my decant for a while, but it seemed pointless to buy a bottle of something I can't even smell.
Category: Ars Amatoria
Dammit! I don't detect *any* of these notes in this at all! To me, this is all jasmine, with maybe a barest hint of musk. It's definitely pretty and sensual...but not the OMG yumminess that I was hoping for.
Category: Limited Editions -- Halloween 2008
This scent is definitely as advertised: leather and musk. The 'leather' aspect evokes brand-new, shiny, supple, oiled leather; it's like walking into a Wilsons showroom (or any other store that specializes in leather coats and goods). The musk is a pure, clean skin-musk that is verrrrrrry delicious; it smells just like fresh, clean man-skin. The combination makes it a pretty damned intriguing scent. I don't need a bottle, but I'm definitely keeping my imp, and I'd recommend wearing this to anyone who wants a highly-interested woman or three to follow them home.
Vanilla with sweet palm date, with the oakmoss and ginger giving it sort of a warm undercurrent. If this would have had any throw at all, it would totally have been on my MUST BUY NAO list. However, it is really, really lovely, and those who prefer to keep their perfumey pleasures all to themselves, to be sniffed discreetly from their wrist throughout the day, are really in for a treat with this one.
Category: Wanderlust -- The Phantom Isles
Hmm, this is interesting. It smells like hot, smooth, black stones, with a hint of smokey charcoal (like that found in Brimstone)...and yet there's also an aquatic side to it as well, as if those stones make up the beach on a lonely island, or perhaps they're part of some natural jungle hot-springs spa. Some nice imagery there, if not as vivid as many others enjoy through this scent. This scent sticks close to the skin, and wears off after a few hours.
Category: Rappacini's Garden
Ohhhhh, yum! I get a lot of coconut from this, though at the beginning, if I lean down close and sniff my skin, I get the 'dirt' notes -- a musky, loamy sort of smell that is creamy in a way -- like, yes, mushrooms. Incredibly odd, but true. As it dries, the coconut smell takes over for the most part, with just a hint of that creamy 'shroom smell running underneath it. I have to admit that I wondered why people seemed to flip over this, but damn! It's delicious. Definitely on my list of favorites, now!
It has a gentle sort of throw, treating me to wafts of creamy coconut all day long. Yay!
Category: Limited Edition -- Halloween 2008
This scent did not work on me at all. Aside from smelling burnt, it smells sharp and shrill and peppery, like the little black dots of mold that you find on the underside of leaves, and the spent brown papery galls that once harbored wasps. Maybe it was the vetiver, or the particular combination of vetiver and tobacco...but it all just adds up to a big cloud of Yuck.
Limited Edition -- Halloween 2009
Not *exactly* like candy corn to my nose...more like a sugary vanilla. Someone who described it as Karo or corn syrup hit it pretty much on the nose.
I was really leery of this one, but like all the Phoenixes, it was really nice. Believe it or not, but I really can 'smell' the 'gleaming white metal' in the description; it's like what the mirror-sheen on a stainless-steel table would smell like, if it had an odor. I think the honeysuckle is what makes it so palatable for me.
It's super-light, and seemed to fade really fast. This one won't be so hard to let go of.
Category -- Wanderlust
I don't get any darkness from this at all -- nope, this is a bright, sunny, lush jungle scent. It's extremely evocative of someone sitting by a waterfall, sipping a rum-based drink, and inhaling the rain-kissed scent of jungle blooms. And, later on, I really do get the scent of stone -- as if our intrepid hero sauntered into the limestone cave behind the waterfall to check on his chest of treasure and sleep the afternoon away.
Alas, it dissipates pretty quickly on me, but it's a very fun little mind-trip while it's there!
It's a really great scent for summertime!
Category: Ars Amatoria
Initially, I got lots of syrupy cherry with a hint of cinnamon; subsequent uses brought out the licorice. Now, it's blended (in that very mysterious way that a lot of scents seem to have gotten their shit together a month after I originally tested them) into a nice mix of cherry and anise, with the licorice smell diabolically present and tempting. I was on the fence about getting rid of it, but now that I've read the reviews again, I think I'll hang onto it. :love!: It stays and throws decently.
Category: Mad Tea Party
On first application, it's Honey Liek Whoa. Thankfully, it doesn't take long for the tonka and perhaps the chamomile to calm it down and make it into more of a smooth, creamy scent. Once it dries, it tends to hug close to the skin, and seemed to wear off pretty quickly.
