I can see right away why this one is popular. It's dark and resinous, redolent with patchouli and spices and musk. I personally get a hell of a lot more 'incense' than 'vanilla' with this one, though I can also sense the vanilla; it wafts up every now and then in teasing little strokes, like a beckoning finger.
I'm probably going to really really really really really hate myself for not getting a bottle, because I have a feeling it's going to age REALLY well. Honestly cannot decide if I want to trade it or keep it. Swaps only, probably, if I get rid of it.
Category: Somnium
I've been applying this every night before I go to bed for about ten days now...and for the most part I'd say it works really well. This is the first of the Dream Formulas that I've tried -- I didn't know that you could order them as imps, until someone in a decant circle thoughtfully included this.
The scent is predominantly lavender, with a strong thread of eucalyptus underneath it, and hints of anise here and there. They mingle to create a very medicinal odor -- as a perfume, this would be really bad, but as a component for relaxation and sleep, it's *very* useful. The strident quality of it is actually soothing...it reminds me of when I'd get colds as a child and my mom would smear Vicks on my chest and under my nose -- that same sort of 'OMG this is strong...but it's helping, so yay!' feeling.
By morning, it has worn off, so I never smell it when I get up...though I often can smell traces of the other perfume I've been wearing the day before. This is the perfect medicinal blend -- it does its job, doesn't interfere or interact with anything, and then evaporates.
The vast majority of nights that I use it, I can be asleep in under fifteen minutes, and sleep all the way through the night with no interruptions. While I rarely have trouble sleeping anyway, this past month I've been having lots of problems with anxiety and such, so Baku has been a blessing.
I tend to be a skeptic, but as far as I'm concerned, this stuff works pretty well.
Category: Diabolus
I really wanted to like this one, both for the name and ingredients! All I get is pine trees and eucalyptus, though, and it's not even that awesome. It could have been the heat and sweat, but even with trying to slather it, the scent just disappears. So sad.
Category: Rappacini's Garden
The apple in this is rather medicinal-smelling...almost like eucalyptus, as someone else noted earlier. However, I don't find it unpleasant at all, due to the way that the ashy notes blend in with it. Honestly, to me it's like a mixture of the appletini smell of Mock Turtle's Lessons and the wondrous charcoal of Brimstone. I like both of those scents, and really like this one. It is a scent that soaks into your skin and gives little wafts here and there, and seems to last for a goodly time. One of my favorites, now.
When first applied, I get frankincense and a hint of amber -- very lovely. I can see how people get the 'fizzy' feeling, though, because I quickly detected it there, as well. Then the incense morphs quickly to something sweeter; while I didn't get out and out 'grape' scent from the wine, it was vaguely there. After a bit, it just goes generically perfumey. Just not my thing...
Category: Excolo
In the imp: Very herbal and 'green'.
Wet: Very strident and medicinal in tone. As time passed, it morphed into a really musty, sour odor; perhaps that's the vetiver? I've never worn anything with vetiver in it before, so I'm hesitant to pass judgement right away, but whichever component was at fault, it was not a very nice smell.
Dry: I was definitely throwing something sour and nasty. Which is a shame, because if I sniffed up close to my skin, I could smell the leafy components of it perfectly, as if I were bending low into a garden and letting the leaves brush my cheeks. If it *all* had ended up smelling like that, I would have liked it a *lot* more, as that particular feeling was lovely.
Verdict: I'm going to have to pass on this one.
What I liked: That leafy scent; I'll try to keep an eye out for scents with olive leaf and see if that evokes a similiar feeling.
What I didn't like: That musty nastiness. I'll have to keep an eye out for vetiver, as well, and see if that was the culprit.
Category: Limited Editions -- Lupercalia 2007
I received this as a decant from my Switch Witch.
This...is sex and decadence in a bottle. The earthy pleasures of opium, tobacco leaf, and liquor -- yes, liquor! I'm wanting to say bourbon -- are all I can detect, and it is AWESOME. It's as if someone had captured the essence of a long night in a bawdy bar, sans the less alluring scents of, say, sweat and actual tobacco *smoke*, and put it in a bottle.
If you want to smell like you've been out all night partying, with the smug satisfaction of not having a hangover, then wear this. And don't be afraid to slather it.
YUM.
Category: Rappacini's Garden
Like many of the Garden scents, I find this one a very green, viney sort of scent. Up close on my skin, there's a more pungeant, earthy scent -- I can see where some people were getting the 'burnt tires' vibe! This doesn't have very much throw; it hugs my skin throughout the day. I actually sort of wanted to like this simply because so many people seem not to. It's decent, but not awesome enough for me to need to keep.
Category: Limited Editions -- Halloween 2008 -- Sleepy Hollow
I get a LOT of maple and oats out of this, with little side-hints of carrot. It's a delicious, pleasant, warm, comforting scent, but unfortunately the throw is minimal -- if there's musk, I really can't detect any -- and staying power is so-so. I will treasure what's left of my imp, but I don't feel that I need any more than that.
Category -- Bewitching Brews
A sweet, almost cloying mix if rose and other florals. Not really my thing. It has decent longevity and some moderate throw, especially if, like me, you tend to amp this certain kind of rose. (Now if only I knew just what *kind* of rose it is...)
Category: Bewitching Blends -- The Conjure Bag
In the imp, it had an almost licorice-like quality to it, with lemondrops mixed in.
Wet, it smelled like bubblegum -- fresh, pink, juicy sugary gum.
Oddly enough, as it dried, there was a sort of...flowery note to it...or perhaps an herbal one...rather powdery and faint and intriguing, after that straight-up sacchirine candy goodness...almost as if Aunt Caroline is revealing her true talents behind that candy-coated mask! Unfortunately, as time went on, it turned plasticky. Very disappointing...
Had it stayed in the candy stages, I probably would have liked it a lot more. It does have a soothing quality to it, but quite frankly, *all* the BPAL scents do that for me. If I encounter a bad smell or am having a bad moment, I'll sniff at my wrists and feel better for a bit.
Category: Discontinued Scents
This is a wonderfully light and delicate floral. I can smell iris and, I think, moonflower; I don't pick up the super-sweet tone that I normally do from jasmine, but that's fine, as it seems to be working its magic in other ways. This scent is fresh and clean, and highly evocative; imagine standing among reeds and fragrant, dew-covered flowers at the edge of a pool, while the moon and stars shine above. It's beautiful. This is the one Muse that I really liked!
Category -- Bewitching Brews
Wow.
This is unlike anything I've smelled in quite some time...
There is supple, well-worn leather, and ivy -- more like the dried tendrils of ivy still clinging to the grass-choked stone of a tower that has long since crumbled away to piles of rubble. Every now and then, the wind stirs up scents from the lives of those who used to dwell there -- their warm spiced wine, the wood stacked up in piles for their fire, their very spirit and essence, all wafting in in a ghostly way. It really is a very sad, wistful, evocative scent...a great sensory experience.
This is not quite for me. But if I were to come across it on a man, I think I would follow him almost anywhere.
Highly recommended for those looking for masculine scents.
On me it's a really resinous, dirty-hippy sort of scent, all teak and musk and patchouli. Then it gets a high, sweet-sour scent, almost like furniture polish...I suppose that's the star anise trying to work its magic. Its best phase is when it's completely dried; then it is a dark yet gleaming scent, like an intricately-carved teak chest, glistening with polish and the adoring care of generations of hands.
As aggressive as all of the notes sound, this one doesn't throw at *all*. Really strange. It's not for me, yet if I were to smell it on someone else, I think I'd really like it and be coming in for lots of close, intimate sniffings.
Category: Wanderlust
Initially, I smelled the myrrh and wine, with perhaps the honey thrown in...it had a very sticky, tart, juicy sap-like quality to it.
As it went on, the stickiness of it went away...just becoming myrrh and wine, with perhaps an herbal tint around the edges.
I'm thinking that myrrh is going to be one of those hit-and-miss things with me. This time, it was a miss, and I think it was the wine note that did it...the blend had a sourness to it that did not appeal to me. So, nope, not for me.
I liked Anubis better than this, and I'm guessing it's because of the mixture of herbs that was in it...the wine note couldn't come out and outright trash things like it did in Athens.
Limited Edition -- Halloween 2009
A very yummy Pumpkin, indeed! This is the first time I really came up against the 'buttery' note that a lot of people talk about. But as soon as the cap is off and it's being applied, I get a hearty blast of freshly-melted butter. It quickly ebbs a bit so that it just smells like lightly-salted buttered popcorn...and then the other notes come out to play. I like honey, but often it can smell just a little too musky or tart; here, the pumpkin mellows it out enough so that it gives a nice, mellow body to the pumpkin and takes away a light sweetness from its fellow component. I liked it so much, I made sure to buy a bottle.
Category -- The Mad Tea Party
Predominantly a glorious, warm amber. The grassy scents are dry ones, and smell a little like patchouli and cinnamon, or some other very dry, powdery spice. I agree with other reviewers about this lasting a short time; it's really nice for the hour or so that it's there, but then the Lion is padding off to parts unknown.
Category: Bewitching Brews -- The Conjure Bag
In the imp, it smelled warm and spicy, like cinnamon and other spices, with a sugary hint to it...as if someone sexy were baking something sweet in my kitchen! (Hey, one of the many ways to my heart is through my stomach...)
If only it had remained like that. As it went on, it immediately smelled like red-hots, or Big Red gum. Not really my idea of sexy, now.
An hour later, it's gone. Not even a remote trace of it left to sniff.
So, no...not for me.
Category: Sin & Salvation
In the imp: There's cinnamon, but in a sweet, sugary, Red Hots candy sort of way.
Wet: Sweetness predominates. I'm assuming this must be the clove, though I had never expected it to smell like that. It is mainly a floral sort of sweetness, with just a hint of sugar running through it; thankfully, the candy-like scent has gone away. Every now and then I can detect a brief spike of cinnamon or pepper, but the scent is predominantly sweet.
Dry: Finally when it had dried and died down (this would be *hours* later), I could detect a resinous incense scent on my skin -- dragon's blood.
Verdict: Even though it's not behaving the way I'd have thought from the description, I LOVE this scent! It is my favorite so far. Every time I would catch a whiff of myself I would feel quite happy...and this would happen quite often, as even with moderate application the scent is very strong and throws very well. Yum! A full bottle of this is a must-have.
What I liked: The sweet scent -- flowery and sugary, without crossing over into being obnoxious. The strength -- this throws *so* well, and I love being able to smell it on me without having to slather it on and risk being too stinky for people around me. And, the lasting power -- I put this on in the morning and can still smell it -- albeit faintly -- twelve hours later.
What I didn't like: Nothing! Wrath makes me happy!
I thought Absinthe and Aglaea were good, but this tops them, absolutely.
Category: Wanderlust
In the imp: It's like sinking your nose into a bouquet of tulips, literally -- that light scent, with an almost peppery air to it, like pollen, all dappled with drops of water.
Wet: The light tulip scent is predominant, though the scary pollen edge to it is gone. It's very evocative of lush green grass in the morning hours, laden with dew. I don't get a 'crisp' note so much as a 'juicy' one: plump tulip heads, thick blades of grass, fat drops of dew sliding down the sides of them all.
Dry: It's as if the sun has come out and dried the grass; now it has a sort of moist, healthy air to it, the tulip scent almost ethereal, with a more traditional 'perfumey' note to it..perhaps that's the peony.
Verdict: Oh, if only this had more throw, and lasted longer! It's beautiful! Once again I am in awe of the perfumist's art of being able to capture such imagery in a bottle. I would highly recommend this to people who like unadulterated (non-perfumey) florals, nature scents, and possibly to those who like aquatic scents. I hate to discard it anytime soon, so I will probably hang onto the imp for a while at least.
What I liked: The light floral scent, and the fact that it smells like a grassy yard in springtime. Mmmmm.
What I didn't like: That it's so shy! It just sort of pokes its head out to show me that it's pretty, and then evaporates. Wahhh!!
Category: Excolo
In the imp: Cinnamon, patchouli, and orange...very, very warm and spicy.
Wet: It starts out spicy, peppery, a scent with bite; the patchouli attacks your nose with the spiky texture of its scent. Then it seems to dissolve and turn smokey, like a newly-lit stick of incense. There's definitely a strong note of both patchouli and orange, mixed with the darker notes of the other incense. It smells exactly like a little clothing shop that I used to go to...it's a gorgeous scent, and very 'incensey' without becoming obnoxious.
Dry: Unfortunately, it grows faint pretty quickly. The airy quality of it takes on a more woody sort of tone, and reaches a strange juxtaposition in that it's earthy and 'grounded', while the faintness of it makes it ethereal.
Verdict: I really like it, I just wish that it stuck around longer...Come back, dammit, I like youuuuu!!
What I liked: Orange FTW!!!!! Also the cinnamon. I was afraid of the patchouli, but it behaved itself quite nicely.
What I didn't like: Its throw diminished pretty quickly, and its staying power is pretty minimal.
This is interesting to compare with Al Azif; where Azif is sweeter and more candylike to me, Shairan is very much a stereotypical incense scent to me. I'm thinking if I can find a happy medium, that has decent throw and lasts throughout the day, that I'd be really happy.
Category: Wanderlust
In the imp I could tell that there was some sandlewood there, with maybe a hint of something sweet, like the mandarin.
Once it gets on me, that sandlewood really amps up. At first there is a sharp, woody tone, but it quickly mellows to something that has sweetness around the edges -- bergamot and orange, it seems.
It's a lovely scent, though like all the sandlewood scents before, it doesn't last too long.
Category: Illyria
This is a really light, clean, pretty scent -- just like a fresh bouquet of flowers. Usually in scents like this I home in on the stems, the leaves, almost anything but the actual blossoms, but here I don't have so much of a choice; my nose is buried in fragrant petals. That's far from a bad thing, though; they are soft and given with affection, and therefore inutterably beautiful. There is an extra hint of berry-like sweetness, but it's perfectly-balanced and subtle with the rest of the blend. It's very lovely -- definitely go for this if you like fresh scents or florals.
Category: Bewitching Brews
Oh goodness, this is absolutely gorgeous. This is my first time smelling violet so intently, and it is really, really lovely. This scent lasted all day, lingering particularly in my clothes, letting me fancy myself to be an exquisite, delicate, highly-feminine creature. Another one to add to my list of favorites.
