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BPAL Madness!

Shollin

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Everything posted by Shollin

  1. Shollin

    King of Clubs

    First sniff: Sweet almond and dirt. How very odd! It’s the dry, dusty earth note from Penny Dreadful, not the potting-soil scent of Graveyard Dirt. Dust puffing up around the sweetness. Wearing: There’s a very dry leather note that develops as it dries, but it also gets fruitier. This guy is a try-again; I adored his lady and I’d like him to work with me.
  2. Shollin

    Evening Star

    First sniff: The description is all flowers, but what I’m getting is lemon tea. Very strong lemon tea. Wearing: And when it first hits my skin, it’s very much lemon tea. I’m entirely confused. The lemon tea does fade after a bit, leaving a very faint impression of sweet flowers.
  3. Shollin

    Hellion

    First sniff: Red fruit and spices. Sweet plum, a dusting of spice, and that very specific almond-cherry smell that I always feel like I can taste right at the back of my throat. (Which, according to the description, isn’t in here. I blame my weird nose.) Wearing: It really does have an almondy sweetness… it reminds me of a spicier Bordello.
  4. Shollin

    The Rat King

    First sniff: Dust. Fur. Twitching whiskers and glowing eyes. And an oddly comforting warmth reminiscent of Coyote. Wearing: About half a second after I put this on, it seems to have melded with my skin, leaving a subtle impression of dry warmth. The description scared me off, but I’m liking the effect.
  5. Shollin

    Pannychis

    First sniff: Jasmania! Wearing: Jasmine jasmine jasmine. Sweet and white and just too much.
  6. Shollin

    La Fée Verte

    First sniff: I’m getting mostly lime and mint from this, with a little bit of sugar. It’s very refreshing and chilly. I like! Wearing: How odd… it goes from smelling rather like a mojito (no rum, though) to a sweeter Antique Lace. It’s simply glorious.
  7. Shollin

    Enraged Orangutan Musk

    First sniff: I was somehow expecting this scent to be darker. It’s quite musky, and one of those musks is doing the funky animal thing, but there’s a lightness to it. Citrus, maybe? Wearing: It’s surprisingly subtle! I just put a dab on my wrists because I was a little afraid of the funk, but what’s happening is nice, if a bit less warm than I generally expect from a musky scent.
  8. Shollin

    Black Hellebore

    First sniff: Very green, with something light and fluttery on top. Wearing: Dark green and astringent, and a little bit floral. This is very nice.
  9. Shollin

    Azathoth

    First sniff: The base is impossibly dark. The citrus topnote is impossibly bright. It’s a tiny, tiny candleflame shrieking “NOTICE ME!” at the top of its lungs in the middle of a vast dark theater. Wearing: I can’t quite wrap my brain around this scent. It’s dark, it’s bright, it’s still, it’s strident, it’s crazy-making.
  10. Try The Perfumed Garden (a Valentine LE)... it's very jasminey, but dried down to more of a Silky Underwear jasmine than a Flying Fox jasmine. If you can get your hands on that one, it's the closest I've found.
  11. Shollin

    Geburah

    First sniff: Leather! I wasn’t expecting that. (Clearly I wasn't paying attention to previous reviews. ) Leather and darkness. Wearing: Well, it’s leather, and there are very few leather scents I can wear. It just smells wrong on me.
  12. Shollin

    Penny Dreadful

    First sniff: It’s perfume and dirt. I can’t get my nose around what the non-dirt part smells like, because the dust blows up all around it and subdues whatever else is there… but it might be a vanilla floral, deeper than Antique Lace. Wearing: The dust seems to vanish on my skin, and the rest of it is really nice – rich and not-too-sweet, a bit fruity.
  13. Shollin

    Mercury

    Expanding The Intellect - Quick Wit - Mental Agility - Communication - Travel -Calculation - Analysis - Learning - Teaching - Gambling - Study - Creativity -Magickal Acumen - Good Conversation - Chance Happenings - Adaptability First sniff: Lavender and cinnamon! Herbal-sharp and spicy. Wearing: Ack. On my skin it morphs instantly into Big Red gum. Fortunately there seems to be no throw at all – I’ll just avoid sniffing my wrists for a while. It got a bit more lavender-y before it vanished, but overall I was underwhelmed.
  14. Shollin

    Toxin

    First sniff: Hovers right on the line between aquatic and medicinal. It’s joltingly refreshing. My nose is cold. Wearing: I really can’t get a handle on this one. It’s sweet and light, but maybe a little too sweet… hey, is that apple blossom? Interesting!
  15. Shollin

    Nihil

    First sniff: I have a hard time pinning this one down. It trips my men’s-aftershave trigger immediately, but it’s (of course) more complex. Bright aqua-blue and chilly. Wearing: Hrm. From men’s aftershave to aquatic floral, sort of an ozoney turquoise. It wore off fairly quickly, but I’m used to that with aquatics. Very nice while it lasted.
  16. Shollin

    Black Orchid

    First sniff: A fantastically soft blanket of deep purple blossoms. I could happily roll around in this. Wearing: Oh BABY. Orchid is one of my favorite floral scents, and this is just gorgeous. It’s very close-clinging, not much waft… someone would have to get right up to my neck to smell it, but I’m OK with that.
  17. Shollin

    Smut

    TEH SMUT! I’ve been dying to try this one. (And my label shows two lovely ladies canoodling. Woohoo!) First sniff: Wow. OK. When a scent immediately makes you go slack-jawed and drooling… Mother of Pearl, this is fantastic. It’s quite boozey – I wonder if my label ladies had a bit of the liquid courage before they scampered off to their corner – but the booziness is gliding on top of something deep and dark and sensuous and wonderful. Wearing: This is way boozey, but holy wow, the base is incredible. The booze burns off quickly, hallelujah! leaving that gorgeous rich deep sugared musk. Love.
  18. Shollin

    The Perfumed Garden

    First sniff: This… may not work. It appears to be utter jasmania in the bottle. It’s rather restrained for jasmine, in that it isn’t attempting to climb up my nose and shriek its jasmininity into my brain, but it’s still quite sweet. Wearing: Serious jasmine. Jasmine, jasmine and more jasmine. I was going to write it off as just too much jasmine, but… it seems to be a rather nice noncloying variety, more Alkmaar than Flying Fox. It still isn’t one I’ll wear often, but it’s nice enough to hang onto a wee bit. Yay for restrained jasmine!
  19. Shollin

    Parlement of Foules

    First sniff: This is… this is… confusing the hell out of me, is what it is. Roses and resins? Two of the most hit-or-miss scent categories ever. So why do I adore this? It smells delicious. And juicy. A ripe fruit with the scent of the most perfect rose. Wearing: I’m still getting that inexplicable juiciness. The roses are definitely there, but the scent is so oddly fruity. It’s very strange for a rose scent, and I really, really like it.
  20. Shollin

    Night's Pavilion

    First sniff: Oh, this is lovely. (And it’s by far my favorite of all the Valentine labels, naughty pictures in black-and-white notwithstanding.) It’s softly, sweetly floral, shadowed but glittering. Wearing: Hmmm. Very, very white-floral, and a little bit soapy. Dang. And yet… after a couple of hours of sweet-soap-flowers, it settles down into a gorgeous calm whiteness. I’ll have to try it again and see if the end result is worth the wet stage…
  21. Shollin

    Luperci

    First sniff: This is utterly feral. I know Beth has an official Lykanthropos scent in the big upcoming list of joy, and I know the Luperci have nothing to do with werewolves (wolves yes, weres no), and maybe this is just because I’m smelling it on full moon, but… this scent very much says werewolf to me. Earthy and woodsy and musky and wild. Wearing: The sun-dappled heart of the forest, and a brush of honeyed musk. Unusual, beautiful… and dangerous.
  22. Shollin

    Khajuraho

    Every time I see this bottle now I end up whispering “’Cause you’re a ho!” to myself and giggling. Thanks ever so to whichever Labbie brought us that particular pronunciation. First sniff: Ooh. I saw flowers upon flowers upon flowers and was a bit nervous, but this is lovely, rich and deep and sweet. Wearing: Thoroughly rich and round and wonderful. It’s an enveloping hug of a scent that leaves you wondering about the hugger’s intentions towards you. The floral is entirely afterthought – the ’ho is more gourmand than anything else, though it’s not something I’d describe as “foody.” It’s just rich and warm and happy.
  23. Shollin

    Roman Chamomile

    First sniff: *happy sigh* I don’t know how a scent can be so plain and still so gorgeous. Roman Chamomile is thoroughly plain-Jane. It’s calm and quiet and understated. There’s a bit of a “cleanness” to it, but overall, it’s decidedly neutral. And yet it’s utterly lovely. Wearing: Understated gorgeousness. I love.
  24. Shollin

    Polyhymnia

    First sniff: *cower* I’m sorry, Lady! I didn’t order you with your sisters at the Muses’ debut, because it sounded like you wouldn’t love me as much as they would… and you’ve obviously developed a grudge, because several months later you’re trying to beat me to death with lemon peels! Wearing: Very high-pitched insistent lemon. It reminds me of the soprano frozen lemon of Yuki-Onna. The orris and rosemary are what kept me away from Poly back in November, but lemon is definitely the villain here.
  25. Shollin

    Judgement

    First sniff: Dark, dark brownish-green. It seems no one else is getting vetiver, but that's what it reminded me of. There’s a cooler, lighter note on top, but vetiver almost always ruins scents for me. Wearing: Resins and mint? Dark and bright. The mint is quite strong when wet, but as this dries it doesn't make much of an impression.
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