Silvertree

Quick note--please remember that this forum is for BPAL suggestions only! We also have Other Perfumes You Love for non-BPAL recs. Thanks!

The customer service account is answers@blackphoenixalchemylab.com. It'll be helpful if you reference your order number in your email.

I'm most likely going as Corporate Wonder Woman (or the Wonder Woman version of Secret Identity Clark Kent): black blazer and pants, boots, glasses, and a white button-down shirt unbuttoned just enough to show a Wonder Woman tank top beneath. I'll probably wear Heroine, or maybe Liberty.

Autumn in BPAL-land is always full of amazing updates, and between Carnaval Diabolique, Scalias, Liliths, Weenies, and the looming specter of Crimson Peak, this year is no exception. Normally there's a little breathing room between Weenies and Yules, but with Crimson Peak just around the corner we wanted to make sure decanters have the ability to run circles even while their Weenie circles are live. This means that we are implementing A Decant Circle Forum Very Special Episode: Crimson Peak Bonus Life edition! Crimson Peak will launch on Halloween, so decanters, get your pipetting hand ready: for the purposes of the Crimson Peak update, all decanters will have an extra pool of bottles to play with according to their level. Level 1: maximum of 20 bottles Level 2: maximum of 40 bottles Level 3: maximum of 80 bottles Level 4: maximum of 160 bottles So even if you are not at the maximum number of bottles for your level (i.e., a level 4 decanter who is at 70 out of 80 bottles), you have those 10 bottles to play with plus the extra 80, for a total of 160. This does not only apply to Crimson Peak items--if you want to have some Weenies, Scalias, CDs, Liliths, etc., along for the ride, that's cool. All other limits/guidelines (pricing, decants per bottle, PayPal fee policies, etc.) still apply as usual. Since the mods will be approving circles left, right, and from all directions, please report all previously completed circles for closing ASAP to make the process as streamlined as possible. Please PM Silvertree and cupide430 with any questions!

I believe Egyptian Musk was in the original run of Single Notes (the line that was discontinued years ago). If you go to the Lab's website and type "musk" in the search box, it will bring up a dropdown of product name and product tag results. Clicking around on the different product tags (especially Musk - African and Musk - Arabian) brought me to one result-- Mr. Ibis: "Papyrus, vanilla flower, Egyptian musk, African musk, aloe ferox, white sandalwood."

Crowley is amazing and should be on everyone's to-try list! I think it's a unisex scent (I certainly wear it), but it has a smooth, smoldering, sexy-confident quality that is irresistible on a guy, in my opinion. The leather and musk are beautifully balanced with the vanilla and lilac, so it's neither too sweet or too aggressive, just rich and deep and gorgeous. Infernal musk, red patchouli, lilac cologne, mahogany, lemon rind, oakmoss, leather, and vanilla husk.

I've been able to gently pry the reducer cap out either with my fingernails or a cuticle stick.

Hi, all- A couple of new things in Swapland: BPTP price caps and updated guidelines for decant circles. BPTP: While Trading Post items have previously been uncapped, we are implementing price caps for bath oils, atmosphere sprays, massage oils, and hair glosses: $12.50 per 1 oz decant A full 4 oz bottle may be sold for $50 A full 8 oz bottle may be sold for $100 Soaps, plaques, jewelry, apparel, and other items are currently not being capped at this time. If we notice a need for price regulation in these categories, we will make an announcement accordingly. Perfume sold through the Trading Post is capped following the BPAL structure: $10 per imp $50 per full 5 mL bottle $100 per full 10 mL bottle Sellers, you have 48 hours to review your sales topics and adjust prices accordingly. After 5pm EST on Monday, October 5, 2015, we will impose price caps for Black Phoenix Trading Post items, as laid out above. Decant circles: In the past we have allowed decanters to keep a waitlist of potential participants once a bottle's five-slot limit are full. However, we have never permitted decanters to charge waitlisted participants until a decant is guaranteed. Recently, it has come to our attention this policy is being abused, people on the waitlist are being charged, and decanters are guaranteeing/selling six or more slots per bottle. As forum guidelines have only ever permitted five slots per bottle, we are currently eliminating the waitlist option. Decanters who find that they have leftover oil in any bottles after fulfilling orders may sell decants or partials on their on-forum sales page. If you are a decanter and currently have a circle open with waitlisted participants, you may keep them on your waitlist. No new circles will be permitted to use the waitlist feature. Additionally, please keep in mind that gauging interest in off-forum swaps (decant circles, sales/swaps, ISOs, etc.), directing people to an off-forum swap page, or discussing off-forum swaps is not permitted. The Swapping 101, Price Caps, and Decant Circle posts are being updated to reflect the new guidelines. Please take this time to reacquaint yourselves with our forum rules. As always, please PM a swaps mod with any questions.

Hi, everyone! Thank you all for your patience as we work to handle the malware issue! We believe that we have taken the necessary steps to resolve this, and everything appears clean for now, but we'll be monitoring the situation closely just in case. And if you see something, say something!

PSST!

Also, try asking in the Recommendations forum! This topic is generally used for "what BPAL is this?"

We have a bunch of old, out of date topics cluttering up the various Swaps forums, so next Monday, May 11th, we'll be pruning anything that hasn't been updated since May 31, 2014. If you don't want your For Sale, Swap, or Wanted topic sent to the Dead Swaps Cemetery, simply make sure it's been bumped on or after May 31 of last year. PM the mods with any questions!

For this lunacy round, I voted for Scherezade + hair gloss, hands down, no second guessing. I may have even browbeaten several kind and understanding friends into voting, too. All that pestering and refreshing and hand-wringing has more than paid off, and I'm sad that Scherezade came and went while the forum was down--this gorgeous scent needs its own horde of rabid followers. The perfume has been one of my favorite fragrances since the earliest days of my BPAL obsession, and the gloss transforms it into a glorious new medium. If you're worried that red musk, saffron, and spices sounds heavy or too aggressive, fear not--the scent of the master storyteller is soft, sensual, and beguiling. I use two pumps, which infuses my shoulder-length curly hair with a lightly resinous cloud that hovers tantalizingly on the border between warm incense and sultry musk. This is warring with Sin for my favorite hair gloss, and as a writer, I use a little whenever I need some creative inspiration. My only complaint is that I didn't buy two bottles. Perhaps if we tell Puddin' stories for 1,001 nights, he might bring Scherezade back!

The lust incense of a corrupted Astarte. A blend of ritual herbs and dark resins, shot through with three gingers and aphrodisiacal spices. (Bringin' it back: I looked up my old (2005!) review of the original Shub-Niggurath before writing this up. Ladies and gentlemen, Shoggoths of all ages: it is the 10th anniversary of Shub! I'm pleased to report that the ol' black goat is just as spicy, sexy, and swoonworthy as ever, if not more. My Shub HG arrived in a new style of bottle: taller and slimmer than the other HGs I own. Which is great, because now I can cram more in my hair gloss drawer! I could cut and paste my old review here, as the gloss is a twin of the perfume, but I'll see if my review-writing skills have improved at all. Apologies in advance for the second person POV....) Shub-Niggurath rushes through the forest, her midnight-black hooves crushing the secret herbs that grow in the shadows. You hold your breath as she passes, fearful of her horns and huge, heaving flanks. In the wake of her passing, you catch the hint of her scent. You thought it would be animalic, heavy and rank. You thought wrong. Warm, biting ginger tingles in your nostrils, making you gasp in delight. And as you open your mouth, you take a full, deep breath, drawing her perfumed essence deep into your lungs. The ginger blooms with life inside your body, growing hotter. Spicier. It reminds you of familiar scents--cinnamon, perhaps? But something wilder, nothing so tame as the powdered stuff you sprinkle over buttered toast in the morning. These are not daylight scents. You're bathed in fresh bark, and rushing sap, and oddly shaped leaves, growing fierce and free in ancient, hidden groves of trees. It's a green-gold scent, alive and lit from within like an ember, glowing and growing warmer and warmer... You aren't certain when you started running, but you're loping through the forest fleet as a deer, that scent on your tongue and steam rising from your skin as the cold air kisses your bare limbs. Laughing, you tilt your head to the sky, getting your bearings from the stars as they wheel through the branches of the trees above. You take another gulping breath of that invigorating, intoxicating, gently radiant heat, and follow its trail into the woods and into the night.... ...You wake up in your bed as the sky changes from inky blue-black to the pinkish gray of dawn. You stretch sore muscles, luxuriating in the slight burn of your limbs. As you arch your back, your husband rolls over and sleepily wraps you in his arms. He picks a leaf out of your tangled hair, and then buries his face in the curve of your neck. "Mmmm," he says, suddenly sounding much more awake. "You smell incredible."

Switch Witch info is fine. You can have the link to your wishlist in your sig, but your wishlist must be in the Wishlist topic, not your blog.

Looks like the butterfly's scientific name is Megathymus yuccae and it's found "in deserts, foothills, and woodlands where yucca plants occur," so it's a [Yucca] [Giant-Skipper], not a [Yucca Giant]-[skipper]. I'm no lepidopterist, but I'd say Yucca GI-ant Skipper. Then again, I suspect you wouldn't make an ass of yourself unless you happened to be chatting about perfume with a very judgmental lepidopterist.

I tend to gravitate towards more traditionally masculine scents. This might fall into the "too green" category for you, but I love Dawn: Cernunnos (Terebinth pine, basil, green sandalwood, fig leaf, armoise, lemon balm, cypress, myrrh, black cedar, and juniper). It's more rich/resinous than herbal. If you can find a decant in the Swaps forum to test, one of my favorite scents of all time is Crowley from Good Omens (Infernal musk, red patchouli, lilac cologne, mahogany, lemon rind, oakmoss, leather, and vanilla husk). It does have a number of your iffy notes, which is why I thought you might want to test it before committing to a bottle, but it's extremely well-blended and just so. dang. good. Not too musky, not too patchouli-aggressive, not too floral.

Since we currently don't have the swaplift center accessible, we've made a swaplift reports topic. Please post there and report your post to immediately bring it to the mods' attention. (This can and should be done in addition to leaving feedback in a member's individual thread, FYI!) We realize that sometimes people may be reluctant to "tattle" on a forum member, but notifying the mods ensures that a member's activity will be tracked, and that they can have their access to the swap area restricted if need be. Filing a report ensures that the rest of the community is aware of the situation. Please PM both Maewitch and Silvertree with any questions!

I searched the reviews topic to see if anyone posted a review for Chaos Theory O: CXXI. Other than that, there's not much to go on--each bottle of Chaos Theory is blended individually/without a formula, so as Andra said, there's no way of knowing exactly what's in it.

I thought of a fun game to play. I'm sure some/most of you have seen the Disney Villains Perfume Bottles fanart, and the only thing that would make this particular artist's fantasy better is if BPAL perfumes were matched to each bottle! The Evil Queen: Poisoned Apple OR Vain Sorceress Ursula: Ekhidna OR R'Lyeh/Cthulhu/The Deep Ones/Y’ha-Nthlei Cruella de Vil: Malediction Maleficent: Dragon's Claw OR Medea Jafar: Corrupt Chancellor OR Djinn OR Al-Shairan (honorable mention: Iago. You got a problem, pinky?) Gaston: Pride Hades: Hades Mother Gothel: The Other Mother's Right Hand Foulfellow & Gideon: Kitsune-Tsuki & The Sluggard Doctor Facilier: Jazz Funeral (possibly too positive for him, maybe skekZok the Ritual Master?) Lady Tremaine: Wicked OR Wicked Matriarch OR Marquise de Merteuil Scar: Lady MacBeth Yzma: A Countenance Foreboding Evil Madame Medusa: Bayou Prince John: Greed Queen of Hearts: Queen of Hearts Dom Frollo: Anathema OR Tavern of Hell Captain Hook: Jolly Roger (or How Doth the Little Crocodile, if you prefer) Governor Ratcliffe: Villain OR Iago Please feel free to make other suggestions! Now...imagine if these bottles became a reality and they tapped Beth to create a unique perfume for each villain...then we could play "what should _____ smell like?"

The US postal service will be operating as usual, so don't worry about swapping difficulties!

After extensive and in-depth debate, we have decided to adopt a universal price cap for all BPAL/BPTP items sold on the bpal.org forum. As of this moment, the price cap is $50 for a full 5mL bottle, $10 for a full imp or imp-sized decant. You are welcome to charge any price up to and including that amount. Why a universal price cap? First of all, individual price caps were confusing and time-consuming, both to follow and to enforce. Second, we trust our members not to price-gouge and inflate costs. We don't need to police every nickel, dime, and quarter. Finally, the marketplace will dictate what works and what doesn't! Laissez-faire BPAL, yo. Please be aware that this is a trial. If we receive reports of abuse of the system, we will revisit this approach. But we hope that this will be more streamlined and simpler, for both sellers and buyers. As always, if you paid more than the $50 price cap for a given item and have documentation to back it up, you may contact an administrator for an exception to the price caps. BPTP items such as lockets fall into this category. Please note that "make me an offer" is still not acceptable. Specific prices must be posted in the For Sale forum. As always, sellers may not charge PayPal fees on top of bottle/shipping cost. Please PM swap mods (currently Maewitch and Silvertree) with any questions. Please note that the old Price Caps database at the top of the forum is merely an archive, and no longer a guideline. The universal price cap supersedes individual pricing.

We have reevaluated and updated guidelines for Group Orders, effective immediately. New GO sub-forum(s) and reporting/discussion topics will be added ASAP. Until that time, please continue to make topics in the Decant This forum and report your order in the Decant Circle/Group Order thread. We will split out posts and topics as needed. Please PM a Swaps Mod (Silvertree, Maewitch) with any questions, or make a report. Please do not arrange or ask to join decant circles or group orders outside of the swaps forum. This is a test run-- if we find that any of the new guidelines aren't working, we will revisit how group orders are run. Also: we are lifting the six-week minimum availability requirement for decanting. At this time, all scents may be offered for decanting, unless they are available in imp form or imp packs. Thanks!

Also, it's a good idea to include your order number-- that makes it easier to match your email up with your order!

I have plenty of bottles from 2004 and 2005 that are not only still fine, but better than ever (I tend to like spice/resin-heavy blends, which seem to age better). But unless something smells off, I wouldn't worry about it. If it's bad, you'd know it as soon as you sniffed it!