quintessentially

I expected this to be fruity and floral but in reality it came out very herbally and green. To the swaps pile, and my quest to try every apple-related scent continues!

HOLY WHITE TEA AND JASMINE, BATMAN! I knew I amped jasmine like a wild thing but it's like the combination of jasmine note with these other components has made it so the man on the moon can smell me! This is very powerful.

I got pure green tea and wisteria from this one! The green tea note started giving me a headache, too, so I washed it off very quickly. I was hoping for a lot more blackcurrant!

This is a sweet fruit smell, but it's also very green to me. I think that comes from "pink strawberries"--which I envision as those poor berries plucked too soon before their time, when they're still firm and mottled white and pink and haven't yet turned to that juicy ruby-red fruit that dribbles down my chin when I bite into it. I get some of the other notes later on, but gardenia overpowers them in a way that I don't like.

This went totally acrid on me almost immediately. I blame the cream note (it reminds me of the time I tried on Katrina van Tassel) but I've been told by other BPAL friends that this could've also been the honey note. Either way, it's totally unwearable for me, so to the swaps!

WOW this is pure strawberry on first application. It's warm and sweet and stays strongly strawberry through dry-down. Vanilla comes out to play and it matures a bit when bergamot comes out a little bit. I really liked this one as a strawberry scent. Very summery, IMO!

The wonderful azurephoenix frimped this scent to me in her Lupers decant circle (presumably because it shared a lot of similar notes to another scent I'd ordered for from her circle, The Initiation). These two scents are most certainly not comparable despite the overlap of notes but Kali is still very enjoyable! Kali is all floral to me, and so perfectly blended that I couldn't discern any one note in particular! If you're looking for a powerful tropical floral scent, definitely give Kali a try. She's got intense staying power.

In the decant, this smells pretty boozy. I don't mind a good boozy scent but it isn't something I'd be able to wear on the day-to-day and it probably wouldn't be my first choice on a special kind of night, either. But that isn't what I get when I applied this. It was richly caramel and vanilla, with faint whiffs of a floral. Which one, I'm not sure. On dry-down, I'm getting less caramel and more of an adult floral and a sweetened tobacco scent. I can't easily identify the coconut in this but peach definitely comes out to say hi from time to time. This is BEAUTIFULLY blended and I absolutely love it. This is a keeper for me

Nepthys nailed this one on the head for me: warm and light. I thought there would be more throw for a magnolia-dominant scent (which is precisely what I smelled when I opened the decant, so I was hopeful) but upon application, it was more vanilla chiffon with a pale undercurrent of magnolia running through it. I had to bring my nose right to the skin to smell much of anything after dry-down. Eventually honey musk came peeping out, kinda like a quick flash of pale naked skin through the filmy material of The Bride's undergarments. It's very quick, so you might miss it. And after about 30 mins, all of her was gone entirely.

This scent was almost entirely all saffron for me. From opening the decant to first application, it blasted a bitter and unsweet odor into my nostrils. Vanilla and cream came in after a few minutes but it was still very much saffron. The cream kind of curdled I'll be swapping this!

I think if you like tiare flower, you'll really like Mermaid! It's a lot more complex than just tiare, though, because there are definitely other florals in there, and lotus petals make a splash for sure. It's beautifully blended with different levels, and it's perfectly seafoam-y and it feels like a pale green scent to me. It's GORGEOUS.

The Vine is SO. FREAKING. BEAUTIFUL. From in the bottle to wet on skin to dry-down: a beautiful pear and very gold. It fades really fast and I have to slather it, but I'm going to buy a bottle whenever I can!

Jester is so vivid, like plump purple berries and violent green leaves in the summer time. There's some kind of sharpness to it which makes me think there's a musk note there. I LIKE it but idk if I'll ever wear it. If I did ever wear it, it would be during an early summer day.

I tried the King's Daughter today and she is SO PRETTY. When I first put it on, I could smell the florals and watermelon and then the lilac musk peeped out but there was this soft wooded undertone to it, so very complex. Then once the florals and the lilac and the watermelon have burned off, it's just that gentle wood scent with the slightest shiver of sandalwood to it. EDIT: Something about it reminded me, very faintly, of Tiki Princess. I'm not sure what, because I compared the notes in each and nothing seemed similar, but I still smell the similarities.

This smells pretty upon first application but unfortunately this dries down really quickly into a plastic-type scent.

On skin, it smells very wet and very, very green. There's something almost medicinal about it, which worries me. I hope that goes away. And it does! I LOVE the scent it becomes: vanilla floral with a faint hint of incense. It is creamy and not nearly as heady as it was when I first applied. Very light and tropical and remains fresh and feminine. I just have to be patient for it to mature. I'm really in love with this one and I'll be on the look-out for more bottles

Warm, sweet, gentle and syrupy. Brown sugar and clove are immediately apparent. Upon application, I get something spicy and warm, smoky and I have to agree with Forspecial Plate, it reminds me of Sugar Skull. The clove overwhelms every other component in this blend for a long while. Occasionally I'll catch whiffs of the sassafras but never anything else. I'm fond of clove but I already have my designated clove scent, which I'm much fonder of than Spicebush Swallowtail. I have to say, I'm disappointed I don't get any of the plum!

Bourbon vanilla, Egyptian musk, tonka, white sugar, and cardamom. In the bottle it smells exactly like Dorian--the sugar, musk and vanilla notes are nearly identical. On skin, it does nothing to dissuade me from the overwhelming similarities. It has much less throw than Dorian, however. As it starts to dry down, I start to get what I can only describe as a cool minty scent. I'm not sure what that could be, and it is really reminiscent of Lick It, which is such a peculiar thing to find. Gypsy is disappointingly faint. Really, I have to press my nose to wrist to actually smell anything, and even then it doesn't last long.

In the bottle, it was very red apples. On application, it turned into a blend of cran-apple juice. Bizarre! As it fades down, it turns really herbal, like wet leaves. I was immediately turned off and I ended up swapping this.

I'm surprised upon rereading the description that this is a RED apple because I envision wet greenery when I sniff! I really like the scent upon application since it's a sour green (like granny smith apples!) and wet and a smidge seductive (which I attribute to the narcotic opium). When it dries down, however, it's almost entirely hemlock. The apple vanishes completely

Ripe and green and juicy! Baneberry is one of my favorite GC scents and it is as close as I have ever come to envisioning pure green, spring and fertility. It comes off as more fruity than herbally on application but the herbal comes out only the lightest bit with wear. Which is good! I like fruity above herbally, generally speaking.