SophieCedar

Wet: amber and vetivert with a touch of lavender. Surprised the lavender is taking backseat in this one. Otherwise the vetivert is masking it. The tea rose is coming out like rosewood because of the vetivert too. Drydown: more amber, actually! The vetivert still dominates everything else and turns it into different flavors of vetivert.

Wet: smells exactly like Alice! Drydown: smells like Hope and Alice mixed!

Wet: dark wispy lavender, oppoponax, and cognac. There's a touch of patchouli behind it but mostly lavender. Very soothing, murky, and a touch boozy and earthy. Drydown: all lavender and a slight hint of patchouli,blackberry and myrtle. I like it for it's soothing, not torturous, qualities.

Wet: ooh wow! This is spicy sweet warm, woody. the sherry note is there. This cobbler is saturated! There's a nutmeg or cinnamon note and a bit of orange and nuts? Drydown: the booze wore off and there's more firewood but still spicy and warm. I'm not sure this is safe for work. I smell a bit like a sherry hangover. I like it but it's one of those that need to stay at home, like unsavory gravediggers.

In imp: perfect. smells like late november, early december at dusk. Wet: reminds me of something I can't put my finger on. argh! The bitter currant is much sweeter than I imagined it would be. The crackling leaves are there however translate to sweet soap mixed with firewood on my skin. There's a cold wind/ozone note coming out. Drydown: my skin has turned this into a bizarre incense. Think along the lines of midnight on the midway...It's darker and a bit more empty. Kind of eerie!

In imp: I almost ordered a bottle instead of a decant. So, when I received my decant package, I rushed to smell this one. In imp, all I could describe it as was "utterly cute" with a hint of blue chamomile. Wet: something that smells like china berry or kiwi notes typically used in oil format. That was the biggest surprise. Must be the lemon peel pomegranate and sage? french vanilla pops in and out but generally stays tucked underneath. Drydown: same but weaker. Totally bizarre!

In imp: smells exactly how it's described by the lab. lovely mince pie spice, dark stout beer, woods. Wet: spice explosion! I smell all mince pie with a strong winey apple? Smells like mulled cider on me. Drydown: ok there's more beer and woods, but it still mostly spicy mulled cider and possibly a touch of fig.

Wet: black currant and frankincense with blue musk. It's a dark herbal resin with a blue black color impression. I'm surprised by the way this turns a bit sour on me because I tend to do well with every ingredient listed. Drydown: apparently, I'm not the right chemistry for this. The frankincense it colliding with the rest of the notes. I think I would have fared better with myrrh. I had very high hopes for this one. It was right up there with Jacob's ladder. Unfortunately, something is not mixing well with my skin.

Wet: dirt, stone, ice, moss, marsh felwort (whatever that smells like..I saw the flower and we have a ton like that up here) and a hint of buttercup and buttery spicy baked goods. Drydown: moss mostly, stone, dirt, hint of ice that smells a bit like aquatic cologne, flowers. Interesting. I'll need to chew on this one.

When I read the description, my fingers were trembling and scrambling, because of excitement, when I typed to my favored decanter to order this. Being this is my 1st full year w/ bpal; and last year I was too distracted by the overwhelming lovely chaos of kicking off my bpal habit, I didn't try any yules. This is like hearing about a new movie coming out on your birthday where all your favorite stars are in your ideal setting. Needless to say, this scent is perfect for me. Amber, benzoin, and tonka together? Yes, please. Plus the sweet gummy pine-like smell of the galbanum and the costus are perfect. The rockrose is incredibly mellow. This is awesome and causes me to daydream.

For some reason I mistook the orange blossom and vanilla together for apple blossom? Maybe because of the carnation and teas. It quickly breaks apart that image when applied to the skin. It's nice however I think mate does not agree with me, as it's too close to green tea. This will be passed along to the mate junkie in my life: my husband.

Mmmm.. This is unsavory gravediggers minus the booze. aka: SFW unsavory gravediggers! I love the combination of dry green and wet earth. Has a lovely morbid bitterness.

Wet: wow. really impressed with this one. Memories of from the 1990's flood back: ethnic shops, new age shops with tons of oils incense and resins, the smell of manic panic herbal base, essential oil mixing perfumeries tucked in weird cramped locations, hummus plates in the smoking section of wonderfully eclectic restaurants. (One with antique wood cathedral where people smoke hookahs with fresh tobacco and the other with a steady big fireplace at my back.) I can't believe I found a scent that properly interprets the whole thing! I think it's mostly the burmese part of the rosewood and the tumeric. During the wet phase, this is sweet rosewood, currant leaf, benzoin, frankincense and oude. All there obviously. Just enough unique notes that I can pick all of them out. Drydown: gets sweeter and there's something that reminds me of the indian and arabian sandalwood oils I used to buy as a teen. Must be the burmese rosewood and benzoin. It's pretty dreamy at this phase. 10 out of 10.

Wet: not sure how people use this for meditation or yogic practices. The green tea is too stimulating and distracting for me! There's aloe in this for sure and some lemon. Drydown: still green tea with lemon. It's strange because I know this is a great scent and I like it, however my senses hate it. I'm convinced there are 2 types of noses: those that can stand green tea and those that cannot. I'm in the cannot section unfortunately.

Sweet pine. smells like the xmas tree I'm sitting next to! Oh wait.. there's eucalyptus. it's bright green blue and sharp now. This is actually a great refresher for the senses. I want to bring this to boring old work but I have a feeling everyone would pop up out of their cubes wondering where the stench is coming from. Mmmm. Quickly orange comes out too. Thinking now this would be good xmas party camouflage...well not really. It would be me standing in the corner like a deer in the headlights with my malfunctioning invisible cloak. People whispering in concern and bewilderment.. Hmm ok, as magical as I think bpal perfumes are, they are still just perfumes. Regardless, this is a lovely atmospheric scent. It definitely needs to be heated up for the orange to release. Perfect for those unsafe (and now archaic with the invention of energy saving bulbs) yet awesome metal scent diffusing lamp rings.

When I saw this I said to myself "now WHY haven't I noticed this one until NOW?!?" Wet: oooh boy! There's something that smells like a dash of brimstone, but I think that's the dragon's blood and vetivert. Red musk and patchouli are definitely there. I love this scent because you definitely know what you're getting into by ordering it. There's no mistaking or unexpected morphing. Drydown: red musk and a drop of vetivert amping dragon's blood with a silky cloud of patchouli. Ordering this was a no brainer. The combination is perfect for me. I fear vetivert mostly, but here it just keeps a dreamy haze around it.

Wet: mmmm.. dark musk I love you. This scent is simple and the notes compliment each other perfectly. It's singing on my skin. The myrrh is amped by the musk, the attar of rose offers a feminine touch without squashing the sexy image and the ylang ylang..well it makes this intoxicating to me. Drydown: the rose and myrrh goes a bit powdery on me. What a shame! I think I would have preferred black rose over attar but then again if we're talking phantoms in the victorian sense, I would expect attar of rose. Oh well!

Wet: the lemongrass is powerful. I can't really smell anything else. Drydown: ok there's the rose.. and the lemongrass.. and who? I can barely pick out the sandalwood. The cedarwood is there but it blends right in behind the rose and lemongrass. There's little pops of jasmine here and there.. it's a bizarre one! It turns mostly jasmine and lemongrass with a breath of patchouli and cedarwood. It keeps morphing! This one will have me intrigued for hours.

I popped this in my bag and have been loving it for the past few days. Wet: sweet wine-like ylang ylang and heady oleander flower with an undercurrent of earthy dark patchouli. Great dynamic. Perfect throw. totally relaxes me and soothes my ego on those tough days at work. Neroli is there but just brightening and sharpening the other elements. Drydown: This turns into ylang ylang oleander honey on my skin. There's still a bit of dirty patchouli but mostly it smells like it should belong in Rappaccini's apiary. I wish it lasted a bit longer but that's why we buy bottles, right?

Wet: sweet pink white golden musk with vanilla tea. Does Babylonian musk have fig in it? This is sweet, meaty, and heavy. I can smell the coconut but it vacillates between strong and weak..constantly. strange! Faint hint of lilac however the decant I received looks pretty old and I bet the lilac has seen better days...the tonka and tobacco are there. Tonka is usually much stronger on me. It seems to interlock with the musk and vanilla tea, making it almost impossible to pick out. Drydown: The lilac, what hint there was, is gone. The tobacco comes out a fraction more but the tonka is the one that amps here! Not bad but this is a bit too.. uhm what's the word I'm looking for here.. uh fatty? for me. It's so meaty and musky that there's something in here making me think of animal fat! I can't help it!

trying to shake the bac-o's association... that's not what I smelled at first but I'm too open to suggestion sometimes. (If my husband says "*smirk* It smells like....." I'll go running in the other room with my ears blocked yelling "lalalalalalala!!" so he can't ruin a scent on me.) Wet: this is the 2nd time I'm trying this. 1st time was not good.. smells better now! Definite vetivert and neroli with a sandalwood undercurrent. Very straightforward. It develops in the way I anticipated it to. Strong dark vetivert with tinges of bittersweet neroli heightening my senses and sandalwood a calmness that I can sense but it's just out of reach. Drydown: just like love, the twist & bittersweetness is there.. I smell neroli most prominently with vetivert taking a backseat! Sandalwood is there and still slightly unattainable. Interesting!

I'm starting to realize I love fig in all it's forms. This one is sweet and very sticky. The combination is festive in that winter holiday sense. At first, the mandarin is tart for a moment, then mellows to a lovely juicy compliment to the ripe fig.

Wet: jasmine sambac and violet water with a touch of the other 3. The violet and jasmine clash on my skin for a minute then the vanilla bean warms up, making the other 2 amicable. Drydown: this is a very light scent. I can see it was a tall order and making the mix too strong could be fatal.. but I wish it was slightly stronger. Maybe a touch more dark musk? The drydown is lovely, regardless. The vanilla develops a lot, making it a creamier scent.

Wet: sweet spruce and shea milk. Nice! Drydown: ugh..something in the herbs is making me a little queasy. That's unusual. This turns really sour and bile-like on me. If there's melon in this, that could do it...melon hates my skin! I'm a little envious of everyone else's positive experience with this one. maybe I need to come back to it...

Wet: oooh red wine and red musk? No? Why am I smelling red wine? Uuhhh...maybe it's the mix of the 3 roses and red musk and the amber's just super syrupy. This is incredibly sweet on me. The amber is beautiful. Drydown: apparently, there's a rose out there that actually likes my skin. I don't know which.. maybe white (ex: shadowy & sublime)? The amber keeps amping and red musk gets spicier. It turns a little powdery after I rub it into my skin more, but that passes. Note to self, just don't agitate it and it'll stay sweet as pie. What a funny one!