perzephone

I received this as a bonus imp w/my Port-Au-Prince order I love spices, really and truly do. First impression upon opening the bottle: this oil smells exactly like Celestial Seasonings Bengal Spice tea. Which is okay, because that tea is yummy. It made my stomach start growling. My dog also when completely bonkers when I opened the imp - she hasn't paid much attention to any of the oils yet, so it was weird having her trying to climb up me to get the imp bottle. Upon putting it on, I got that full heady rush of cinnamon, clove and cardamom - plus the earthy bite of cubeb berries, which is the pepper smell that I pick up on. It's a fresh green pepper instead of aged freshly ground black pepper. It works well in the blend and keeps the spices from being too heavy and cloying. I got no honey or ginger, but I did get a hint of powdery amber and the warm rough underbelly of musk. My one complaint about Port-Au-Prince was that it wore off too quickly, but Bengal has stayed with me, and I only used a 'test' amount to try it. It's mellowed out, and the musk has become more prominent since I was outside in sunlight, but it's not overwhelming. It still has that beautiful that spicy chai tea scent - and my husband can tolerate it. I gotta say, I love it

I like this scent. It is extremely complex, and no one note stands out above the rest, but it's a nice, well-balanced perfume. I do pick up hints of leather and tobacco, kind of like one would expect a reading room in an old-timey men's club to smell. Or maybe the after-party at a jockey club. I work in a smoky, badly ventilated casino and I'm a non-smoker, so one might expect me to not like the smell of tobacco, but I do. At least fresh tobacco, cigars, pipe tobacco, that kind of thing, and Kubla Khan has it in spades, but it blends in with the rest of the perfume scent. This is where my lack of sniffing experience leaves me in the dark. I have no idea what champaca should smell like, or lily. Jasmine smells like honeysuckle, and has a dry green-tea like tone that I can pick out, but I honestly don't know for sure what the other scents are in Kubla. It is just a nice, mature, professional perfume, one I could imagine on an established business woman. It's feminine, but not overtly sexual or tartly playful, and it doesn't have that powdery 'old lady perfume' flavor. My husband hates this kind of perfume, and that's all I heard from him from about 8pm til about 3am, which was 4 hours after I had been out of the house & at work. I probably accidentally rubbed some off of my arms onto the dog - and she likes to lay next to him on the couch. Plus whatever came off on my non-work clothes that I left draped over my chair. I thought it was funny how it lingered, until about 4am when I started to taste the perfume. Then I got a headache, my sinuses swelled up, my eyes started itching, and I found myself in the midst of a horrible allergy attack. When I got home from work, the first thing I did was take a shower, but I could still taste the perfume, and it left a lingering after-smell of skunky musk, which was tolerable. I'm surprised I didn't get a rash because that's what usually happens when I have a bad reaction to a topical, be it lotion, perfume or whatever. I'd wear it again in a heartbeat, but unfortunately, I don't think I can.

I can't express how much I freakin' love this blend! I'm not one to pay attention to 'gender' when it comes to perfumes & colognes. I've worn Polo without getting any nasty comments from anyone, and if I like a scent I'll wear it. I love Bay Rum, always have, but I feel strange about wearing pure bay rum cologne because most of the men I work with wear it. I avoid it simply because there are too many implications in wearing a cologne at work that could imply a physical transference of scent. Anyway, the initial notes of PaP was heavy on the bay rum, which made me hesitant, but it settled down into a gorgeous heady cloud of sugar and spice. The almond and sassafras kept the perfume from being too cloying and heavy, and gave it a playful kick. I was expecting dark drums in the night & instead I got a day frolicking through rum distilleries. It smelled extremely edible, too. It wore off very fast, and left no lingering whisper of its glory. That was a disappointment, but I still ordered the big bottle It's light enough where I wouldn't mind reapplying it as the night wears on.

I like dragon's blood. I like vetiver. There isn't much more to say about Serpent's Kiss. The vetiver does sort of 'ground and center' the spicy heat of the dragon's blood, but it doesn't bring it down too much. It's a very simple, clean perfume. My only whine is that it doesn't have much lasting power - it only lingered about 4 hours and then it was poof, gone!

I wore this last night, and I didn't enjoy it. In the bottle, it smelled like a mild dragon's blood - it had that kind of cinnamon candy smell to it, anyway. It's weird, because there's no dragon's blood mentioned in the ingredients, and when I've worn the components separately in the past (amber, musk, sandalwood & rosewood) none of them have smelled dragon's bloody on me. When I put it on, I received the overwhelming impression that I had just dumped a bottle of heavily-scented fabric softener on myself. It was soapy, powdery and floral funky all at the same time. Kind of like freesia or lilac softener. It gave me an instant headache behind my eyes, and I was pressed for time so I couldn't take another shower. I've got to make sure when I sample these that I give myself enough time for emergency scent-removal if necessary. The heavy floral smell faded quickly, though, and alleviated some of the headache along with it. It dampened down into dryer-sheet smell. In fact, it began to smell exactly like a certain generic 'mountain breeze' dryer sheet that I've purchased in the past, and blended in with my freshly laundered work uniform. The only thing I can attribute the floral scent to might be the rosewood, (and I'm hoping it's not because I just ordered a couple of imps that mentioned rosewood) because after about 8 hours, I was catching brief hints of sandalwood and amber. After about 12 hours, it's faded to a wonderful warm amber glow. If that amber note was sold separately, I'd buy it by the gallon, because it is so subtle but makes me feel like a plump, lazy wood-nymph whenever I catch that hint of fragrance. However, I can't take the immediate heavy floral that Fenris starts out with. Maybe that explains it - I thought my regular deodorant had worn off really fast this morning, but it might be lingering musk that's got the BO effect for me, too.

I'm new here, so pardon any mistakes. I requested Bohun Upas in an imp sampler, because the description appealed to me - I have a fondness for poisonous plants, and a poisonous tree was right up my alley. I really wanted to like it, but my first impression upon opening the bottle wasn't favorable. It smelled like drugstore alcohol-laden perfume slathered on a man. Like High Karate or something. I decided, since most of what I've been reading on the forums here indicate the oils smell different on skin than in the bottle, that I would give it a try, and I'm so glad I did. The only 'real' perfume I can tolerate on me for any length of time is YSL Opium, and on me, that's what Bohun smells like - only sexier and more complex. Depending on body chemistry, I think either a man or woman could wear this and pull it off. I also couldn't taste the oil like I normally can with perfumes, which is part of why I don't wear them much - walking around all day tasting perfume. Fresh on, BU had a sharp, clean, freshly-cut-wood scent to it, almost like cedar resin that stood out from the base tones. The base notes were darker, muskier and more like vetiver, myrrh, a hint of bay or bay rum. It makes me think of syrupy spiced rum. My perfume/oil vocabulary is fairly limited - I don't like fruits or florals so I don't know what things like ylang ylang or lily-of-the-valley smell like, but I could pick up some hints of tuberose or maybe spicy, clovey carnations. Someone else mentioned burning & redness on their arm - yeah, I got that, too. I thought I was going to have a major allergic reaction to it there for a minute but it did fade away. After a few hours, I couldn't notice the complexity of it anymore, and the Opium-like aura went away, but it left a very nice pure sandalwood scent on my arms. This is definitely going on my wishlist for next payday!