edenssixthday

Clermont - The instant I opened the bottle, I smelled the beautiful, honey-sweet, smokey opium note that I love so much in my beloved Chrysanthemum Moon. It's the exact same note. The rose is strong, but does not overpower that gorgeous opium scent. The rose seems like a dark rose, maybe even a dried rose. This is really gorgeous. It loves my skin and smells like pure, heavy, dark, smokey, opium-lade, rosey sexiness on me. This is a keeper.

Midnight Bell - The incense is really beautiful -- sort of reminds me of Midnight Mass in how regal and sophisticated it smells. However, the stone note in this blend is the same one used in Inganok Jewelers, and it's a note that makes me faintly nauseated (it's not as strong in this blend as in Inganok, thankfully), which renders this scent unwearable for me. If you like Inganok and if you like Midnight Mass, you should try this blend.

Alchemical Laboratory - Heavy, spicy, rich, incensey, smokey, sexy... I don't know how else to describe it. It's mostly myrrh, then frankincense and rose geranium to my nose, but the cinnabar and daemonorops in particular add a level of depth and richness that the other notes don't have on their own. This room spray is pure, sexy, love. I wish there was a perfume oil that smelled like it. I am absolutely nuts over how good it smells. I can't find words to describe my depth of love for this fragrance. It's really remarkable. edited because I'm a dork

Oh dude, you are totally Antikythera Mechanism!

I think I went through gallons gallons of Anais Anais in the '80s '80s. I'd just go to walgreens and get yourself a $9 mini bottle of that. But if you need to go the BPAL route, I agree with the people who said Stardust. It totally reminds me of the '80s. God, the '80s were great. I miss that decade.

Nope, I am bummed out by the aging of two of my favorite Snake Pits, Western Diamondback and Death Adder. I'll still wear Western Diamondback, but I don't think it aged well at all. It's just not as strong and rich and deep as it was when I first got it. I don't know if it's the leather in it or something else that didn't age well. The Snake Oil part of it seems to have aged fine, but it's missing something. It's hard to explain. And Death Adder -- I freaking LOVED how heavy and dark it was from all that awesome vetiver, and I was sure that with the vanilla and coconut in it, along with Snake Oil, it would age and get even darker and deeper, and instead, it needs to be renamed "Wimpy Adder" because with aging, it lost ALL of it's oomph. It's mostly a rich, aged Snake Oil bolstered by a faint hint of some other notes, but it completely lacks the depth and intensity it had when it was fresh. I'm REALLY bummed out about that one.

Erebos - My very first thought was that this smells remarkably similar to TKO. It's not a dupe, but it's very close -- more floral than TKO, but the vanilla is deep and rich and sweet and the lavender has to be the same lavender used in TKO because I pretty much can never stand lavender blends, with the exception of TKO and now, Erebos. This is an absolutely gorgeous scent and lavender-vanilla lovers have got to try this out. It's stunning!

We have very similar taste, I think. So here are some of my favorites that, in my opinion, fall into the same category (whatever it's called!), along with some others that are very close, but for whatever reason (e.g., chocolate) don't work on me as well as they could otherwise, but which you might love. I tried to get a good mix of LE's and GC's. Also, if you like vanilla and leather and haven't tried Liz yet, I would definitely give that one a shot. It's by far my favorite. It's very similar to CC: Female, but I'd take Liz over CC: Female any day (although I have at least one friend who prefers CC: Female to Liz). And then there are layering possibilities -- I've never tried it, but I think layering Liz with Port-au-Prince could be really stunning, or Blood with Port-au-Prince, or Blood with Hollywood Babylon, or Antikythera with Inez... layering makes so many more possibilities! Antikythera Mechanism: Teakwood, oak, black vanilla, and tobacco. Aperotos Eros: Unloving love: benzoin, Indian musk, massoia bark, myrrh, ambrette seed, galbanum, bergamot, and fir. Blood: Essence of dragon's blood resin, thickened with myrrh and cherry, with a trickle of clove Boomslang: Snake Oil with cocoa, teakwood, and rice milk. Clockwork Couture: Female: Leather, golden amber, vanilla orchid, Spanish moss, Oxford clay, and tonka. Hollywood Babylon: glittering Egyptian amber and heliotrope, infused with the sweetness of strawberry and vanilla - dragged into debauch by lusty red musk and a dribble of black cherry. Inez: Golden amber, vanilla musk, myrrh, cedar, carnation, and red sandalwood. Liz: A light, feminine vanilla floral perfume and a swirl of smoke and leather. Mme. Moriarty: Red musk, vanilla bean, pomegranate, patchouli leaf and wild plum. Playing With Dangerous Toys: dirt-smeared cocoa, with a Spanish moss, coconut, tobacco absolute, charred wooden beams, and blistered resins. Port-au-Prince: buttered rum flavored with almond, bay, clove and sassafras. Pulcinella & Teresina: Labdanum, cedar, teak and red rose. Tamora*: Amber, heliotrope, golden sandalwood, peach blossom and vanilla bean * I find that unless it's aged, the peach blossom (which smells like peach fruit to me) overpowers the resins. It's still pretty, but not nearly as pretty as really good aged Tamora. However, if you have an imp or decant of Tamora, it ages a lot faster than it does in a bottle. (I have a 10ml I bought in 2006 that is *still* "not quite there", so I continue to keep it in the back of my drawer and let it age away, but my 2005 and 2006 5mls of it smell gorgeous, and my 2004-era imp (what little is left) is devestatingly perfect.)

In Reilig Oran - This scent whisks me back in time to a day when I was exploring Balloch Castle near Loch Lomond. The early July foliage on the castle grounds lush, heavy wet, and green under the thick, grey skies. A thin fog wisped through the misty air, and everything around me smelled damp and earthen, the scent of crushed wet greenery underfoot... this smells just like that day. I'm not typically drawn toward heavy, wet, green scents like this, but this one evokes so many specific memories that I can't stop huffing my wrist. It's really beautiful and I'm so glad I had the chance to try it.

NVL1 - Lots and lots and lots of dirt, and then more dirt, and then another big ol' pile of dirt. There's also something very faintly medicinal. Very far in the background is the dragon's blood, but the dirt note is so loud on me that if I hadn't read the other reviews, I'd have never identified the dragon's blood on my own. I have a couple friends who would probably love this, but I never wear dirt scents, so this one's just not for me.

Pyramus - On me, this is very, very subtle. It's mostly a soft white tea scent with a hint of dragon's blood and lavender. I'm not generally a fan of lavender, and I don't care for the way it blends with the dragon's blood -- it turns into something a little "off" on my skin. While the overall fragrance is subtle, the lavender and dragon's blood are strong enough to drown out the other resinous notes. I'm afraid this one's not for me.

Against Idleness and Mischief - I like this a lot. The honey blends gorgeously well with the tonka, creating an overall smooth, warm, golden scent. The chamomile is fairly subtle, but adds a light touch of calming herbalness to the scent. The hyssop is also subtle, but adds a nice, soft floral touch to the overall scent. The honey is definitely the dominant note, but the others work really well with it. Very pretty scent. Makes me want honey-sweetened tea.

High-Strung Daisies - This isn't a good scent on me. I don't like the smell of daisies or carnation and pepper can be "iffy" on me, although I do like sugared blends. This one is too sweet, though, and the spiciness of the pepper and carnation are really unpleasant to me. It's got a bit of a plastic-like scent hanging around the edges, too.

Each bottle of Chaos Theory is truly unique, a fragrant fractal, an exercise in the joy of chance and uncertainty! Each is a one-of-a-kind, utterly random combination of scents, the composition of which is based on whim, mood and gut instinct. CT IV: MCCXXXII - This is another of the strange ones. It's got a strong initial blast of vanilla and orchid that is quite lovely, but there's something weird and unpleasant behind it...something... well... meaty. The meat note is very subtle and barely there, but intereferes just enough with the pretty vanilla-floral that this becomes a quite odd scent. I also think there's some animalic musk in this, as it has an aspect of it that reminds me of Buck Moon, Ivanushka, and Faunalia.

CT V: CDXLVI (446) - This is from the Dorian series. The person who sent this to me said it smelled to her like... bell peppers (?), I think it was. Sure enough, whatever's in this has that crazy note that I associate not with bell peppers, but with canned green chili peppers. This is such a bizarre scent -- it's got a ton of that glorious creamy-sweet and smooth Dorian, but then it's topped off with this bizarre vegetable note. Now that I think of it, the combination of that weird canned green chili pepper note combined with Dorian makes the overall effect something like fresh cumin. Bizarre Chaos Theory, but that's part of the fun of it, I suppose.

CT III: DLXX (570) - This smells like white musk and vomit. There's maybe a bit of something resinous in there, too. Passing along... CT III: CDLXXXIX (489) - Click HERE to read other reviews of this particular one. When I first sniffed it, my thought was that it reminded me of something I'd smelled before -- kind of foody and Christmassy... kind of gingery, but also piney -- there's definitely some pine pitch in there and something slightly medicinal, which could be the pine or could something else. It's another odd one. Glad I got to try it, but I'll be frimping this along.

The Montauk Project - This smells like medicinal, heavy, wet potting soil. It's incredibly damp, mossy, dirty, and green...heavy, heavy, heavy. It reminds me of hiking through the Pacific Northwest rainforest and the smell of the mud as I try to dig it out of the grooves in the sole of my shoes. I don't like this at all -- totally not my style.

Whoso List To Hunt - Overall, this is a very golden, warm, brown scent. The brown musk is the dominant note followed by the oak bar, which I adore. The amber and rose blend beautifully with the other notes. The rose and amber are both giving this scent a bit too much powderiness for my preference and the musk is almost sweet, in an animalic way. I can definitely see why people would like this, but it's just not quite right for my skin chemistry. On the right person -- male or female -- who doesn't amp the powderiness or musky-sweetness, I think this would smell really gorgeous.

Egg Moon - While decanting, I spilled an imp of this on my jeans, which I was too lazy to remove, and so I got to smell lots and lots of Egg Moon for hours on end while decanting the rest of the blends in my group, so I'm very familiar with it, and my final assessment is that it's awful. Whether it's on me or on my clothing, it's super-strong, super-sweet and spicy red-hots cinnamon, and the cassia is unpleasant, but made even more unpleasant by the way the frankincense blends with it (wah! I usually love frank!) and then, beneath it all, is this weird scent (the dammar gum perhaps?) that smells kind of heavy and almost-boozy-but-not-quite and really, just makes the whole thing heavy and cloying and horrible. I've tried all but one of the lunar oils, and this is by far my #1 least favorite.

Dark Chocolate, Whiskey, and Cognac Truffle - I love dark chocolate, I love whiskey, I love cognac, and I imagine I'd love them all together in a truffle, but sadly, on my skin, it just does not work. Chocolate blends are bad on me 95% of the time and whiskey rarely works on me, and together, the smell is really wonky with my skin chemistry. I wish it smelled more like what I imagine the real truffle would taste like in my mouth!

Serpents with Glittering Eyes and Forky Tongues - I LOVE this scent. This is an absolutely perfect summertime fragrance. It's heavy on the lemon, lime, and currant. The herbs bolster the citrus notes, keeping them from becoming too bright and airy. And the green musk -- I recognize that from 51 and a couple other blends I've enjoyed. I love it -- it's a really awesome, ethereal addition to the citrus notes. I've been wearing this a lot this spring and foresee myself wearing it even more this summer. Now that I think of it, I should have tossed a bottle into my last Lab order. Next time!

Monsieur Petitbled's Frivolous Wheeled Footwear - On me, this is an odd little scent. It starts off smelling like clove and orange, but almost immediately, the clove backs off, which is surprising in and of itself, and what I smell is orange blossom and fig. The clove and pepper are definitely there giving a spicy edge to things, but they're subtle and not in-your-face as both usually are on me. I can't smell the patch or the red currant for the life of me. If I had to classify this, I'd call it a spicy fruity-floral.

Ambergris accord, water lily, freesia, sea spray, molluscan seashell accord, and driftwood. Octopus and Abalone Diver - This one opens up on me with the scent of freesia, water lily, and salty sea spray....and it's really strong and perfumey. As it dries down, the florals mellow out and what I smell then is mostly the scent of salty sea and wood, and oddly enough, that molluscan seashell accord. I had no idea I knew what a seashell smelled like until I recognized the odor in this perfume oil blend. How odd. After a little longer on my skin, the warm, deliciousness of the ambergris starts to take over the other notes until all I'm left with is ambergris and salty sea spray. I like it, but it's not something I'd find myself reach for over my other favorite aquatics and ambergris blends.

Plastic Pink Flamingo - Well, considering that marshmallow does indeed turn to "plastic" on my skin, this is a fitting scent -- it smells like marshmallow plastic and lots and lots of sugar. Dandelion is usually an awful note on me, and while I can smell it in this blend, the plastickiness of the marshmallow keeps it from coming out in full force. In the decant vial, it's marshmallowy sweet and delicious, but I have a feeling that if I wore it in a scent locket to keep it from going plasticky on me, it would become cloying after a while because it's just so uber-sweet.

Doll's Eye Infused Honey - Bitter herbal honey with a hint of mint. Another reviewer mentiond marigolds, which is dead-on -- that's exactly what the bitter part of it smells like...stinky marigolds. It's a very unique scent, but that marigold-like scent combined with the mint make it unwearable for me.