astarinel

Chimera (cinnamon and honeysuckle) and Sudha Segara (ginger, milk, and honey) are both warm spicy blends to me that stay clear of incensey notes. Chimera is a bit more floral, while Sudha Segara is more creamy.

Of the retail salons I have tried thus far, this one was the surprise winner for me! I expected it to be nice, given the notes, but I wasn't expecting it to be swoon-worthy. First: Probably my favorite scent, period, is Et Lux Fuit, and in the imp, this has kind of a slightly similar feel to me which is awesome. On my skin, it has a great spicy-golden vibe with the honey and carnation mixing, with a sort of creamy light musky feel in the background. I can't really pick out other notes, but it's very light and has decent throw and staying power. It stayed pretty constant throughout wear, and continued to be, to my nose, somewhat similar to ELF. I love it!

I generally like resinous scents, although I like them a little more balanced with other notes. Nevertheless, let's try it! In the imp, this is quite strong and very heavily incensey/woody. On, it continues to be quite strong with a lot of throw, and starts out pretty true to what I smelled in the bottle. However, given some time, it first started to warm up and then suddenly turned a bit unpleasantly sharp. I wish I knew what was doing that, so I could avoid that note in the future, but it began to border on chemically-cleanerish and I eventually had to wash it off before it gave me a headache. Quite strong throughout, though. This had a lot of throw which started off good and then quickly became very bad.

Oh, I was so hopeful about this given the other reviews! I am one of those people who love love loves vanilla -- Dorian and Antique Lace are near the top of my GC Top Ten. I'm not saying Haloes went bad on me, because it didn't... it just didn't go particularly good. In the imp I can get a little of the vanilla, but on the whole it just smells slightly sweet and well-blended. I don't really get any specific notes. On, it starts off very gentle and light, with continued smoothness. I want it to smell like... more, I guess. It's somewhat of a golden scent, which is usually right up my alley, and it's a bit sweet. On the downside, I think I'm getting a touch of soapiness from the lily which is one of my personal chemistry woes. Unfortunately, I can't see myself even keeping the imp of this one.

Gosh I love warm sunshiney scents. I can't say Et Lux Fuit enough times. ELF ELF ELF. <love> But, uhm, don't love it too much. I'm enjoying being able to grab ever-more backup bottles at below lab-price. To keep recommending LEs, Jacob's Ladder is also very sunny to me, as is Sportive Sun. Up until recently I would also have added Tarot: The Sun, which is relatively recently discontinued so you might be able to grab a bottle. I find it to be warm ambery citrus sunshine. In terms of GCs, my favorite warm happy scents are Thaleia (honey and apricots), O (amber and vanilla), and Antique Lace (linen/musky vanilla). I'm also a big fan of Fairy Market (grassy/incensey/sweet/whoknows). If you prefer a bit of spice with your sun, I'd also recommend The Lion (warm dry amber) or Basthet (lightly spicy amber).

You might have the same problem I did -- my skin EATS chocolate notes. Most things that most people declare to be heavy on the chocolate end up relatively light on the chocolate once I put them on, and often totally not chocolatey at all! Another issue I have is that I prefer scents that aren't outright "foody," so bear that in mind. My current faaaaaavorite chocolate is the most recent (7/07) version of 13. It's amazing, and it actually has a chocolate note that lasts on me. The last few 13s, the chocolate tended to fade while other notes took prominence. My standby for chocolaty-ness is Velvet, which was already mentioned. It's a very rich chocolate, and I love the sandalwood note. I found Boomslang to be sadly relatively un-chocolately to me, and primarily a weaker Snake Oil. Bliss disappeared within minutes, and while Gluttony kept the chocolate a little longer but was WAY too sugary and foody for me on the whole.

Chimera is my favorite cinnamon blend, and I'd recommend it as a lighter, summery cinnamon. Chimera - The fiery, volatile scent of cinnamon, thickened by myrrh, honeysuckle, and copal. Although the description sounds kind of heavy, when I tried Chimera it was more of a sweet, lightly floral cinnamon.

I like Eris, as a spicy fruit. I only get very vague florals from it; it primarily becomes sweet, juicy fruits backed by spices.

I suppose this thread is a testament to how different BPAL can be on different people's skin! For me, Kitsune-Tsuki is noticeably daffodil-y (part of what I like about it!) with the plums very sweet but less prominent than the florals. If you like sweet, fruity florals, Kitsune-Tsuki is one of my absolute favorites in that class. Eos, on the other hand, is primarily jasmine with skin musk on me, but I do tend to amp some musks. I had high hopes for that one and ended up not liking it at all!

In the imp, it was very strongly peony and I only started to smell the teas sort of after the peony was done assaulting me. After I put it on, however, the peony started to behave and stayed sweet and light, floating above the crisp teas. I really, really like it. It does tend to fade a bit quickly, particularly the peony, leaving me with a weak primarily-tea scent after a few hours. I would probably want to reapply, since the sweet peony smell is something I like very much about the scent. As a note: After loving the Dormouse so, I picked up an almost-full 5ml off eBay that was probably reasonably old, as it came in a blue bottle rather than amber. When I opened to sniff, I was absolutely SCARED -- where was my fresh sweet peony? However, I steeled myself and put it on and within a few minutes it had returned to the Dormousey goodness that I loved, and, in fact, it seemed to have BLENDED a bit better. The peony and teas were more together rather than layered. I'm not sure if that makes sense. In any case, I wanted to warn anyone who bought aged Dormouse not to be scared off by the very-different bottle smell. It calms down quickly and all is well.

Oh, Namaste, I so wanted to like you, but my body chemistry has decreed that it isn't to be. At first, when I put it on, it was a morpher. I was getting a little sandalwood, a little jasmine, and a little lemongrass, and I was looking forward to seeing where it went after it dried. Unfortunately, my skin decided that what it really loved was lemongrass. Lots and lots of lemongrass. After about half an hour of Namaste on my skin, it basically smelled like I'd dripped on some single note lemongrass oil. I like lemongrass, don't get me wrong, but I'm not sure I like it THAT much. Off to the swaps pile, alas!

As soon as I put it on, it was very, very golden amber. I love amber, but my skin tends to amp it so it can drown out other notes in blends if they're at all shy. At first, I was a bit worried this was going to happen with Brisingamen. However, as it dried, I got a bit of spicy floralness from the myrtle and mums. I don't really get any apple blossom, but I'm not too bothered by it. It stayed nice and didn't change too much after the inital amber-fade, had decent throw and lasting power, and I quite like it but don't love it. I'm keeping the imp, but a bottle is probably not in my future.

This is so delicate and lovely. It starts out more of a sweet-ambery smell, and I'm guessing the florally-ness I smell is the sweet pea. The vanilla starts to come out more and more as it dries, and it reminds me of the vanilla in Dorian (my great love). It stays very warm and creamy and sweet, and lasts a decently long time on me without changing too drastically. It does, however, seem to lose the sweeter notes first (vanilla and sweet pea) leaving me with more of an amber-sandalwood feel as it goes on. I'd probably need to reapply a few times during the day to keep up that creamy sweetness, but oh so worth it that would be.

To sum up: I love love love Dorian. Love. If I were a different person than I am, this would be written with many capital letters and exclamation points, I assure you. In the imp I mostly get sweet vanilla, which is a nice start. It is somehow both light and rich. It is very sweet, on me. I am definitely getting the tea, so my first impressions are of sweet, creamy vanilla tea. However, there is something musky and floral and deep underneath it, which gives the scent a much deeper and more complex feel. I started out thinking, oh, how delicate and sweet... which quickly turned into huh, this is actually kind of dark and sexy. This turned out to not be much of a morpher on me, and had pretty good staying power and decent throw. However, it was one of those weird ones where it started strong, then I couldn't really smell it anymore, then periodically I would get whiffs of something good and think, "what is that delicious smell? oh right, it's me!" My boyfriend, who is generally uninterested but a rather good sport about my perpetual "smell me! SMELL ME NOW!" liked this one so much that he offered to buy me a bottle immediately, and spent the rest of the evening snuggling my neck.

I am a vanilla-blend person, so. Wet, it smells lovely and nice and warm from the amber and sandalwood. The florals are right behind, primarily what I think I can recognize as heliotrope from other blends. I am a little worried about the lack of vanilla in the imp and the immediate wet stage, but I am going to persevere. As it starts to dry, the vanilla comes out a bit more and I can start to smell a bit of peach, but I definitely don't get the sweet peachiness many were reporting. On me, it's primarily a sweet, warm, vanilla-amber-wood scent with a bit of floral and a drop of peachiness in the background.

In the imp, a bit sweet and fruity with a touch of warmth. On, it warms up a lot (my skin also tends to amp amber). Like many other reviewers, I'm not terribly familiar with the individual scents that went into this blend other than the amber, so I can't pick out any single notes. It stays vaguely sweet, in a fruity way, but not too sweet. As it dries, it blends well into this warm sweet fruity floral spicy thing that I adore. It doesn't have a lot of throw, but lasted a long time on me. Even the sweet notes, which tend to be the first to disappear into the ether, hung around for a while and stayed soft and gentle. This is one of the ones I perpetually debate buying a bottle of. Do I need a bottle of it? Does it fill a niche I haven't filled? Don't I have enough perfume already, dammit? But I may break down and pick it up in my next order.

In the imp: extremely well-blended! Wow. I can't pick out individual notes, but I'm getting a sweet ripe fruity-floral. On, wet, it gets lighter and a bit more ethereal, like I'm walking by the garden instead of standing right in the middle of it. The most prominent scent wavers a bit -- sometimes I'm smelling more dark fruits, sometimes more florals, and it doesn't have too much throw on me. As it dries, it gets much much woodier on me. Woods seem to cling to my skin and just last, and that's what I'm left with after the fruits and flowers have faded away. I actually really like this. The wood is almost a little spicy -- maybe that's the fir? In any case, I don't think I'd want a big bottle of this since my fruit-floral niche is generally taken up by Kitsune-Tsuki, but I'm keeping the imp for those days when I just want to smell like a beautiful garden/orchard.

Queen of Hearts is the blend that solidified my opinion that anything "lily" hates me. In the imp, very white floral with a hint of cherry. On me, wet, it stayed pretty true to that with the cherry floating around the white florals. It wasn't quite as sweet on me as I expected, and was more mild and soft. However, it quickly dried into soap. Soapy soap soap soap. The same thing happened to a few other lily blends, so I'm thinking that note is likely the culprit. I was a little disappointed not to get any of the sweetness others reported, and also that the cherry ran off and abandoned me so quickly.

I'm going to preface this review by saying that while I'm a big fan of sweet scents in general, my preferences tend to run more towards vanilla/floral sweet rather than foody sweet. However, I liked it okay when I sniffed the imp. My love of vanilla was all, "hey, there's some vanilla in here! awesome! slather it on!" It smelled very sweet and kind of cakey. On, it became overwhelmingly unbearably sweet. The cakes amped and amped until that was all I could smell and took on sort of a grainy smell-texture, if that makes sense. As this was my first cake-foody scent try, it may just be that the cake note goes crazy on me. After reading all these reviews, I was really hoping I'd like it, but apparently even my skin's love of amping vanilla couldn't beat the sweetness of Eat Me, and the vanilla was lost in a cakey abyss of doom. This was one of the few scents I've ever actually had to wash off, as the sweetness began giving me an angry headache.

Oh, White Rabbit, I so wanted to love you. In the imp, it was fantastic. I got some vanilla and the linen note (which I love) backed by some honey and something spicy which was probably the pepper and ginger but I'm terrible at identifying spice notes. As soon as I put it on: Licorice. Oh my god lots and lots of licorice all over my skin. I'm not sure exactly what note or combination of notes did this to me, and believe me I wish I knew because it's VERY licorice, VERY strong, and even as someone who likes licorice I'm a little freaked out by this. I'm going to guess it has something to do with the pepper, as most of the other notes have played nice with my skin in other blends. It stays strong and true licorice for a while, and takes its time drying down. A number of hours later, I start to get this lovely sweet milky tea scent that I adore, but unfortunately it isn't worth sitting through the lengthy ack licorice phase to get there.

In the imp, I can smell the plum and the jasmine most. It's primarily sweet. I do like jasmine, so I'm hoping the florals come through a bit more on. On, wet, it's plummy jasmine and pretty strong. As it dries, however, all of the notes start to play nice with each other and I start to get some lovely daffodil and orchid. It becomes hard to pick out the notes and feels extremely smooth and well-blended. On me, it had decent throw and lasted absolutely for-ever. It's very bright and stays sweet throughout, but what was almost TOO sweet at first mellowed into this lovely sweetish fruity-floral blend. I've taken to wearing it on Mondays and days when I might need a little bit of an olfactory pick-me-up.

This one was very juicy and sweet in the imp. When I put it on, it started out very true to its imp-scent -- a little strong, but still very sweet and fruity. On me the fruits were more prominent than the florals, which I couldn't smell other than a vague hint of what I think was the sweet pea. However, after about 5 minutes on, it was gone. My skin ATE it, and the only lingering scent was a bit sour and dusty. I was terribly disappointed, as this was delicious in the imp and on me for the first moments.