astarinel

So every year, despite knowing that pumpkin = hot buttered fail on my skin, I try one pumpkin scent because it sounds SO GOOD that surely maybe it will be the exception and I can find my one true pumpkin scent and ride off happily into the sunset with it. Normally these are epic failures and I vow to not delude myself again next year. This was the one I picked this year. And, surprisingly, it is not terrible! I agree somewhat with the reviews that mention carrot cake, I don't actually get that much pumpkin out of this, more like a carrot cake cupcake with thick cream cheese icing. The cream cheese icing/cheesecake note is definitely reminiscent of the Beaver Moon family, which is a good thing in my book. This is the least fail a pumpkin scent has ever been on me! I'm not in love with it, but it's a nice foody scent. Although I have three versions of Beaver Moon with a similar vibe, I'm definitely keeping the decant.

Tart and fruity when wet, backed by patchouli. This actually reminds me a bit of the old version of Mme Moriarty on my skin, with the red fruit + patchouli. The fruits fade as it dries, leaving mostly patchouli + amber. I don't get much honey, but I also don't get much of the leaves note that tends to go bitter on my skin. I have a feeling this will be a winner for the people who can do the dark red/purple/gold type of scents, but I am not one of those people.

I'm generally terrified of milk/cream notes, as they have a tendency to go a bit off on my skin, but I'm relieved there's none of that here! I'm surprised by how much I like this. It is a sweet, creamy scent, a little heavy and warm/fuzzy. It reminds me a little of Boo and a little of Arcana's Mme Lapin. It's actually something closer to a combination of the two: sweeter and more vanillic than Mme Lapin, but fuzzier and muskier than Boo. I would never have tried this if I hadn't tested all of the Liliths, but I'm glad I did. Don't be afraid of the goat's milk accord, it's a very wearable creamy note. I personally don't find this scent overly sweet, but I love sugar/candy scents so there are very few scents that are too sweet for me! Definitely keeping my decant, maybe seeking out a bit more.

This smells incredibly accurately like pink strawberry bubblegum. It does have a bit of a spicy undertone. I do not smell anything like ozone, which is good because generally it goes straight dryer sheets on me. If you want to smell like bubblegum, this is terrifyingly accurate. I do not want to smell like bubblegum.

I usually don't like aquatics, but this is really pretty! It's both salty and sweet to me, and it feels like there's some sort of light pink floral note adding a bit of a sweet, perfume-y edge. Although it's primarily aquatic scent while wet, the water fades as it dries leaving mostly soft amber + whatever floral note this is + a touch of salt. I'm often reluctant to try outdoorsy/scene scents because ozone and air notes can go really off on me, but this has nothing of dryer sheets about it. I would never have tried this if I hadn't signed up for little testers of all the Lilith scents, but I'm actually glad I did and may try to seek out a bit more of this one. It's wearable, a touch sweet, and unlike anything else I own (which is a fairly rare thing for me to say at this point). Definitely a light, feminine aquatic scent.

This is interesting! It's sweet and green and a little wet. It's a pretty unusual combination of greenery + pink sugar candy. I get only a slight whisper of mint in the background. I quite enjoy honey notes, but I don't get much honey here, just sugar and candy over damp green. It feels like a summer scent, something cooling and sweet. I don't generally like "green" scents, but somehow pink + green is fine, if a little quirky. Probably not something I'll need more of, but I'm glad I tried it because I don't think I've smelled anything like it.

Pink marshmallow candy. Definitely creamy, very sweet. The strawberry note here is definitely a "fake" candy strawberry, which isn't a criticism! This is a "pure sugar" type of scent, a dark pink, juicy, sticky scent. While I like it, I have marshmallow perfumes I like better (Chewing Little Bits of String, Plastic Pink Flamingo). I actually think I would be more impressed with this if I hadn't just tried Battle Fairy, which has a similar strawberry candy vibe but a much stronger strawberry note that I prefer. But if you want sugar and marshmallow with your strawberry, this one would be the one for you.

Honey + cake + currant. There's something about the scent that reminds me of Lady Una, maybe the honey cake vs. honey musk? It doesn't remind me of Eat Me, which is good because that scent is super fail on my skin so whatever note made that one go off isn't present here. In general, though, this scent is much more about the honey and sweetness and much less about the cake. I like it, but I have a lot of cake scents and there's nothing special about this one that grabs me, and it's definitely not very fruity. I expected it to remind me more of Tomoe Gozen, but that one was CURRANT + honey while this one is the other way 'round.

Sugary florals! I'm not sure of the floral notes, I would guess freesia or something else a little sharp, and maybe orange blossom? There's an orange blossom note I'm less fond of, the one in Hunger, and I'm getting reminded of that here. A little too floral and not enough sugar for my taste.

I'm another person who loves candy and sweet blends, and so far I LOVE this one! It has the same strawberry note in BPTP's Kitty, round and soft, combined with vanilla and sugar into delicious candy. It's definitely a sugar rush scent, but I don't find it quite as overwhelming or cloying as some other candy scents I've tried. It's juicy and soft and wearable.

I love this so much. I use TKO sometimes to help me sleep, although I just like the way it smells too, and this smells exactly like TKO except I can spray it all over my linens. I personally prefer scents on the sweeter side, and the sweet soft lavender marshmallows of TKO are exactly what I want in a room/sleep blend. I will echo all the requests to make this GC, because honestly it's more perfect as an atmo than as a perfume oil. I'm sorry I only bought one bottle!

I love fruity drink scents, so this one is fairly up my alley. I agree with the "tropical drink" vibe, but there's a little airy-quirkyness to this that I'm guessing comes from the spun sugar and apple blossom (a note I LOVE). Sweet, juicy, and fun. As it dries, the pepper comes out a bit more adding a little bit of bite to the scent. I'll definitely have to give this one more of a skin test to see how quickly I go through the decant; since we're moving into fall I may be less interested in smelling tropical drinks.

Dark spiced cherry lemon! ... I guess that sounds weird, but I actually rather like this. Verbena has a tendency to go all stompyboots over all the other notes in blends, and the dark spicy cherry is actually managing to keep it in check for once. I don't get much patchouli, but the scent verges more on "dark" than "sweet" and I'm guessing it's contributing to that. I don't recall loving this last time I tried it when the Carnival was out originally, but I think I rather like it now, at least enough to keep my decant around and see if I manage to use it up.

Dark powdered chocolate. The scent has sort of a dryness to it, and the chocolate is bittersweet. I found all these mentions of florals terrifying, but I don't actually get much floral to the scent myself. There's a bit of dark earthy greenness, maybe a touch of mint? But this is primarily a dark chocolate scent with an interesting "perfume" twist.

Sharp! I didn't really like the original Mme, as red musk and dark fruits is not really my olfactory jam, but I thought I'd give this a try. Like others have mentioned, I find it significantly different from the original and I don't really like it. Red musk rarely works on my skin, but that combined with whatever is so sharp in here (patchouli leaf, I guess? I know all the other notes are fine on my skin...) makes this verge on weirdly medicinal. Almost no fruit during the wet stage, very little sweetness. I love vanilla and fruits, so I was hoping those would be more prominent here, but they aren't really for me. Man, the people at the beginning of this thread talking about bright sweet fruits are making me wonder what the heck happened. I wouldn't even think there were fruit notes in this blend if I hadn't read the notes list. I'm going to hang on to the imp in case aging does... something. Just in case. :/

I was looking forward to this one because the previous artist tea scent didn't work on me, and I like a good tea scent but a lot of them seem to go off with my skin chemistry. Citrus tea and sugar with a glimmer of mint. The tea note is fairly strong and a touch astringent, and there's that herbal mint in the background. I don't find this very sweet at all, although I love sweet scents so my sugar tolerance is pretty high. In addition, I love one of BPAL's orange blossom notes (Katharina) and hate another one of their orange blossom notes (Hunger), and I don't smell either of them here. Primarily it's just light citrus tea. I think I would like this better as an atmo than as a perfume. The throw is pretty low, but the scent is sort of a crisp, fresh, and energizing one. As the citrussy notes burn off as it dries, I'm left with sort of a faint slightly sweet tea scent that's nice but so faint! Definitely a pleasant, work-appropriate sort of scent.

I really liked the old MOTM, but I find this one fairly different and it might be aging or the balance of the notes or both. I found the old one to be something of a "night" version of Fairy Market, which is one of my favorite "magical outdoors" scents, I guess you could say. On wet this is very floral, not particularly sweet, kind of ozoney. Ozone has a strong tendency to dryer sheets on me and that's what I'm mostly getting here. Both the "sugar" and "incense" seem to be missing entirely on my skin. If I sniff hard, I get a little bit of that sweet outside air that I liked about the old version, and as it dries the incense starts to poke its head out a bit, but I'm kind of disappointed. I'm going to keep the decant around and test it to see if aging brings around the magic I remember, but I guess I'll have to dissent from the other reviews that found this one similar to the original. The ozone balance is just different enough where my skin chemistry turns it overwhelming, especially in the wet stages.

Smushed apples with spices. The apple reminds me of the SGA green apple. There's something dark and not-sweet hovering in the background, and the sweetness of the apple fades a bit as the tea and spices come out more on the drydown. This has pretty good throw and lasting power, and I wouldn't necessarily call it a foody scent. I actually will probably give this sample to my boyfriend, who likes quirky not-too-sweet fruit scents sometimes.

This definitely reminds me a little of High Strung Daisies and Treat #1, it has that same hard crystalline sugar note. Orange creamsicle cotton candy. I get a very slight spice aspect to it, but pink pepper tends to not be super prominent on my skin. It's a very airy, almost crunchy sugar scent. Pretty light throw and the citrus fades fast. I rather like this, but I think it's a bit too light and similar to candy scents I already have.

I have and adore the massage oil from the previous release of this, so I was very excited to see it come back because I love this vanilla and it goes well with the many vanilla-based scents that I wear. Unfortunately, to echo some of the reviews here, I find this one very very lightly scented which surprised me because the massage oil was very strongly scented. The underlying scent is similar, it's just like someone forgot to put in half the vanilla. I'll still use it as moisturizer because I love the texture, but I'm pretty disappointed.

Not quite as apply as expected! This goes on with a very crisp, slightly tart green apple note. Behind that apple is a soft resiny-sweet scent that comes out more as it dries, while the apple note softens and sweetens up a bit. This is a fairly unique apple scent -- I've tried a lot of apple scents, and I don't think I've ever tried one like this. An interesting, non-foody apple scent.

Mmm heavy sweet musky fruits. For the opening moments, it is peachy peachy candy peach. As it dries a bit, the peach backs off and I get some papaya. It also gets a bit less sweet, and although I like sweet scents that peach note was bordering on too much for me while it was wet. I like this, but I have a lot of peach-heavy scents already and this is definitely a PEACH sort of scent.

2015 version. I tried this one early on in my BPAL career and didn't like it, and I've lately been re-trying stuff I dismissed long ago to see if my tastes or the formulas have changed. I'm glad I did, because I actually like this scent now! Caramel is definitely the strongest note wet, backed with coconut and tobacco. I find some tobacco notes smell like ashtray to/on me, while others add a pleasant chewy-bitterness to a scent, and this is that latter kind. Warm, sweet, dark, thick, and a bit spiced. As it dries, the sweetness fades a bit and the amber becomes more prominent.

I like the apple note here, it's very pink and crisp and fresh, but with a little spice and almost smokiness underneath. I'm not sure I would pick the spice out as cardamom, but it's definitely present and a bit dry. I love honey, but the honey isn't super strong here, the apple is definitely the most prominent note. Despite basically liking all of these notes, I don't think I like this scent all that much. I have a fair number of apple scents, and I like all of them better than I like this one, even if this particular apple note is quite nice. The odd smoky-spice fades a bit as it dries, and the honey comes out more, but it never turns into something I love.

This is, as people have mentioned, a really lovely fresh pear note. I really like pear, but I've only had a few work for me. The Perilous Parlor is good, but The Vine was unspeakably bad. The lemon is a little more prominent in the decant, but fades a bit on application and ends up mostly giving the scent a bit of a tart edge. The white musk-fruit combination reminds me a little of Katharina, but with this cool, crisp pear instead of the sweeter apricot. I am getting relatively low throw, but that may be just the testing process. I'm going to hang onto this decant and give it a few longer, more thorough wears, because this one is definitely my favorite out of the Shungas I've tried this year.