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BPAL Madness!

sprout

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Everything posted by sprout

  1. sprout

    Tuberose

    I second the recommended Ava and Butterflies Flowers and Jewels Attending and add two of my favorite oils: Stardust and Radiance of the Opium Dream
  2. sprout

    Stekkjarstaur

    This thread does not need my review but I feel compelled to express my love. I mean, I'd be exaggerating only a little bit by saying that I heard angels singing when I opened this. This smells like marshmallow cream, the ice cream topping, but no dairy products here. Then there is the fabric note. I can describe this as more wool like than linen. There is a similarity to the pillowcase note, in Sticky Pillowcase. But more wooly. The drydown is exquisitely vanilla plus wool. Which doesn't sound appealing but it is. So, this oil, unaged (I let it rest a week, but otherwise it is quite fresh) on my skinistry, is Vanilla that is foody nonfoody, sans butter, sans cake, sans crust, with a modest dose of sugar, and a hint of wooly fabric. I'm amazed at how the wool has a texture, created olfactorily. Which is not technically even a word. I just made it up, that is how inspired by the majesty I'm feeling here. If you wanted pure unadulterated marshmallows without any milk, butter or other foody complexity or burnt notes, this is your grail. Needless to say, I totally love this and purchased an unprecedented amount of back ups. I never want to run out and imagine aging will just make the vanilla sublime. Don't even get me started on the layering possibilities/mind blown. The sillage is respectable, but they won't smell this across the room. The lasting power is quite respectable too for such a young oil. I predict aging will improve both of these parameters. I think that the wool note adds needed complexity to the simplicity of the sugary marshmallow topping. Epic fucking delicious!, which is my buzz phrase of highest praise.
  3. sprout

    Oak blends?

    Oak Moon...
  4. sprout

    Osmanthus

    Fairy Bites is nice for a blend with osmanthus.
  5. sprout

    Osmanthus

    I found single oil of osmanthus on Eden botanical website, quite reasonable. I'm considering an order, I think it would be even more affordable to buy and split if anyone else is interested...
  6. La Ronde Du Sabbat Satan Summoning his Legions Satan Starting from Uthuriel's Speer Pan Twardowski and the Devil Witchcraft Scene Mars Corotiacatus Midnight Mass Autumn Fancies (grass) Autumn Coolness (grass) Interfector Prosperous Flowers of the Elegant Twelve Seasons Doc Constantine Organ Grinder Visions of Autumn VII Looming Spectre of Inutterable Horror Ian This is Your Wilderness Streets of Detroit Wild Indigo Duskywing Ichabod Crane Tatie Bogie Cuchulain Fight with the Sea Marche Funebre Graveyard Dirt Dawn: Cernnunos Young Pine Saplings WILF The Christmas Tree phobia scent from 2014 Yule that I cannot spell If you like musk, Faunalia Bloodlust Bonbon Memory of Primal Secrets I'm a chic, but I do love masculine scents, especially leather, incense and wood These are from more or less the last 5 years
  7. sprout

    ISO *Perfect* Winter Scent!

    Hunger Moon is my frosty Winter sky scent. No berries, mint, holiday spice or pastries. Just the smell of the cold sky with a hint of ozone. I've tried many, many Winter scents in my quest to find that crystalline, pure sky scent like the space between the stars. This one does it for me, maybe it is what you're searching for...
  8. Any of the BPALZ dirt blends feature a prominent petrichor note?
  9. sprout

    Pears - different BPAL pear scents

    Blue Moon 06 was a nice pear, not sure how hard it is to find
  10. sprout

    Père Noël

    This is an Insta bottle purchase for me. In vitro: oranges! The oil is orange too. Wet: sweet orange oil and zingy, effervescent tangerine! Early dry: Each of the notes are discernable, orange/tangerine, anise, candy sweet lavender, cookies Drydown: Father Christmas dries to slightly sweet pizzelle cookies. Lavender candies are like the Belfana note. Final analysis: The notes are all present but combine to smell like a tray of delicious treats. This is perfect. The pizzelle cookies are dead ringers, slightly sweet with just a hint of anise. If you liked La Belfana and Sugar Cookie, this should be a no-brainer. I'd love it if the sillage was stronger, but aging could improve that. The only question I have to ask is do I need multiple bottles or not?
  11. sprout

    Pears - different BPAL pear scents

    Pleasant Embrace, a Shunga from last year's (2015) Lupers was lovely, but hard to find, as it went out of stock before most people could test their decants. LA Belle au bois Dormant is beautiful and easily obtained as it is general catalog, which is easily overlooked
  12. sprout

    Haute Macabre smell alikes

    Hi! I'd recommend trying Antikythera mechanism, Haloes, Liz (Hellboy series) and Sachs. For related, consider Dee, Tombstone, Le Serpent Qui Danse, Whip, Perversion, White Rider...
  13. Hmmm, I agree. Could it be the civet?
  14. sprout

    BPAL blends with Opium

    Fettered in the Shackles of the Drug comes to mind. It should not be hard to find a decant. It is better than Carnivale Diabolique but similar to my nose. I just tested Paysage and I recommend it, but test first, if you are not sure about the mugwort. The drydown is sublime, though. It went from, "maybe I need to wash this off," to, "I think I need a bottle or two!" Debauchery, Anathema, and Belle Epoque are all high on my list of favorites. Finally, it may be difficult to find, but Radiance of the Opium Dream is exquisite, if tuberose isn't a deal breaker note. Mum moon and Red Lantern are well loved and I think they're divine but the above are my off the beaten path recommendations. I had no idea how much I loved Beth's opium scents until just now! Guess I need to track down Parliament of Monsters and Romanti_goth now...and The Snow at Dusk may be a winner, I've yet to try it but it's getting great reviews.
  15. sprout

    Statistically Favorite Scent

    No one's said it yet but I will, that spreadsheet is bloody genius!
  16. sprout

    Indulgence

    This does not begin well, as it smelled like hairspray in the imp, but I persevered in the spirit of exploration. Green initially while wet, an undercurrent of sweet from the amber, and hippy dippy patchouli. Elemi gives this an almost citrus edge, with green aquatic suggestions from the? green amber and perhaps tobacco flower. Is an aquatic resin possible? The light of a smoky golden topaz, crystalized into mineral is the synesthesia I envision. Drying, sniffing my wrist is becoming more compulsory. The tobacco flower with perhaps help from the vetiver are present as a contraposition to the crystalline elements of amber and patchouli. The ornate smoky topaz sits on a black velvet cushion. Drydown, now this becomes exquisite. The green, aquatic edge has softened. Tobacco and patchouli are dominant but the champaca, darkened by vetiver are adding a smoky quality, without smelling of incense. The green amber is a new take on resin for this nose. It is green and vegetable but resinous and smoky at the same time. I imagine that this will age beautifully as amber and patchouli are wont to do. I'm suspicious that this will be a sleeper hit as fresh can only suggest the magnificent olfactory glory this will likely become. I'll retest in about 3 months to get a better idea but damn the torpedoes, I'll probably need a bottle!
  17. Black Annis is a personal favorite, if you like musk too. Licorice whip is great too. I spray that on everything!
  18. sprout

    Apocalyptic Scents?

    The Come and See series suggest the Apocalypse to me, literally: Scales of Deprivation Bow and Crown of Conquest Great Sword of War Death on a Pale Horse Representative of the stages of the apocalypse, according to John, the Revelator. And each one is a winner! Bow and Crown is my personal favorite.
  19. sprout

    Ad Montes Oculos Levavi

    Teak wood and blood musk perfectly melded. Initially the teak dominates, the musk on drydown. I didn't smell anything extraneous to the listed notes: no metal or blood. Teak wood is it's own thing, it smells like well polished, hard wood furniture: Slightly sharp and high end. Blood musk is less skanky than red, less citrus than black, and not high pitched like white. It strikes a balance between red and black, more like the feral musk in Baby Goat or Coyote, but slightly more mineral, and it hints of blood, like iron or red clay. It suggests these things, rather than smelling like them. Perfect! Very bpal. Very woody. As I'm a woods and a musk girl, this is my thang. Bottle worthy.
  20. sprout

    Sugar Skull

    2015 version Wet: sugary fruit Dry: browned sugar I see why this is popular! I think I'll get my paws on a bottle. Sorry, I don't have any older versions to compare to this year's offering. I remember trying this many years ago and fresh, or maybe it's just this year's iteration, but my decant has more fruit and less burnt sugar than my memory of the original.
  21. sprout

    Now Winter Nights Enlarge

    I found a 2009 version, aged til now (2015) to review, since the new update has this recurring for the 2015 Yules...so, in case you are wondering how your decant will age... in vitro--def. a red musk blend, smells a bit foody, like caramel wet--red musk, honey, a bit of caramel, very faint patchouli drydown--reminds me a bit of Red Lantern in the drydown, due to the red musk, caramel, there is a trace bit of the champaca incense but only because I read the notes and know it is there. There is also a woody, balsalmic note, the "celery" note that others noticed is probably the galbanum. It almost smells like a tobacco leaf note. In this quite aged imp, the red musk is very calm and soothing, not as sexy and in your face as it can be. Wondering if I will need to get a bottle of this with the 2015 Yules? I like this quite a bit, but I have a bottle of Red Lantern and I am not sure this trumps it. It does have honey...maybe I will try layering the new decant with this aged decant and make my decision from that. If I come up with anything amazing I will report back...
  22. sprout

    Le Revenant

    In vitro: White floral, gardenia predominantly Wet: Floral! White florals, which are not screechy or high pitched, but soft and whispy, which could be the contribution of the sandalwood. Drying: A bit of the musk comes out, no cognac, some ambrette (musky and sweet) Late drydown: White musk predominant with a hint of fading gardenias and ambrette. The sandalwood is evident now and it is glorious. No cognac to be sniffed. Final thoughts: I was moving this imp to the retry pile when I noticed the drydown was the type of white musk and sandalwood I really, really like. Prior to that, I was just going to keep the imp, because I like florals, and gardenia particularly is lovely but this lacked complexity. However, I can tell by the late drydown that this will develop into the sort of skin musk I really, really like so now I have decided I will get a big bottle when I do my combined Weenie/Yule order. Aged, this will be magnificent! ETA--this is the 2015 version
  23. sprout

    Insects

    This one is hard to describe, but I'll try. Wet, Dry, it's not much change. Initially, I got a blast of minty paste, the kind from kindergarten. It transported me back to being a school child. But then the perfume did take it's final form and it lasted. A long,long time! And I was transported instead to the late nineties, early 2000, when I wore big name perfume from department stores and floriental was the rage... This reminds me of big, celebrity designed perfume from the nineties: Specifically, Elizabeth Arden Provocative Woman. I get the purple fruits, plum rather than grape, floral patchouli (no wood or dirt tones), plus neroli blends in with opoponax to make a blast of perfume! Citrus top,like a chypre, with a base of super sweet, resinous, heady sweet myrrh. The opoponax, patchouli and fruit merge to form a super note. It reminds me of many of the fruity chypre perfume bases from the nineties, Chanel Mademoiselle, Flowerbomb, etc. I think it is the sweet resin base combined with fruit and patchouli. It's a power hitter, very sweet not vanilla or gourmand, but quite classic "parfum". It lasted all day, sweet and sexy, grand Dame parfum. The citrus like neroli burned off and left the base of cloying resin plus patchouli and fruit. Drydown was well over eight or nine hours! Final thoughts- this is brilliant. I imagine it's Beth's interpretation of the fruity Oriental chypre, big name perfumes popular at the turn of the century. As in Y2K. I for one loved it! I'm not sure it reminds me of insects. But, it is big, powerful, sweet, fruity, patchouli resin following a neroli top note. Since it reminds me so much of a BPAL version of my favorite Elizabeth Arden perfume- Provocative Woman, which I wore frequently before my conversation to BPAL, I'll have to have a bottle.
  24. sprout

    Satan Summoning His Legions

    In vitro- leather, cinnamon. Wet- ouch, I'm getting weals. This disappeared shortly after I applied so I slathered. My skin is red. So this is the cinnamon reaction? Cinnamon and leather mainly. Cardamom lends a spicy edge. Dry- First, cinnamon, leather, soft skin musk, and woody cypress. Cardamon does the spice note thing. It disappears again. Late drydown-My skin is tingling again. Up close, I smell soft leather, like suede, and cinnamon plus cardamom. These are my favorite spice notes. The musk is soft, it isn't the soapy or high pitched white note that I fear. This has very little throw. I really have to put my nose close to find the scent. Analysis- I almost bought a bottle of this without smelling the decant first, as they had me at "Ceylon cinnamon." However, I tested first because leather can be problematic for my skin and white musk can be soapy. I really want to like this but my skin swallowed it. I'll age the imp and retest. The lack of sillage will hopefully improve with age because the notes combine well and the composition is complex, sweet, leathery, and spicy. Cypress combined well with the leather and spices. Genius combination of notes, if only my skin didn't eat it.
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