Casablanca

Mm, this is a nice amber.

 

When I tested it I only remembered it was an amber, not the other notes, and it smelled to me like amber (primarily), blonde woods, redwood, carnation, and saffron. I looked up the notes and it seems like maybe the golden fig and oudh together remind me of blond woods. :-) I was reading red patch as redwood and the clove as carnation. OK then.

 

Why haven't I tried to do it this way more often, where I don't remember what I'm smelling, and then get to see? It's literally Christmas in July. Probably because I look at the scents so much when they come out that I memorize them. This time I looked a couple times, ordered, and not again. This is much better than testing scents without listed notes. Reading the list is like opening the Christmas prezzie after you've rattled the box enough and made your guesses.

 

Ramble. So yeah, good blend. :-) Another one I'd like to hang around to age. I might have to forget I have her for her to avoid my attention that long, though.

Not remembering any notes for Harper, I got a luscious, sexy wood musk -- I was thinking rosewood and teak, but see instead rose and oudh -- and a little lazy, subdued vanilla. The labdanum and incense are also out in the ring. I love the way the incense blends into the wood here, almost as though it's part of the wood grain.

 

I don't pick up bergamot at any point, so seeing that one in the notes list was a surprise. I should forget what's in an ordered fragrance more often, because this was fun.

 

I like this and look forward to its old age... if it lasts that long.

Alisz goes on me mostly as a sugary, chewy vanilla mint with a little poofy marshmallow, and a hint of red fruitiness I couldn't name before re-checking the notes. When I hunt around for it, I get a pale, subtle rose and faint frankie texture, but she is mainly a confectionary vanilla mint for me, chewy like a taffy.

 

She doesn't change much on me as she dries, and lasts under two hours (for me, a bit under average). I like her, so even though the balance isn't what I was after, I'll enjoy the bottle.

 

 

ETA: Wearing this again today, I wanted to add that when this bottle was new, it smelled mostly of sugary vanilla mint. After a few months, I tried her again and was getting more of the red currant, spun sugar, and mallow in the blend. Alisz has come into her own and, knowing that, I'm likely to nab a second bottle at some point.

This one takes me back to college days, when I inhabited a rickety chair in an off-campus cafe back courtyard, drinking a pint-sized iced coffee and scribbling on crosswords.

The coffee I drank then was black and sweetened, resurrected here in a black coffee scent blackened further by a mellow vetiver musk, and then sugared and a little vanilla'ed. I even think sometimes I smell a little half-melted, last-surviving ice cube in it.

It lasts a few hours on me, longer than average. This is what I wanted.

Non-foody creamy is probably my favorite type overall!

 

I would just second several mentioned here already, and add Audumla, if you can find it (four streams of milk, white honey, frankincense, motherwort, and angelica root).

I was going to skip this one, changed my mind based on reviews, and am glad.

 

Fresh on my skin, Shadow is a sleek blend of clove-spiced, ambery, woody bay rum over a dark cologne musk. More often than not, I don’t like cologne musk smells — but I like it here. That part starts on the strong side, but mellows quickly into a contributing dark smoothness.

 

The spiced bay rum is exotic and, in this blend, somehow comforting; the oudh is a nice woody oudh without the fecal tones I got from Bestla and Nevertheless, She Persisted. As a bonus, this isn’t like anything else I have.

 

I like it.

From the bottle, I get a light bergamot-sweet orange floral impression, but once Media meets my skin, she’s mostly flowers.

 

She becomes a floral and white musk perfume, commercial in vibe, and her citrus flits away. Like Sprout, I seem to mostly get honeysuckles and lilies for the floral. A little soapiness develops on me, such as what I tend to get from wearing lily of the valley, but it never takes over. Likewise, a little white-musk powdery quality comes in, but without going crazy.

 

The blend is on the faint side and fades quickly on me. I hope it comes more into its own with additional settling, so it can shine in its proper vapid glory.

A citrus and white musk perfumey perfume. The fruit comes across on me like a clean, clear, watery, lemony grapefruit. As the blend progresses toward its heart, I think I smell a little of the orange lollipops thing neroli does on me.

 

It smells commercial, but I get the desired shimmery metal from it when I slather it.

In the bottle, Buck Moon smells – conceptually, if not literally – like an early summer evening in woods with soft, sappy pine and a mix of herbal greenery.

 

Initially on my skin, it’s similar, except that everything comes out more. I get a very soft, sappy pine, green herbs, and a cool lunar note. Moonflower? It seems like that pale coolness, but not quite floral. Sometimes I think I pick up a little mugwort in the herbs. Everything is soft and well-blended, hard to pin down individually.

 

As the blend dries, I start to catch whiffs of musk – it smells to me like a neutral skin musk with just a tint of brown musk.

 

Lovely now, and I look forward to seeing how it settles in a few months.

Sniffing the bottle: oo, snuggly musky spicy woody kitty!

 

First on, this reminds me of Coyote and Faunalia, and a little of Buffalo Man. It’s the brown musk, not as heavy as in Buffalo Man, and super-fuzzied, more comforting. The cardamom-spiced vanilla cedar is right there, too, rounding out the blend with a cozy, hearth-like mood.

 

It’s like a fuzzy pet basking by the fire in a wood cabin.

 

I’m probably maxed on brown musk animal scents at this point, but wouldn’t want to let go of the ones I have. They’re all different and have their own uses.

First up on my skin, I get a sweet honeyed mead with a little carbonation. Alongside that, unexpectedly, is a lotta yellow-orange fruitiness: something like nectarine (or maybe peach) and mango. The mango-ish part reminds me of the yellow-orange fruity note from The Glimmer of Northern Lights – that recent Yule with the yellow arctic poppies.

 

The sparkling honeyed mead fades quickly, leaving mainly the fruit for most of the blend’s life on my skin. I never quite pick out any wood. I wish I did: it would help balance the sweetness.

 

I like this scent, but it’s fruitier than what I was looking for.

A lovely dry, golden saffron dominates this scent throughout its life on my skin.

 

Secondarily, there's a blend of ambery honeyed wood, with a little orange blossom showing up now and then. I'd been concerned that the neroli would take over and smell like orange lollipops, as it often likes to do on me, but I don't always smell it, and when I do, it's mild. Overall, the blend smells dry and golden, like August.

 

This is the mood of scent I'd hoped for from the aged Sportive Sun I got from the Lab's Etsy, but that had been kind of flat. A friend said hers had also aged past its prime. The Sun's Treasure strikes gold.

On the wand, I smell apples, but with a fresh, brisk chilliness, flowers, and a little wood. A quite sweet, almost candy-like alpine or subarctic spring.

 

On my skin, this is similar, but even sweeter, and less chilly. It’s like a yellow apple sugar syrup. I can see the similarity between this apple note and that in Golden Apple of the Sun. I really love the white wood note in this – I wish there were more of it to tone down the sweetness, which is considerable. Nice throw, though.

 

I want a different balance, and Sjofn comes closer to that once dried: the birch comes out a little more. But for me it doesn’t come out enough to balance the sweetness of the rest.

 

I would probably bottle this if it were more wood and less sweetness. As it is, it’s too apple syrupy-sweet for me.

On the wand, I smell airy, clean aquatic flowers.

 

On my skin, though, this is initially a musky, aquatic gardenia with a nip of ginger. At the first application, this borders on cloying, but it settles within a minute into an airy, aquatic floral with a little ginger warmth to keep it interesting. It smells subtropical – lighter than a steamy-green jungle blend, and more like a hidden, flowered pool on a Hawaiian vacation.

 

The Lady drops to nearly zero throw on my skin even before she dries, and she fades to a more generic aquatic floral before winking out completely. She was lovely at first, though.

I use this as a moisturizer. I think it smells pretty dreamy -- like coconut-creamsicle clouds.

 

Lovely warm-weather scent.

In the bottle, there’s a heavy, dark brown labdanum, imbued with a Faunalia sort of musk and a little smoke. It smells moody, weighty, and thick.

On my skin, this is so heavy brown animal. The liquid itself is dark brown. It smells musky, woody, smoky, resinous, and brown. This is the herd animal stamping on the plain, or the rugged man wanting sexy times by the campfire.

The woodsmoke smells to me like that from Baby’s First Krampuslauf, which is what I hoped for. I liked that note. Those who enjoyed that, or blends like Faunalia and Coyote, might want to try the buffalo, too.

 

In the bottle, there’s a lovely lunar lavender, and some tuberose.

 

On my skin, I get moon-dappled lavender, just a little tuberose, other background flowers, and a light sandalwood. This lavender is dreamy, with light green and herbal tones, but not sharp. There’s also a ghostly vanilla hint, which is combining with this particular lavender to remind me more of Solstice Scents’ Lavender Vanilla than of any other BPAL I’ve tried. But LV has more vanilla, and Lullaby simply has more going on for me during the wet phase.

 

My friend really amped the tuberose in this, but it stays mild on me.

 

After this dries, I get a little moss coming out. It’s mild and pretty, but faint. The flowers subside, also, into faintness. Soon after it dries, Lullaby mostly disappears on me. The song has ended.

 

The lovely dominant vanilla in this blend is what I usually want a vanilla to smell like in a perfume — this is how vanilla smells in my hopes and imaginings. Secondarily, I get musk, and also linen, browned with age and faintly musty. I don’t pick out flowers.

 

This is well-blended, and will be one of my favorites.

In the bottle, I get a cool, medicinal lemon fir.

On my skin, the medicinal quality lingers for a few seconds, and then mostly settles into a forest of silver-frosted lemon fir trees. After another moment, I pick up the apple flower, adding a little sweetness. It reminds me of the pretty apple blossom in Bestiaire du Moyen Âge. I dont smell mugwort at any point.

This is an intensely silvery blend, with glints of pale yellow lemon, and ghostly fir white-green. Its mix of spring and winter elements makes me think sometimes of sweet late-winter snowmelts, and sometimes of Vicks VapoRub.

Sugar, honey, and rose, and a sort of autumnal apple tone. This reminds me of the honeyed apple-rose musk of Bilquis, but less bright and youthful on my skin than she was.

 

I smell caramelization in the sugar, which is lending some maturity. I feel like there might be more than one sort of sugar in play here, or maybe sugar and a sugar-crunchy honey.

 

I love Bilquis as she is, but I think this is more of what I was looking for when I picked up Bilquis. Lovely stuff.

Im mostly comparing this to a well-loved bottle of Strawberry Moon v5.

SM v5 smells like deeply red strawberries and sunny dandelion meadow to me, while SM 2017 smells to me like pinkish-red, sugared strawberries and milky dandelions. The strawberry mood of 2017 almost reminds me more of Diligent Instruction for the Bridal Night than of SM v5, with that youthful sugared quality, but with an outdoorsy meadow vibe replacing Diligents fluffy mallow pillows.

Mostly, this is sugared pinkish strawberries and meadow on me. The meadow here is like a soft wildflower background, with dandelions and a little texture that reminds me of chamomile. Grasses color things a bit but dont stand out on their own. The sage mostly hides, but now and then I get a little pale coolness.

I love both versions of SM; this one feels more youthful than SM v5.

I'm also wearing Cave of Treasures today and freshly reminded of how much I like it.

On the wand, I smell lemon and apple, with rose trailing some distance behind.

 

On my skin, lemon dominates this bright, citrusy apple-rose. Starts out on me as fresh-out-of-the-shower playful.

 

Then the apple disappears and my skin turns it to citrus rose soap. Bummer.

No idea how old this imp of discontinued scent is.

 

On the wand, I get vetiver musk and general darkness. I think I catch a side of tamarind.

 

On my skin, the oil is a ghoulish olive green and makes me think of Weenies. Mostly, I get a dark and green-smelling vetiver. I think of something like Troll, but more medicinal, and just a little fruity-sweet from the tamarind.

On the wand, this is lily and wisteria, with a light-handed graininess from sandalwood and frankincense.

 

On my skin, calla lily! And a little wisteria. This goes kind of high-pitched and thin-smelling on me. I expected the calla lily to go to soap on me, and it doesn’t. But it’s not a full-bodied, exciting blend on my skin, either.