ivyandpeony

The current forum search engine won't find three-letter words, unfortunately - and the current version also doesn't seem to search subtitles of threads like previous versions have. So this thread was hiding from you! No worries though.

Oh cool! Thanks for sharing that explanation!

Just bumping this up, since so many of us are planning out our holiday shopping lists. Give yer friends some BPAL!

Even though it makes me giggle to say (or type) the name, Pussy (Moth!) is my current fave. And I love being able to wear my honey scents with the scent of Honey Hair Gloss wafting around me.

Don't forget Wicked - dedicated to all those characters right in the copy! "A paean to all the Wicked Queens, Evil Stepmothers, and other misunderstood villainesses throughout history and lore. Lends an aura of majesty, refinement, strength, and a deep, brooding malice. A sophisticated, womanly scent: rich myrrh and jasmine draped in the subtlest rose."

I wonder if Morocco would be something that would work. On me, it's soft carnation (which kind of combines floral and spice notes) with woody spices.

I love Urban Decay's Sin - one of my favorite pre-BPAL perfumes and one of the few that I've hung on to! I haven't found a perfect duplicate of it (and I have tried lots of BPAL) - but I think you could get close by layering different scents. Despite the notes that UD listed for it, it's mostly vanilla and cinnamony spices on me although there's a hint of florals and musk. I'm thinking a strong vanilla scent layered with a spicy one might at least give you something similar. Maybe Dorian or Detestable Putrescence (from the Gris Grimley scents) for a vanilla base, depending on how sweet you want it to be, and then something like Chimera or Bengal for the spicy notes. I have to put this on my "experiments to conduct" list

You should definitely e-mail the Lab at answers@blackphoenixalchemylab.com. They can figure out what it was that you wanted and whether they owe you some money or credit. Good luck!

The scent that immediately came to mind when I read your post was Amsterdam. You'll find it in the Wanderlust category - the notes listed are "Tulips, peony, fresh flowing water and crisp green grasses," which I find to be a fresh, clean scent with light floral-green notes. Bayou, which is also in Wanderlust, is a bit deeper and more robust, but in the same general family - "A lazy, warm deep green scent with a thick aquatic undertone: Spanish moss, evergreen and cypress with watery blue-green notes and an eddy of hothouse flowers and swamp blooms." Most scents with "rain" in their names have a bit of an aquatic feel, so as you dabble in search of a similar scent, I'd look for aquatic notes and light florals based on the description & name. Good luck!

I am a little embarrassed to admit that I haven't placed Halloween orders from the Lab or the Trading Post yet. For those of you who have started testing your loot from the Halloween updates (including Pickman's Gallery), I would love to hear your opinions - what's this year's big hit? Sleeper hit? Any disappointments for you? I am having the worst time deciding because there's so much to choose from.

I don't think that the Polls option allows for nearly enough choices to list all the Halloween LEs, but if someone decides to do a poll of all of them on another site, feel free to link it in this thread. I got my Halloween order yesterday - bought 9 bottles (some thanks to you all!) and have skin tested 2 so far. But all of them smell awesome in the bottle, which is rarely the case for me! Last night I tried Le Revenant and The Glittering Apple of the Stars and both were beautiful. I realized while looking over notes yesterday that the scents I ordered this year were much less "Halloween-y" than I've chosen in the past - nothing foody, or pumpkiny, or clove and cinnamon-y. If there was a drop of white floral in it, I bought it (that wasn't intentional, it's just what happened )But I'm really hopeful that they all are going to smell great on me and not just in the bottle. Here's what I got: From the Gallery: An Incubus Leaving Two Sleeping Women Muse of The Night The Ta-Ta The Two Tailed Sogg "regular" Weenies: A Nocturnal Reverie Ghosts in Love Le Revenant The Silver Apple of the Moon The Glittering Apple of the Stars

The CCNow shipping status is the source of lots of confusion - it actually means that CCNow has sent the orders to the Lab, not that the Lab has physically shipped it to you (apparently, CCNow batches the orders periodically instead of sending them one at a time &/or in real time). You should receive a USPS Click 'n Ship via e-mail when your order ships from the Lab (and I wouldn't be surprised if you got one soon, I just got an October 4 order). Of course I have no idea why you haven't received a response from the Lab, but it may be that customer service is very backed up from some of the comments I've read here & there. Be sure to check your spam folders in case it grabbed an e-mail from the Lab. (And I use the folders function in Gmail and it sometimes sorts things into folders where I don't expect them to be, so that might be something to check too). Hope you get your order soon!

If you happen to find a discontinued GC scent that hasn't had its review thread moved to the discontinued subforum, please report it if you have a minute

I had not picked up my bottle of Honey Moon in a long time - man, is it the most delicious honey ever! Not that I haven't loved it since I opened my mailbox back in 2005 but age has only made it better. I layered it with Jacob's Ladder 2005 and it put me into a honey-amber pleasure coma.

I will have to re-try Snooty Rose! I recall at least sniffing it at one of the GA will calls, but IIRC it came along w/a fairly large GC update, so there were so many things to try that I was overwhelmed. I keep hoping that one day Beth will have the time and inspiration to try to reformulate Noir. It remains my favorite plum BPAL of all time (although Snake Charmer is nothing to sneeze at.)

You might have to layer some scents to achieve what you want - it's really rare to find a BPAL blend with notes that match a non-BPAL perfume or product. Maybe look for fruity vanillas? Tamora is a peachy, amber vanilla that you might like.

I've really loved all the Soap & Glory stuff I've tried, but I haven't tried this scrub yet. I did poke around a little bit and saw that Sephora is not just selling it, they've got notes listed. Here's what they say: ". . .Soap & Glory's signature Pink Fragrance combines fresh bergamot and mandarin, rose, jasmine, peach, strawberry, oakmoss, amber, woody notes and warm vanilla musk, amber, and warm vanilla notes on the bottom." (Some of their other bath and body products feature a blend they call Mist You Much, which is bergamot, black currant, magnolia, freesia, vanilla, and musk.)

The original Devil's Night is one of my favorite BPAL scents ever - not just one of my favorite Halloween blends! The only reason the 2011 version isn't on my list is because I have several back up bottles of the original 2005. Pyewacket, I also thought about a possible similarity to 51 when I first saw the description of The Two Tailed Sogg I love 51. and lamentuese - when torn between dead leaves and pumpkin/vanilla, I would choose pumpkin/vanilla. I like the sound of The Changeling from the feedback so far - it seems like it's a less foody pumpkin scent. And leaves sometimes = vetiver, which always gives me pause.

I knew it would happen when I started the topic - I'd start adding a bunch of stuff to my list that wasn't even on my radar before! First up, The Wiley Grasser and The Gorobble! Thanks so much for all the feedback so far. As far as budget, I've been trying to winnow my list down to around 5 or 6 bottles so I can just use my PayPal balance, but I am not sure if I can make myself do it. I didn't join any decant circles this time around either. I have a love-hate relationship with decants. I love being able to try without buying a bottle but it seems like imps and decants pile up like tribbles around here and I have enough trouble keeping bigger things organized! So with many updates I will just end up waiting until reviews start rolling in. I tend to say that I'm not a foody fan and then I fall in drooling, idiotic love with something like Cake Smash, so I think I have to get Halloween: Las Vegas and Sprinklecake. But overall, I do tend to buy more BPAL scents that are a little more like traditional perfumes than the edgy or unique blends. I think I'm looking for the new The Girl with this update. I love to hear about everything, though. And I meant to add to my first post - of course this topic is open for anyone and everyone to ask questions, make recommendations and comparisons, etc. It's not my personal Halloween thread

A LOT of reviews for Elephantine Colussus mention popcorn. I don't know how easy it is to find, but I was surprised by how many people mentioned it! I searched reviews for mentions of popcorn, so here are some unexpected scents that were mentioned in reviews: Young Pine Saplings, Bogle, Gollettes, Huesos de Santos, The Snack Hut, Drink Me, Miskatonic University, Feeding The Dead, Cockaigne, Boo.

Here are some scents that other members have found similar to Yvaine - The East Under the Harvest Moon Misericordia Quicksilver Phoenix TKO Moonshine and Mist Psyche (d/c GC)

Is there any chance it could be Marshmallow Poof? When you said between Boo & Midway that immediately popped into my head.

The closest thing I can think of, as far as scents that I've personally tried, is Hell's Belle (Oleander with wet, sweet mandarin, lush magnolia, a rush of deep musk and a touch of spice). Black Dahlia's description is "Voluptuous magnolias strewn over orchid, star jasmine, black amber and smoky rose" - of those notes, I think magnolia is probably the Lab's least commonly used one, but it's similar to jasmine to my nose. So maybe take a peek at some other jasmine-rose florals.

Not that either is identical to Regan, but there are two vanilla+orchid scents are at least cousins to me - Echo and Marae. I honestly don't know how hard either one is to find on the secondary market. If you are missing Gluttony, get an imp of Cockaigne. It's been a while since I sniffed it, but it is very sweet, buttery and caramel-y. I should probably warn you that I didn't like Gluttony and I didn't like Cockaigne either, but I figured I'd throw it out there. And I happened to pick up my neglected bottle of Mania this weekend and was pretty amazed at how similar it is to Venom on me. I am sure this bottle is at least 4 or 5 years old and it didn't really strike me as that similar to Venom when it was fresh and young, so I think aging has something to do with it. I have the tiniest bit of Venom left so I even compared the two head-to-head.

My favorite powdery scent is Diabolical Offspring, from the horror movie tropes line that the Lab did for Dark Delicacies. It's still available at the store or via mail from their website (http://www.darkdel.com/index.htm?bpal.htm&1). It's desciribed as "baby sweetness and a touch of brimstone," but I don't get any brimstone whatsoever. Just a sweet skin-musky scent that's reminiscent of baby powder, but much more complex.