White Rabbit

[LiberAmoris]

Strong black tea and milk with white pepper, ginger, honey and vanilla, spilled over the crisp scent of clean linen.

Ack, I just cannot do the tea scents. No matter how good they sound, the ‘tea’ note always turns sour on my skin and smells like tea with milk past the expiration date. Unfortunately, White Rabbit is no exception. In the vial it’s utterly delightful, but once it hits my skin it’s bad news. In the vial: lemon, English tea, and ginger. It reminds me a great deal of Sudha Segara at this point, with the addition of tea. On my skin: high tea ruined by adding milk and lemon to the same cup (curdle city).

I am so sad that this did not work on me because it’s so gorgeous in the imp. Off to someone whose skin chemistry is more amenable!

ADDED April 6:

I really wanted to adore White Rabbit, but the tea scents just don’t do it for me. I have worn this one a few times and have been warming up to it slowly, but the tea note still doesn’t really charm my skin the way I would have loved it to.

Even though I’m not crazy about the way White Rabbit played itself out on my skin, I still find myself admiring the way the blend captures the downy, dreamy softness of white rabbit fur along with the teatime sequence from Alice’s adventure. This is why I love BPAL.

[wolfie13]

In the vial, I get mostly ginger, tea and the clean linen scent.

 

It stays this way for a bit while wet, though after a few minutes, the linen

scent fades to the background and I suddenly get milk and honey added to

the tea and ginger.

 

Though it's a bit on the sweet side, I don't find it to be overly so.

(It's funny - I have seen others mention that it's not sweet enough, but my

skin tends to amp up honey way too much in most blends that have it, so this works out great for me)

 

It ends up being what I had hoped Suddha Segura would be like on me - ginger, milk and honey - with the tea lending a different sort of element.

 

I've been looking for something lighter and in a different vein than the heavier, earthier, incense-y, scents I tend to favor - just to break things up once in awhile -

and this may be the one. Definitely keeping the imp and may get a bottle.

[Ina Garten Davita]

First Impression: Tea and ginger.

 

Second Impression: This one is a morpher. This has changed several times over the past couple of hours. At first I get the tea and ginger; sharp, tannic not sweet. Then as it dries down the pepper makes the appearance and the tea falls back. It's pepper and ginger steeping in milk. How it smells so much like warm milk, I have no idea. And then after the milkiness leaves, the fresh linen smell remains. It's sweetened up a bit, too. That must be the vanilla and honey, though I don't smell them as such.

 

Final Analysis: This is a very unique blend from the other wonderful tea scents I've tried. Though I'm not keen on the milky stage, I like the other stages enough to consider keeping the imp and perhaps getting more in the future.

[ivyandpeony]

White Rabbit zoomed into my top ten the first time that I wore it and is by far my favorite of the BPAL tea-based scents. On me, it's a spicy gingery-peppery tea blend with the smooth milk and honey creaminess of Alice as its foundation. I don't get the linen note from the description that some do pick up on. It is a lighter fragrance, so I have to slather a bit more, and I have scented some body cream and decanted an imp to slip into my purse for touch ups. But I think it's worth every bit of the extra trouble!

[phoefromelsewhere]

In the bottle: Green nyquil. Um…

 

Wet: Definitely getting the vanilla. A smidge of ginger…so far everything is fleeting…

 

Drydown: It’s warmer now. It does smell like a cup of warm tea with milk and honey. No pepper or ginger yet. Or linen, come to think of it.

 

Later: Ooh, this is really growing on me! Sort of milky yet warm and spicy. Somehow this seems more mad than I envisioned the White Rabbit to be, but is IS Wonderland, and as the Cheshire Cat says: We’re ALL mad here!

[Falathwen]

This was surprisingly light and brisk. The tea note smells exactly like the Irish Breakfast blend my husband and I prefer…I actually went and sniffed a tea bag to test this notion. His skin ate this blend up quickly, but it would work on either a man or a woman.

On me, tea and ginger were strongest at first, with nose-tickling pepper in the background. The milk and honey came forward as it dried down, but overall this was not a particularly sweet scent. The last note of this to come out on my skin was the vanilla, which made the fading scent a bit powdery. I have no idea where the linen note blended in - I have an easier time picking out notes that I recognize from other blends. I think this scent will be fabulous in the hot weather.

[alizarin]

When I opened my 5ml of White Rabbit I was dreadfully afraid I was going to hate it. In the vial it is this sharp, crisp clean scent, which, while pretty, is just not me.

 

Luckily, the crispiness fades rather quickly, and leaves a scent that's just a tad sweet and very soft (like a bunny!). I can smell the tea but just barely, everything just seems to mingle into an almost powdery sweet scent. I find it very light on me, and at first I thought it might be too light but now I've simply taken to slathering it on which gives it a bit more depth.

 

I think this will be a brilliant scent to wear once the weather is warmer. Right now the snow outside my window does not seem fitting.

[grrrlennyl]

at first: fabulous. definitely ginger and sweet scents, along with something clean.

on: very nice. clean and crisp. i feel the pepper more than i actually smell it.

1 hour later: a bit stronger and almost biting. very different and nice.

2.5 hours later: fabulous. lots of crisp, light ginger.

7.5 hours later: still nice, but now it's very pretty. almost sweet, but not quite.

overall: this is really nice. apparently, ginger is just fabulous on me.

[Sheila]

I this! It exactly captures the name "White Rabbit" and the feel of Lewis Carroll's character. The pepper is what really makes this--I was scared that the smell of pepper would make me sneeze, but it adds a gentle spice to the sweet tea that is just beautiful. It really smells like tea spilled over linen. It's amazing. I just wish it wasn't so faint and didn't fade so quickly. Layer this with Alice for the perfect little-girl-tea-party scent.

[bellis]

This is just such a lovely blend. I can pick out most of the notes when it's in the bottle, especially the linen. Once it goes on my skin it gets extremely creamy. This subsides after ten or fifteen minutes, and turns into this smooth sweet peppery blend that is absolutely gorgeous. This is definitely a comfort scent for me, it made me want to curl up in a fuzzy sweater, look at picture books, and listen to Joanna Newsom. I'm very glad I went ahead and got a bottle of this.

[Spastik_Kitty]

 

In the bottle: It smells exactly like white tea with pepper

 

First on: The milkiness comes through and the pepper gives a wonderful cooling sensation. It still smells more like a white tea than a black, but that's probably because of the linen.

 

After 30 minutes: This is so smooth and creamy with a hint of pepper, but without the dusty aspect of pepper. I get more of a bone or ivory colour from this than white.

 

After an hour: This is so soft and milky with a faint touch of sweet, I simple adore this. This is a second skin scent on me. I wish it had a bit more throw, but I'm fine with that.

[summer]

Just fabulous -- big bottle, please!

 

I didn't really know what to expect from this, and when I first opened the vial, I thought it was mis-lableled, because I smelled lemon. Bright, sweet, lemon! Surprise notwithstanding, I LOVED it.

 

I now realize that I wasn't smelling lemon, but more likely, the sharpness of the ginger -- but really, this is such a well-blended fragrance that I can't really pick out any of the individual notes. For instance, I can't smell the pepper or the tea distinctly. I can smell the honey (the sweetness that I noticed right away), and I can smell a clean, light floral that must be the "linen," but this doesn't smell soapy in the slightest (which is how I imagined a linen note would smell). The tea, pepper, and ginger seem to create a warm, complex base for all of this. All in all -- this is FREAKING FABULOUS.

 

As it really settles in to my skin (after about 4 hours), the milk & honey develops more and more and the crispness starts to fade. Unfortunate, because I LOVE the crisp phase of this blend, but the milk & honey phase is delicious as well. It's remarkable how much this reminds me of Alice, particularly since I'm not that fond of Alice. As I've said many times before, Alice smells like a baby nursery on me, in a kind of powdery, diapery, icky way. White Rabbit, on the other hand, has the same milky sweetness, but with that slightly spiced, deeper base that makes it MUCH more wearable for me. This is not a little girl's tea party -- it truly is a MAD tea party!

 

I love this scent; it encapsulates the energy of spring fever, and is unique and interesting while still being wearable.

 

Bring on the 5ml!

 

[Laurel the Woodfairy]

I am quite psyched up for this one. I am reviewing it while sipping Earl Grey with milk and envisioning ChupaChup's avatar for inspiration (:mental snuggle:)

 

In the vial, I got 3 "L's": linen, lemon, and...licorice. I kid you not. But once on me, ohhhhh yum! A delicately sweet blend of sugar and warm milk, very soft. I love the linen note--I can see why you could compare it to Snow White; it has that same gentle "feel" to it. :slathers more on: Upon further application, the black tea and ginger peek out, but in a subtle way that doesn't distract from the creamy sweetness; it simply becomes more complex.

 

I *must* buy this for my Mom, as we have tea every Friday at Chelsea's, a girly-frou-frou tea-room here in town. I hereby dub this my weekly afternoon tea oil, b/c I will feel like a Tea Party Princess wafting this when I pass the scones.

[stardust]

For the first ten seconds after application, White Rabbit smells like warm milk, pepper, and freshly grated ginger. That might not sound appealing, but it's so warm and comforting, like a fuzzy blanket on a cold day.

 

And then...

 

The linen note dominates everything else. It smells like a dryer sheet. The honey also is prominent, and I get a hint of melon. I spend the next few hours smelling like a dryer sheet dipped in honey.

 

I would love this if the scent remained as it was in the first few seconds. As it is, I don't love it, but I can't seem to part with it, either. I'll keep trying, because something is keeping me from swapping this one.

Edited March 6, 2005 by stardust

[lixolux]

White Rabbit for me is a lighter, more wearable Baobhan Sith for me. I loved loved Baobhan Sith but there is an element in it that really irritated my sinuses - and White Rabbit seems to have the same sort of gingery/floral scent but without the high citrus tang that made my eyes water so sadly!!!!!

 

out of the vial it has that lemony tea scent - and upon application it becomes a rose scent that reminds me of Alice without the spicy carnation - and then the honey and vanilla take over and its so delectable! I dont ever get the warm milk part but it does evolve into a soft beautiful non-powdery ginger tinged floral tea - and then the floral part fades a bit and it stays on for hours as the scent of light creamy milk chocolate tinged with ginger.....mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Edited March 7, 2005 by lixolux

[amrita]

Wet, the predominant notes are very natural blue/green/white florals. I think this is supposed to be linen, but to me it just smells like fresh, unassuming, natural flowers. I am not a big floral person at all, but I think this smells really, really good.

 

As it dries down, milk and astringent black tea emerge, with a hint of honey and subtle ginger.

 

Fifteen minutes after application, I'm getting sweet creamy biscuits and those same lovely fresh florals. This makes me feel like I'm eating soft, homemade buttermilk biscuits with honey in a beautiful sun-dappled garden with spring flowers wafting on the breeze.

 

Long after the drydown, I can still smell sweetness, like amber and vanilla.

 

This is one of my favorites. I can't wait to wear it more as the weather warms up!

[diabolique]

in the bottle, i get cream and lemon (which i always mistake ginger for).

 

on my skin, it's immediately the lemony-ginger smell with the same soft cream from the bottle. there's something extremely astringent in this that burns my nose if i smell it too much, which might be the ginger, but it seems like a completely separate entity. something very, very weird is lurking in the background and making this not quite work for me.

 

this went through TONS of stages on my skin. it morphed from the creamy lemon-ginger smell to a slightly anisey scent. at this point, i really wish the honey and vanilla notes were coming out stronger, because they've disappeared behind this anise stage. i think the pepper, ginger, and black tea notes blended to make a strange black licorice smell. it isn't unpleasant at this stage, but it certainly isn't something i ever want to smell like.

 

eventually, the anise smell dies down and i'm stuck with a weird smell that isn't quite me.

 

i'm on my period right now, and i'm sure my hormones are throwing this heinously out of whack. i'll try it again in a couple of days.

Edited March 8, 2005 by diabolique

[vitawash24]

Love this - neither tea nor ginger scents work particularly well on me, so I was nervous about trying it. But it's gorgeous. Sweet, but not overwhelmingly so, and sharp, but not in an unpleasant way. I definitely get a lemon-gingery thing, but it's mellow and relaxing.

 

My only complaint in fact, is that my skin eats it. The scent disappears completely within about two hours. It's just weird.

[astrid]

Three words. Ok, four, but really three.

Honey

Milk

Black Tea

...all beautifully blended together. The honey is most predominant on me. This is a very cozy scent! It would be great as a bath fizzy!! Imagine bathing in a great big tub of soothing tea! Mmmmmmm....

[HappyLoveJoy]

White Rabbit There's something about White Rabbit that makes me feel sick to my stomach. I'll blame it on the milk because all those other notes sound like they'd be lovely together. It reminded me of Alice----Evil Alice!

[Lit Chick]

I love this - it's very comforting. My mom drank copius amounts of black tea with milk and honey, so it makes me feel secure. It's like baking cookies or apple pie - the smell makes you feel at home.

 

I originally got this imp for her to try - if she likes it, I'll have to get more for myself.

[tempete]

Sigh. I do not seem to do well with vanilla-containing BPALs, with the notable exceptions of Snake Oil and Dorian. I usually get a weird funky note, and White Rabbit unfortunately seems to follow that trend. Other than the funkiness, I can't smell much else other than the vanilla note, so my little imp of White Rabbit is headed to the swap pile...

Edited March 10, 2005 by tempete

[kythryne]

From the description, I was expecting something like chai... but this is a whole tea party, rolled into one bottle! It's spicy and sweet and vanilla-y, and not at all what I expected but utterly lovely. The honey was quite strong most of the time, and I had a little trouble picking up the tea and the linen, but I liked it a lot. And now I want to go to Central Park and have a picnic on the grass somewhere in the sunshine.

 

My one unhappiness is that it made my skin itch, which isn't surprising since I'm badly allergic to black pepper. (Yes, I'm smart. In the future I'll just put it on my hair.)

Edited March 10, 2005 by kythryne

[inkstone]

In the imp: Milky tea with a spike of ginger.

 

Wet: Very strong black tea scent and the ginger comes out sharply. It does smell vaguely like lemon, but I know it's coming from the ginger because usually true lemon does something very noticeable and unique on my skin. Ahahaha.

 

Drydown: Very creamy on the drydown. But I think that's creamy from the milk. Oddly enough, the vanilla and honey don't come out so strongly on my skin. In this stage, it's mostly milk, tea and ginger. Oh, and the pepper too because whenever I sniff my wrist, I sneeze. Huh. That could be a problem.

 

Final thoughts: This is a very nice, comforting scent. I really like it. It's creamy, but on me, it's not too sweet. Then again, I like sweet and fruity blends so by comparison this isn't that sweet. Unfortunately it makes me sneeze, so I have to pass it on.

[feline.by.design]

Somehow or another, I had forgotten that I ordered White Rabbit as an imp previously, thus I ordered it again with my current pending order. I've done this with a few others, as well.

 

But there's no worry, as White Rabbit is a really enjoyable scent for me. It smells like a wonderful tea treat. White Rabbit's a perfect blend between the gourmand and light floral/green. It's not strong, like many other foody-type scents, so it's very grand office wear. My supervisor at work, who is a fan of the oils, said that it smells "just like Easter." Appropriate, eh? As well as balancing gourmand and floral, White Rabbit works well as a delightful mix of playfulness and elegance.

 

Although it doesn't last as long as many other oils, clocking with me at around 40-90 minutes, I really enjoy White Rabbit, and I'm looking forward to my spare imp in my next order.

 

-doreen

 

~~~

 

So, apparently I never got a bottle of White Rabbit as it gave me a sour milk smell, but having been away from the BPAL forum and having a bit of BPAL amnesia of sorts, I had recently intended to get a bottle of The White Rabbit, but had to abstain due to lack of funds.

 

But I wound up getting a frimp from the Lab! Either tipped off by the amount of vanilla scents I was buying (Dorian and The Mouse's Long and Sad Tale) or by simple serendipity, I got a free imp and was able to try White Rabbit again.

 

And I loved it! It's something I hope to get a big bottle of soon.

Edited May 26, 2011 by feline.by.design