Silk Road

[pinkpoodle]

A panoply of cultural treasures, spanning the herbs, flowers, oils and balms of the Romans, the Byzantines, the Mediterranean, the Levant, Northern China, Eastern Europe, Iran, the Bulgar-Kypchak, Mesopotamia, the Crimean Peninsula, Anatolia, Antioch, and North Africa.

Silk Road really is beautiful. It smells like aromatic rice to me--must be saffron. I mostly smell this aromatic rice smell, and then a teeny bit of exotic spice after about an hour of wear. I like this a lot, but my sister fell in love with it, so I gave the imp to her. I just might have to order both of us bottles!

[theseagrows]

silk road is a warm spicy scent. i smell almonds, sandalwood and spices. it kind of reminds me of lush karma. warm and exotic but fresh in a way.

[malanna]

Right upon application, this smells like mulled cider. However, that impression goes away quickly (I'm sure there's no apple in this). Like everyone said, this is green, herbal incense. It's not an astringent note and it's not quite foody, but it does smell like the spices that come from mulled apple cider or some other spiced tea. It's quite pleasant and mild, but I don't think I like this enough to keep it.

[Oio]

Silk Road

 

In the imp: Resinous, spicy, cinnamon

 

Wet on skin: CINNAMON!! Wow. Not red hots either, pure cinnamon stick. Slight resin in background

 

Drydown: Cinnamon dies down gradually. Resin, incense and a faint tinge of patchouli blend into warm spicy perfume.

 

Conclusion: Pretty. Spicy. Pretty spicy. Not my thing, really, but could be terrific on the right person.

[AlaskaSnows]

Wet: Honey, fresh fruit, spices including cinnamon.

 

Dry: A subtler Bengal. Less honey, less spice, but also less interesting. this is warm and smells of baking spice. It is nice and gentle. But I like Bengal better, even with the cinnamon being too potent. Silk Road is too mellow for me.

[karikazo]

I don't understand what the hell I'm smelling with this one, but I love it! Its very herbal/spicy, but not too hippie-ish. Probably best as a cold-weather scent for me but it's one of those BPALs I want to smell over and over again. Yum.

[The_Merf]

In the imp: Stash India spiced chai tea.

 

Wet: See above.

 

Dry-down and wear: It retains the "tea" quality. I'm having a hard time picking out anything besides the general "tea" and the cinnamon, because the immediate association with chai is hard for me to shake. This scent does not have a lot of throw on my skin--it was one of the last ones I tried on, but I can tell that it has entered its final dry-down stage. Because it doesn't last too long on my skin, and because I think there are others who would like this more, I'm probably going to send this one off to swaps.

[valentina]

Silk Road is lovely in the imp and not what I expected -- it's a gentle scent, to my nose it's mainly herbal with warm spicy notes. On application, it retains that quality, but after 10 or 15 minutes, the herbal qualities do amp up a great deal. It reminds me a lot of Hamadryad with warm spices. After a couple of hours, my body burns off the herbs and all that is left is the spice. Unfortunately, the spice burns away after another hour or so, and it just doesn't last. And I tried slathering in on a little more to see if it would hang with me, but no, it still fades.

 

A lovely scent, and while it's not going to work as a day-to-day perfume, I'm going to use in in bath salts, so I can enjoy it that way.

 

valentina

[brownbear]

mmmmm

I like this one. It has spice, buy isn't super strong. I think there might be a bit of sandalwood coming out. It's very warm and doesn't change a whole lot on my skin. It just gets a little mellower as it dries.

[Alchemy21599]

In the vial: spicy, tea, faintly fruity. I love tea scents!

 

Wet: tea, faintly spicy and fruity.

 

Dry: gee, this went away really fast. I can barely smell it after half an hour. I love the notes and would really like this if it lasted longer.

[Bagfish]

I have tried Silk Road a few times now. When I first put this oil on it is sweet, herby, slightly green and fruity all at once . Wet, Silk Road feels a bit confused like it doesn't really know what it is supposed to be. I suppose if the Silk Road is the meeting place of traders, then a market-place of the near east and the far east would seen pretty chaotic!

 

I don't particularly like this stage of the drydown as it sort of makes me feel a bit headachy as all the different scents swirl around each other. However after about an hour, the most delicious spices emerge from the fruit/herb/green morass - they are totally not obvious to start with and they are a wonderful suprise. The spices are very similar to those in Snake Charmer, and this oil is definitely made worth-while for me by the Snake Charmer spices without the musk and the vanilla found in Snake Charmer.

 

So, I do like this oil, but find the first hour of wearing it to be quite difficult because of the fruit/green smells. The drydown makes it all worth-while though, so I will just have to apply and ignore for the first hour!

Edited February 5, 2006 by Bagfish

[Rhowan]

In the vial, Silk Road smells like fresh green herbals, a bit of citrus and I have to agree with whomever said saffron - maybe a hint of it.

Wet on my skin, this goes on very,very light. I have to strain to smell it but what I can smell it's similar to in the vial.

On the dry down, Silk Road turns into a more woody scent. Not an overpowering cedar or anything like that. Green woods, herbals, spices and I swear that I am catching just a bare wiff of mint - it's just barely barely barely there...

 

In conclusion, I love this scent. It goes on way to light for me at the beginning but the longer I wear it, the stronger and more complex this gets. So-so throw, and minimum wear time for me but that isn't going to stop me from ordering a bottle!

[blu°]

Oh, this is pretty. Green, woody, spicy, and that note that reminds me strongly of Lush's Jungle conditioner and Flower Tub bbs, as well as of that green stuff from the florists, that you use to stick dried flowers into, don't know what's it called.

 

Freshly applied I get a strong floral note à la the crocus in Prague which immediately is being warmed by something else and turns into that green florist-note.

Soft, warm, sort of an ambery halo.

Close to the skin it's ...whoa! FIZZY!!! Much fun!

Below that fizziness there's a more nutty, waxy note, maybe something akin to the skin musk in Bengal?

 

I'd agree there's something woody in here, and cinnamon, though I didn't detect that by my own. I can also smell green tea after reading about it in somebody else's review. And I think there is a bit of jasmine in Silk Road, too.

 

Conclusion: This is a really pretty, complex, fresh but incensey scent that captures the image forwarded in the description not only by its complexity of notes but by actually feeling a bit "silky", too. I'd consider it suited for everyday wear as well as going out. It seems to fit well with the start of spring, as it's so green and all, but I can imagine this being equally nice in any other season. Big ups.

[ovxi]

I discovered the other day that Silk Road is Peace-In-A-Bottle. I was highly agitated, very unhappy (breakup and suchlike), and I felt a strong urge to put some of the stuff on. As soon as I did, my spirits lifted. It's amazing. I've been using it ever since when I'm unhappy, and it makes life SO much better. No idea whether this would work for other people, but I thought I might mention it. I feel safe and loved when I smell Silk Road. I've never had this with any scent before.

 

My imp smelled a little more complex and mature than my 5ml, but I imagine that's because, well, it IS more mature. The 5ml is still great and still the same in essence, just slightly less aged and slightly more floral. I have no idea what notes come out when at all-- it's far too complex for my uneducated nose. It smells like happiness. And the best thing ever is to wear it outside in the wind, because when the smell whips up past your nose it's even more amazing for the fact that it's in contrast to the smell of the rest of the world. A bit of Elsewhere wafting by as you walk down the dull street to work.

 

I am aware that this is an almost entirely useless review, but I did want to make the point that this stuff has, for lack of a better term, serious aromatherapy potential. Sorry I can't be more evaluative. I'm new to all this, and all I really know is that I love it.

[kaelei]

I was really looking forward to try this scent - since it is middle eastern scent and all...

 

Unforunately, something in Silk Road is giving me a massive headache and sore throat. This is the first BPAL scent that has ever irritated my throat so badly o_O; I had to wash it off after five minutes because it became so powdery and the irritation was getting worse.

[GemmaCat]

In the imp: crowded tea scents, with a little spice and something almost citrusy, like green tea with lemon.

 

On my skin, initial: A spicy-tea note comes to the fore. This has that weird scent like with Bengal; both pretty and off-putting to me at once.

 

Drydown: this softens over time, changing to sweet, faint tea.

 

Overall this is very nice, and a great representation of the silk road route, but it's not tea-smelling enough for me.

[nancybridget]

This is pure liquid fall. It's mulled cider and other good spicy smelling things that go along with it. Cinnamon is the dominant one here, but I'm guessing there's some cardamom, clove, rosemary, and other good things involved. At the end of february, this isn't quite what I'm looking for, but I bet when the leaves start turning I'll wish I still had my imp lying around...

[sthenno]

Umm, Play-doh mingled with a lovely spicy sweet scent??

 

I just read one of the reviews and it mentioned aromatic rice. It does kind of smell like that. Later, it dries down to dough. Dumpling dough. What the heck? What happened to that lovely scent I could smell underneath the Play-doh during the wet stage? I guess this is what I get for coveting a scent based on the description.

 

Will retest, as I'm determined to like this.

 

Edit: Retested and no longer get the wet dumpling dought scent. Now it's purely aromatic rice. It's a pleasant smell, but not something I want to smell like.

Edited March 12, 2006 by sthenno

[Ryvre]

I can't pick out any notes in Silk Road- there's something spicy, something herby, maybe some sort of tea. On my skin, something more fruiy comes out, but the other notes are still there. This is too busy for me. There are too many things just below the surface.

[elphaba]

This is all that's good about walking into an Asian grocery or a natural foods store, taking a deep breath, and having everything mingle together - the herbs, the spices, the tea, the rice (I'm definitely getting the smell of cooking rice in this). It's a beautiful, comforting scent. I don't see myself wearing it out often, but I'm keeping my imp. It's lovely for curling up at home or for sniffing on my wrist as I fall asleep.

[undream]

This oil was a gift imp from isyche; thank you, Tahlia!!

.

Silk Road to me smells clean, very sharp & green, a pleasant bite with very little throw. It has a fresh-cut grass quality about it, it reminds me of bamboo, things atmospherically & botanically oriental; I had the distinct image of walking down a road paved with light sand, tall bamboo stalks on either side.

 

I also detected an elusive creamy note in there somewhere? Mmmm.

 

Overall a very unique & interesting, lovely scent. I wasn't terribly certain about this one upon my first try? But after a second go-around, I admit, I'm hopelessly smitten.

Edited March 11, 2006 by undream

[sissa125]

Imp: Very complex and eclectic, preserved flowers, slightly musty

Wet: Meh, moldy flowers

Dry: Old soap

 

It smells to me like someone is traveling down the Silk Route, picking up something organic at every pit stop and stuffing it into a burlap sack. Strange fruits, vegetables and flowers picking up each others' scents, as well as some eau de travel. Very interesting, and growing on me, but not quite my thing.

[PirateMaggie]

This starts as the delicious incense-and-spice smell of a Middle Eastern Market and ends as...Pad Thai? Yep, that's Pad Thai all right, right down to the egg and onion. I love Pad Thai, but don't want to smell of it. Oh well, I have an imp of Baghdad for days when I want to evoke a spice bazaar.

[Celestyna]

Wow!

there's an amber with a real nutty-like quality behind it.

at first i even got a sort of citrus-y scent but that left in 20 minutes.

Very resin-y without being too sleepy-thick. No note stays too high.

I want a bottle of this.

[lizardling]

In bottle: Sharp, bright smell. I think there's a citrus component and spices -- I want to say clove. Incense-y effect.

 

On skin: The citrus is fading, which lets the layered scents below come up to tease me. More floral now, although I can't identify the flower.

 

5 minutes: Softer, still.

 

15 minutes: This is a sweet and warm smell that hovers just next to my skin. I fancy I smell a bit of sandalwood in with the florals, which is bizarre as I usually hate sandalwood with a burning passion. This is most likely because it's just a tiny bit as opposed to great golloping gobs which will instantly fry my sinuses.

 

30 minutes: Dude. My skin ATE it! And this is the second heaping swab on my wrists. I can't smell it anymore -- the nose, it does nothing.

 

Overall: This is a wondrous scent, but the fact that my skin eats it -- so not good. I'm going to hang onto this anyway, just so I can sniff the imp.

 

Score: 3.5 for skin chemistry, but wondrous smell in the imp.