Baneberry

[lorajc]

A poisonous fruit-bearing member of the buttercup family. The scent, like the plant, is dark green, herbal, and plump with bulging black fruit.

I've only tested this so this is subject to change. This is a very different berry scent. I don't really know how to explain it. It's not too tart nor too sweet. It is an herbaly type of berry scent that is slightly sweet and slightly green. It is not overtly strong, but rather soft. I think I like this and may purchase a bottle. I've got to wear it first.

[Nadirah]

The description tells all. Baneberry smells of berrys and big fat juicy almost overripe plums with dark green foliage in the backround. Very faint, It seems to fade faster than I'd like but it is a pleasant scent.

[LiberAmoris]

Baneberry is blackberry and what smells a bit like ylang ylang on me. Once those settle down, I get orris and a flower note that reminds me of tulips.

 

I am really enjoying the RG blends! On me they are florals that have their sweetness perfectly balanced with root and earth notes.

[Thorne]

Fresh berries and greenery, with a little tiny bit of something warm and resiny underneath. There's some amber here, I think, in the drydown stage.

 

Slightly fruity, slightly earthy, slightly woody, entirely yummy. It's not as "bright" a berry as Wolf Moon or Bewitched, in my opinion; it's more subdued, deep forest berries - hard to find, but worth it.

[shelldoo]

in the vial: green and slightly sweet w/ a soap like aftersmell

 

wet: hmmm smells like shampoo on me. a hint of berry fruity goodness so it would be a berry shampoo

 

yup it is a clean berry scent and by clean i mean it smells like some kind of shampoo w/ a touch of green possibly ivy in it.

 

my chemistry does some weird things sometimes....shampoo that is fun

[LushNatty]

In the bottle: Tart, almost sour berries.

Initial application: I tested this a bit differently than I normally do—this time I was applying it surreptitiously in class and so I only swabbed the side of my hand with the imp wand, and WOW does this scent have throw. I could smell it immediately and POWERFULLY with only using about a fifth of what I would normally apply. So much for surreptitiousness.

That being said, it’s a very nice scent. I can see where people have compared this to berry shampoo, but even though I do smell the soap, it doesn’t bother me and I actually kind of like that smell being in there. I do detect a bit of a “dangerous” feel to this berry—like the berry is saying, “Eat me, and I will kick you in the ass.” Definitely a poisonous berry—tart. Juicy. The part of the description that describes the nature of the fruit is absolutely accurate.

30 minutes later: More of a soapy smell comes out —and the initially heavy throw also tames down quite a bit. It’s still pleasant, but now the throw is more sweet and less dangerous. But still adult enough that I would expect this berry note to appear equally at home in a candy or a wine. She could still kick my ass if she wanted to, but it’s not her top priority.

1 hour later: I’m very surprised, and impressed. The original kick-ass tart berry has totally mellowed into a sweet, ripe, youthful berry that is just pluckable. The only caveats are that 1) it’s still a bit soapy and 2) it lacks is the smell of the plant to which the berry is attached. It would be perfect with some “green” in it. It actually smells a bit childlike, kind of like if my old Strawberry Shortcake doll’s strawberry breath had smelled like real, living berries fresh off the bushes.

I like it, but I would definitely not slather this or I would feel like I was a gigantic berry, not a person (kind of like how Absinthe made me feel like a licorice drop.) I also sense that my true opinion of this will take a few applications to fully develop. This will either bore me or develop into something really interesting and bottle-worthy.

On a scale of 1 to 5: 3.5.

[darkling]

Baneberry has an almost perfect balance between sweet, dark berries and lush greenery. It is very well-blended. The berry note is especially intriguing; it smells like someone crossed a raspberry with a juniper berry.

 

This scent has a lot of throw at first but fades fairly quickly (within the hour).

[QueenFae]

A dark, juicy, ready to burst berry blend. It smells like evil berries, and I can just picture the over ripe black berries hanging enticingly from their stem. It's got a bit of a sweet undertone, similar to jester, but it's overshadowed by a dark, almost green note that makes it incredibly unique. This is like jester's evil brother. Baneberry is really hard to describe and I'm probably not doing it justice, but I really love this one. I might even need a 5 ml. This is a good one for people who think berry blends are too sweet for them. This one may be a pleasant surprise.

[gingersnapp]

This is a very herbal berry blend. It reminds me a lot of holly and berries, so it will be nice to wear around the Christmas holiday.

[coulrophobe]

I can't add much that hasn't been said already about baneberry - the "dark green herbal with bulging black fruit" in the description is the exact image this scent evokes for me.

 

It starts out a strong herbal/berry, but sweetens a bit on my skin to a fresh blackberry scent - I'm picturing blackberry vines entwined with dark green ivy. To me, this is a very late summer scent, sweet and warm, but with a "growing wild" feel.

[sarada]

Baneberry makes me think of little green unripe blueberries...tart, slightly antiseptic in aroma. I can almost taste it when I smell it....an almost sour apple green. It never gets too sweet, but it also does not become a powdery or soapy scent. It simply stays tart, green and almost floral before fading.

 

I really do agree with shelldoo that it reminds me of some pleasant sort of shampoo, when I sniff it. I also agree with everyone who smells ivy...that might be what imparts a slightly "clean" smell to this as ivy is a very bright, crisp, clear and clean green to my nose. Almost grassy.

 

I think this is interesting and I might keep it around to sniff but it's not something that I'd wear...if it was a deep, luscious purple berry it would work on my skin, but this is an interesting scent to experience to wake me up.

[Thursdae]

Baneberry smelled very green to me, but not minty green, more like the greenery in the lower layer of a shady forest. It didn't smell berrylike on me. Herbal. Not soapy.

[astrid]

Baneberry is not one of those uber berry scents like Bordello. It's berry, but light with a hint of greenery. Gentle, but playful, too! I'm not so sure about the herbal part. Maybe a bit, like Lady Macbeth? My skin seems to soak this up so that it's not very powerful. I'd have to ask my husband how much of a throw this has, but I'd say light, unless I doused myself in it.

 

Love the labels on this series!!

 

I also want to add that the 'berry' part reminds me of little wild strawberries!

Edited November 13, 2005 by astrid

[maewitch]

I was expecting something far more malevolent. This is like very high-quality berry and herbs soap. The berries are deep and juicy, the herbs there in the background, adding just a bit of green sharpness. But the overall feeling is one of fresh-scrubbed cleanliness.

 

In the drydown it loses that overt soapiness and just becomes incredibly fresh and translucently red.

 

Interesting, but I don't know if I would get a bottle. I think I like my berries married to something richer overall.

[harmonyfb]

Yup, herbally sort of berry scent, not offensive, not overwhelmingly exciting.

 

However...when layered with Mistletoe, it makes a passable substitute for Skadi! I'm quite pleased about that, let me tell you.

[emzebel]

This is a really nice ripe dark berry scent. I like the freshness, and how it is not mixed with any overtly perfumy notes like musk or unrelated florals, which helps to distinguish it from, say Carnivale or Bewitched, both of which I adore.

 

Baneberry smells like berries as you smell them on the plant, or just plucked from the branch, with slippery droplets of juice and the odor of the plant itself fighting to hold its fruit.

 

This is outdoor fruit. Fruit that you work for little by little and that gets used in a potion, not a pie.

 

I like it. Not sure if I will get a five ml, but I might one of these days.

[Miss Lynx]

I like this one, though not quite as much as I was expecting to. It's very, very fresh and green on me, with a touch of that same poisonous/bittersweet edge that Belladonna and Wolfsbane have. It's actually fairly reminiscent of Belladonna, except with berries in place of the flowers.

 

But the berries actually aren't that strong in here, at least on me, but then my skin doesn't really amp fruit notes. There's a sweetness to it, but it's only slightly fruity, not strongly so. It's also a fairly gentle scent -- I found I needed to put on a fair bit for it to be very noticeable.

 

It's a nice scent, and I'm not sure what it is exactly that made me feel slightly disappointed in it. I guess I was expecting something a little more Bewitched-ish, and it doesn't really have that earthiness that that one does. It's just overall a bit more of a lightweight than I was expecting.

 

But I do like it -- it's got a bit of that scented-candles feel to it that Verdandi and Lampades have, which I enjoy, so I'm definitely not swapping it. But whether I'll eventually want a bottle or not remains to be seen.

 

Grade: B or B+, not sure yet

 

ETA: several hours later, I have to say that this has turned into a dead ringer for Verdandi! That's odd, because fresh, even for the first hour or two, it had only a slight resemblance to it, but around six hours later, what remains of it in the places it's lasted longest is dead-on identical to the way Verdandi wears down on me. The greener notes have mostly subsided, and it's become a lot sweeter, but still with a bit of counterbalancing bitterness from the herbs. Very nice, and definitely pushes it more toward a B+.

Edited November 24, 2005 by Miss Lynx

[wickedgoddess]

Wet - a delicious juicy berry, reminiscent of one of the notes in Yemaya.

 

Dry - as it dries the berry sweetens up, and becomes perilously close to blueberry. Nice, but too sweet a fruit on dry-down.

 

On the wickedgoddess scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being best, this rates a 2 .

[SevenSins]

In the bottle: Very berry. Not sweet, fruity berry, more green,herbal, feels "full" and abundant and juicy.

 

Wet: Clean, herbal, dark berry scent. It smells poisonous and compelling - it invites you to pick that juicy ripe berry and take just a little taste. But there's a darkness there that tells you maybe not such a good idea. Nice!

 

Drydown: A little softer, green herbal slightly floral coming through, more like smelling the whole plant rather than just the berry. Berry is a little sweeter, but still dark and juicy.

 

Later: Still nice! Throw has diminished a bit, the scent has softened overall, but maintains its original promise.

 

I am consistently surprised at Beth's ability to create scents I wouldn't otherwise dream of trying. Berry is just not my thing - but this is now the third berry scent I've tried of Beth's that I do like! I will probably get a bottle of this one.

 

Labbies - you are so amazing and talented!

[Finny]

Wet? Pez candies.

 

And in a fantastically good way.

 

A bit of herbal and berry fruitiness. Sweet and light at first. But as it dries down there is a darker note coming out, almost resinous. It becomes sweet, powdery, and really tickles my nose, maybe a hint of mint in here?

 

Delicious. I am going to hoard my imp, and will probably need to order a bottle for spring time. At the very least I need to hunt down another imp...

[malanna]

Goes on loudly as sweet and very tart berries. Sort of tartly green, too, like mistletoe. When it's completely dried, it smells a bit soapy and herbal.

[Blood onmy hands]

Baneberry is intensely perfumey and headache inducing on me. It's like thick overripe blackberries hanging on thorny stems. Fruity and green. But the background is very sharp and generic perfume on me. It was strong and long lasting on me too. After two hours and a migraine, I scrubbed it off of my wrists.

[allidavie]

I'm not too big on berry scents, but this one is very nice. It is a rich, deep berry - for some reason I picture unripe black currants, although I see how people see blueberry here too. It is not a sickeningly sweet sort of berrycherry thing, which I really dislike, it is definitely a more sophisticated berry scent. This one reminds me more of a commercial perfume; I don't mean that as an insult, more that this is accessible. (Note - it is somewhat reminiscent of YSL's Baby Doll, which I love, but is a little less complex). I can't imagine anyone actively disliking it, and it's not one of those BPAL scents you need to learn to love/develop a nose for. Very nice, but I don't think I'd get a big bottle, mostly because I have enough Baby Doll to get me through, oh, the next 30 years.

[Cedar]

I love berry scents but hate raspberry anything, so I was really excited to see this offered. In the bottle, I get about 75% deep, dark berry and 25% green herbal something. Wet, it gives me almost all berries, and it's just like the description, very dark and bulging with a sweet overtone. It's more sophisticated than other berry/herbal scents I've tried. While it dries, a lot more of the green scent comes through and the sweetness fades to something a little fresher. It's not that complex, but I think that's what I like about it. Somedays I just don't feel very complicated It's one of those scents to wear when you don't know what to wear.

[aidenraine]

I smell blackberry, really. Smells just the same to me as most blackberry-scented products do. It's definitely a sweet, dark colored berry, very juicy. I am wondering if this'll change or remain so straight-forward.

 

Nope, it's still somewhat berry-potpourri. Very bright, sweet, and strong.

 

*tapping fingers on desk*

 

What else to say... would it be gauche to say that all dark reddish berries smell the same to me?

 

It's good, but somewhat unexciting.