Scarecrow

[pseedie]

An agricultural gargoyle. Though he is the Guardian of the Crops and Keeper of the Fields, his visage is still the stuff of nightmares. The scent of a hot wind blowing through desolate, scorched, barren fields.

Scarecrow (or how to scare yourself with a fragrance, by lil' miss chickenpoop.)

In the Imp: My first impression is nail polish....and something dry and plant-like...the name releases cornhusks into my brain, but I can't say I've ever really smelled cornhusks, so dead dry plant material is what I'll say.

Wet: Oh....something scary is happening in my brain....the fragrance is bringing up the apocalyptic weather that I envisioned while reading Cormac McCarthy's The Road. Acrid desolation, empty dead fields for miles. No hope, many many fears, no future.

Dry: Jesus, Mary and Joseph....the scenes from the book are more vivid as the fragrance dries. (I never saw the movie, hence no Viggo to brighten my fragrance) Dry scorched grasses, earth and wind. Endless desolation...and no hope for anything other.

Timelapse 1 hour: I take a nap...when I wake up, the fragrance is still there....a first (out of 20 tries)....of course it's the SCARY fragrance! The scent hasn't changed in the last hour....it's still haunting....visionary....

Timelapse 2 hours: The fragrance has not left me, and the only change is that a little touch of bitter celery similar to Szepasszony smells like it's in here somewhere... but it still won't let me shake the visions of "The Road".

Verdict: If you've read that book, and are planning on taking acid (or peyote, or mushrooms...), DON'T PUT THIS FRAGRANCE ON. It will mess you up. The smell is dead on. I will keep this imp to torment myself on the odd occasion as it is a complete mindf**k for me. I'm a bit sensory integration dysfunctional, and this one tripped lots of switches. The name and the description are as true as can be. I've decided to love it and never wear it (unless I go see the movie! ) and scare myself with the imp on occasion.

[ouch!]

This is so strange and hard to describe.

 

There's a sweetness to it, bu it also smells dry...and a bit perfumey/soapy. There's something about it that's turning my stomach a bit..so weird.

 

I do get the whole hay sort of thing and the hotness. But..there's just something really odd about this. I can't tell if it's more masculine or feminine.

As it dries it becomes more grassy and even more dry. Almost like there's nettle in it or something.

There's a similarity to Hay Moon for me, except Hay Moon had an overwhelming lemony feel to it.

 

I've never smelled a BPAL like this.

 

[ephemera]

This smells like a dry and powerful men's cologne on me. I can't pinpoint any notes in it, because something in this amps to high heaven and all I can smell is the mishmash.

[topazphoenix]

Green and...sappy. Sharp. Woody. Green and dry at the same time, like some sharp pungent grass drying up and dying in the hot sun. Smells extremely dry wood at the end. Reminds me of Yggdrasil.

Edited July 10, 2009 by AmandaKay

[Siberia]

This smelled just like scented acetone nail polish remover to me. It had a very strong and distinctly chemical scent. Not for me, though I do like the image.

[undream]

i get the exact same first impression of nailpolish. ("wow, it does smell like nailpolish!") once i put it on, however, it sweetens up and that nailpolish smell disappears. there's a dryness to it and something also perfumey. not what i was expecting at all, to be honest! i had great fears that this one would turn out like darkness, which was just atrocious on me.

 

to my pleasant surprise, this is really quite beautiful. someone mentioned that to them it smelled like a men's cologne, but it seems far more unisex to me, definitely something i would wear myself (&this coming from a girly girl, although i hate that phrase). i get a gorgeous sweet dryness of hay and dry grass but no nightmares, no scorched, barren fields. more of a prairie scene, in my mind.

 

this reminds me a bit of coyote, which i heart all over the place, so that's a good thing, but it is wholly different from coyote. the prairie scene to coyote's desert, but they share that dry, sweet grass smell. yum.

 

scarecrow also reminds me of something i just can't put my finger on, maybe a perfume that someone i once knew used to wear or a kind of makeup i used to use. it's driving me nuts because it's so familiar.

 

all in all, a lovely light to medium throw and a sort of sweet, musky perfume spilled onto dry hay. i really like this one.

[Mayhem27]

In the imp, Scarecrow smelled very green and grassy. Once it hit my skin, the hay note sprung to life. This didn't change much during the course of wearing it, but I could detect the faintest whiffs of dirt/soil throughout the day. Which is great for me since I love dirt! This reminded me of walking though a hay field in the fall. Scarecrow had really good staying power on me as well, so this one is a keeper!

[tragedy]

wow... this is unique.

A dusty arid... ylang ylang???

Quite nice and as I'm not reading the notes as I jot down the review I'm so curious as to what is in this.

 

(When typing this up, I looked at the notes... no ylang ylang??? Someone snuck some in mine! Cause I SWEAR its there!!!)

[TypicalYyan]

If you ever get a Bpal that you sniff in the jar and don't like, I must say you REALLY still have to try it on your skin before wisking it away to a swap pile. Smelling this in an Imp I really was wondering what I was thinking when I ordered it. It smelled like nail polish remover.

 

 

But after it dried a bit, it does smell a lot better. But I really can't give a description of "hay" or "grass" because it smells exactly like one of Crayola's Magic Scent crayons. It might have been the "Lumber" or "Daffodil" crayon. I can't be sure because it's been about 20 years since I've smelled them.

 

[Leopard403]

I get the dreaded nailpolish, too. Fried my nostrils a little.

 

I couldn't even bring myself to skin-test this.

[Venneh]

Someone further up thread compared this to nail polish, and that's what I'm getting in the imp. On my skin, it's pretty much the same at first. Hrm. Blossoms into a hot, dusty cologne. Yep, gonna pass on this one.

Edited March 29, 2010 by Venneh

[lunchboxmonkey]

I have to say, I'm not getting any nailpolish at all

 

On me, this is all sweet, golden straw stirred by a gentle, hot breeze. Its like standing in the middle of a barren field when the heat of summer is just beginning to give way to fall. I'm not getting any grass or greenery, just sweet, warm golden fields.

 

This is going to make me sound totally cheesy and romantic (not my usual m.o., I assure you all) but if you've ever heard (I can't believe I'm going to say this) "Fields of Gold" by *cough* Sting, this scent really evokes that song for me. (Yes, yes, I admit, I love it. Guilty pleasure, what can I say?)

 

Anyway, I have a bottle on the way.

[SophieCedar]

Smells like dry golden men's cologne. Mental image description is accurate however a little more Mad Max in my head.. I can pick out a bit of ylang ylang in there like a previous poster said. Totally arid fields baking in the sun!

[impolight]

:::THE SCARECROW:::

 

This one came as a Frimp from the pre-Bat's Day 2010 WCWC... Thank you, Labbies!

This one has held a long-time allure because of the imagery and associations conjured up in reference to this, "Agricultural Gargoyle", as it were, ranging from the affectionate buffoonery of the character in Frank L. Baum's immortal "Wizard of Oz", to the demented sadism of the Batman villain... And everything inbetween!

From the Imp: Yum! The notes from the Lab aren't handy, but something about barren fields and scorched earth jogs the memory... Which is unusual here, because this is delicious!This is the syrupy goldness of captured sunlight! This is sweet, clean, and golden!

Hay Moon was sweetened with Hay Absolute, and while this is roughly similar ( maybe, thanks to the power of suggestion, from the label?), it isn't quite as sweet... More like clean, fresh straw.

There is some kind of earthen, spiciness to Scarecrow, too... This could very well be Patchouli, yet Cedar is just as likely a candidate.

Deeper sniffings actually do suggest something burnt or ashen, just a smidge, and something here is close to Terra Cotta dust.

On the Skin: This just keeps getting better and better! Scarecrow gets sweeter, lusher, greener!

This Sarecrow wears a magnificent corona, wields a scythe for his scepter, throws his head back and crows, gloating over the majesty of his kingdom in defiance of the winged scavengers that would threaten his tribute!

A plantiness has emerged from Scarecrow that suggests broad, green, serrated, heart-shaped leaves, spiraling vines, and pumpkin innards... This fragrance would be a splendid representation of, "The Pumpkin King" too!

The longer that this embraces the skin, the better it gets!

This has sharpened just enough to tame the burgeoning sweetness, and also started to develop an almost rusty-cologne feel to it.

Scarecrow is a pastoral rogue of a fragrance. It manages to be somehow bucolic and sinister at the same time.

Scarecrow leans alot more toward being a fragrance for Him. This could work as a unisex fragrance, yet, on her it might be a little...

Strange...

It would be as natural as a dress and bonnet on a Scarecrow or a historic oil painting of lady behind a plow...

A possibility, to be sure, simply incongruous with intents and purposes.

Spectrally, Scarecrow is golden, various shades of green, pale yellow, rust, terra cotta, cocoa and pumpkin... Appropriately autumnal!Scarecrow is incredible!

The Lab readily surpasses expectations at every opportunity yet again!

A tried and true marvel!

This one gets a 5.5 out of 5.

[milo]

Wet, this is a kind of wildflower department store style cologne. After it dries, this indeed sort of smells like a scorched field, though I still get cologne underneath it all, which kind of ruins the association. There's some sour powderiness as well. Very glad to have tried this, but I don't need anymore.

[tailoredshirt]

Weird! At first, this smells grassy and fruity to me, like pears. I'm starting to wondering if I am hallucinating about pears, because something smelled like pears to me yesterday too and there were no pears listed in the ingredients.

 

Anyway, yes, this is a green scent. Still kind of fruity for the first 1/2 hour, but that dies down. After about an hour, I get dry, green grass and a slightly sweet, fruity edge. This is actually pretty. I would not classify it as a classically masculine fragrance, at all, although it seems to be doing different things on my skin than it is on others'. For one, I don't get cologne at all, because if I did I'd be all over that. On me, it's mostly sweet, fruity grass.

 

After an hour, it's actually quite faint, with no throw at all until I get about 2 inches away.

[waternight]

In the imp: Yeah. Nail polish, as others have said. And, wierdly, sour ylang-ylang.

 

Wet/Drydown: Much gentler and less sour/acrid than in the imp. Actually... wow, actually really awesome and unique. There's something very fresh and outdoorsy about this, and normally "outdoorsy/fresh" does NOT translate well on my skin. I smell... lemon? Something quite crisp and citrusy, but in an understated way. Like lemon juice sprayed over wet lettuce. This is not barren, scorched, or desolate to me at all, though there is definitely a slightly dusty, dirty, earthy quality to it. The image that comes to my mind is a dry, unwatered field that's been sown and is waiting for the spring rains to start. This doesn't smell like plant life or a garden, but the POTENTIAL of a garden. The possibility of growing things. There's also, oddly enough, something that reminds me of the way humans smell. Not stanky BO, nor the personal scent of someone you really, really want to jump. Just... person smell. This is INCREDIBLY evocative and unbelievably unique. I'm in awe of the artistry of this scent.

 

Dry: A really unique and different skin-scent. I love this so much. So, so, so much.

[cyanidenoir]

Describing this scent is hard for me because I am having a difficult time distinguishing between notes (thank you, chronic sinus infections)

 

I can say that it's very dry, and almost paper-y with a hint of dirt and a powdery note. It does in fact smell like a dry field.

 

Would love to have a 5ml bottle of this. If anyone has a bottle they'd like to swap/sell, let me know.

[sarielswish]

In the vial, it smells like fresh cut hay and corn husks. Color, gold.

 

Wet on my skin, it's very sweet, like freshly husked white corn and almost milky.

 

10-15 minute drydown - Too sweet. Like, corn syrup sweet. Not for me. I mean, that's ALL I can smell - corn syrup.

 

30 minute drydown - Ok, now it's corn mash and musk. Not unpleasant, but still a little too sweet. I think I still prefer the sun-dried musk in Coyote to this one.

[mryan66]

I was hoping this would be awesome, and it is, though not in the way I was expecting. This is one natty scarecrow. If I wasn’t married I would date this scarecrow. Wet, it’s a very clean men’s cologne [smells a little like ‘Clean men’ in fact.] As it dries the outdoor elements take over, but it isn’t the dried dusty withered autumn smell I was anticipating. It’s more like fields of the midwest in late June, sweet hay, clover, fresh wind, wildflowers and old sun dried denim. The final fadeout is a clean bright breeze mixed with straw and aromatic wood; a beautiful scent, not creepy at all. I was bargaining for jeepers creepers, but ,oh well, I love it anyway, and will be looking into a obtaining a whole bottle ASAP.

[tajana]

Wet: Perplexing. Freshly applied, it smells greenish-yellow... like grass and sweet clover mixing with dried out hay... some distant cousin of the pleasant but innocuous Coyote. But that quickly subsides, replaced by weird sour-sweetness, vaguely fruit syrupy, vaguely chemical... like half-dried nail polish

 

Dry: Ahh, ylang-ylang, is that you? Ylang is a nemesis of mine, and it's tainting this scent something awful. That mean-spirited, sour note is one of the only things that stands out clearly in an otherwise near-indecipherable wall of cologney scent. Words like musky, yellow, and sharp come to mind. With the passage of some more time, a burned quality does show up, but instead of a natural touch of charred foliage, it smells like someone is trying to burn some ylang-flavored plastic. Throw is minimal, thank goodness.

 

Overall: I was envisioning a dry grass hay scent with a touch of smoky vetiver and a cologney "wind" note, but instead I got a sour nail polish disaster. It smells like something I might find at the bottom of a drug store bargain bin for 85% off. Clearly not one for me!

[raisin]

An awesomely generous forumite sent me a partial bottle, and wow...

I'll just say right away that I can't pick out any definite notes in this one. I can see where people might be getting nail polish or nail polish remover, but that smell mostly comes across as the "clean man" thing to me, then pretty quickly gets processed as something yellow/green.

 

ETA: I don't really have a problem with the smell here that I can identify, but it is super strong and pervasive and doing something not entirely pleasant. I don't dislike the smell, and actually want to like it quite a bit, but it's sending me to headache territory instead. Not sure what's up!

Edited September 17, 2010 by raisin

[Ilectra]

Just got an imp of this from the wonderful Tragedy and I sniffed it and yelled "mustard" so my hubby grabbed it and said "wait and min, Dijon" Sooo yeah this in the imp smelled just like Dijon Mustard. It made us hungry lol for MUSTARD! Not sure im ready to try this on skin yet, cant imagine smelling like mustard all day.

[Incendiare]

The sweetness is a huge surprise. Combined with a grassy note, there seems to be a fruity, pear-like note in here too. I can see where other reviewers are getting nail polish from because when I apply this to my skin, it sort of takes that turn. To my nose, it seems that the sweet note is linked with the potential nail polish feel this brings. It's still remaining sweet though. I don't really know what to make of this blend. When the lab frimped me this, it initially smelled very dry, slightly woody, yet green. Six months made this morph into something smoother yet ultimately, it's still kind of weird. The sweet note that has come forth with age, while unique, doesn't work with my skin chemistry.

[Jihana]

From the first sniff, this smells like dry earth, dead grass. Quite interesting. I keep sniffing, and it's like the walls of my house fall down and leave me in the middle of this dead field where nothing will grow. It's horrible, not the scent itself but the feel of the place it comes from. There are no trees, the earth is scorched and only some dead grass remains. I can not wear this, but Beth is a genius for making such an evocative blend. I would like to know what this morphs into but I can't stand it that long.