Litha 2006

[bella_delirante]

... Honey mead with honeysuckle, oak wood, ivy leaf, wild thyme, carnation, daisy, vervain, gum arabic, frankincense, yauhtli, and liquid copal.

When I smell this one in the bottle, the honey and that citrusy note really jump out at me, very sweet and I can smell something green in the background.

On my skin it develops into this complex, delicious smell and I just can't stop sniffing my wrist. It makes me feel like I'm glowing, it's so warm and full of light. My only regret on this one is that I didn't order two bottles of it. It isn't an everyday wear sort of thing, but I can tell that putting this on when I'm in a bad mood will help put it right.

[fiddlehead]

Litha was definitely worth the wait. Honey mead...drool. I catch a whiff of the Thyme, something tart/herby, and a bit of the oakwood and the copal with honeysuckle drifting in and out. Damn I think I can even smell the Ivy. The other notes I can't pick out yet. Perhaps with repeated wearing I will be able to.

 

Beth outdid herself on this one. Very complex but with the honey mead taking the lead. This one will be getting a lot of wear before Summer goes away

 

 

ETA: I woke up from a nap with this delicious scent coming off of me and it took me a minute to think what it was. Litha turned into an even more sweet and natural/musky smelling oil while I slept. I totally get what Zenvodunista said in her review. This is kind of naughty, this oil!

Edited July 18, 2006 by fiddlehead

[astridclaire]

Gorgeous! Like daffodils dipped in honey, rolled around in candied lemon rind and soaked in pineapple juice! Sweet, smooth, and very golden yellow.

 

Once it dries it's a bit less juicy and a tad more herbal, but it's still amazingly well blended, complex, and just plain sun-shiny lovely.

[alasindocs]

All these honey filled reviews!

 

Not this one...I get lemony pledge...if there is a lemon/citrus note buried anywhere in a fragrance, my chemistry will find it..and amp it until I smell like...well my library table after I've pledged it.

That would be the oak I'm suspectin..

 

I'm going to give this another try..because darnit..I want honey!

[Kittyflop]

Oh my. I can smell every note and none. Beautifully blended. This is sunny, pastoral, peaceful, fruity (?). Honey and overripe summer fruits. As it dries it gets spicier, the ivy and thyme are rounding out the honeyfruit notes. It stays close to the skin, not much waft. My skin seems to be eating scents lately.

[eleventhousand]

Very sweet and a little sharp at first.

Something about this reminds me of Hexennacht, but brighter.

Daytime forest rather than night.

 

It's mostly honeysuckle on me...

[sophia_helix]

There's no doubt about the honey mead in Litha -- that sour-sweet scent is all I can smell for the first fifteen minutes. Then it's like Honey Moon meets Mabon, with the honey-thyme-flowers wrapped in booziness. Later it gets a little too soft and cloying for my taste, but it's pretty glorious for the first hour or so. I think this is my new Ren Faire scent....

[Galatea]

In the Imp: Not unlike wet straw hay.

 

Wet: The straw hay smell is pretty strong still, but is joined by a bit of sweet honeyish scent.

 

Dry: This is a nice not-to-sweet hazy, warm, very beginning of summer scent. So appropriate! The honey definately stands out, but it's not some sugar soaked honey, it's the honey scent of the mixture of a beehive plus grasses and wildflowers. Gorgeous.

There is also elements of something barely green, and the base steadiness of the frankinscent and copal.

 

Throw: Mid-level throw, but it wears off fairly quick and reduces to not much throw at all.

 

Overall: I actually really like this, but I can't see wearing it all the time. It evokes that certain time of the year when the days are getting warm and the grasses are getting high. I think I will be keeping only a ml of this to wear on special time of the year occasions.

 

Rating: ++

[BrightRedScream]

In the bottle: A sweet, herbal floral...I don't really get any of that honey mead that everyone is talking about in their reviews though.

I am getting a SLIGHT bit of oak wood lingering in my nostrils after I sniff the bottle.

 

Wet on the skin: More of that herbal floral smell. I get the carnation and thyme mostly, and I think the frankinsense is lingering in the background a bit. I don't know if I like this. It might be a little too herbal amd strong floral for me - and I was really hoping for more that honey mead to come through.

 

Dry down: Ugh. I'm not liking this.

I can't even describe why I don't like it...It just comes out as floral on me...

No sweetness..nothing. Just a herbal floral field.

 

 

 

I would like to add that about two hours of wearing this - I got a honeysuckle type of note that popped out. It wasn't strong enough though at this point, and the scent was almost gone. This is a VERY pretty scent, but I don't love it, and I honestly couldn't see myself wearing this all the time.

 

I'm in the debating phase right now about if I want to keep this.

Edited July 20, 2006 by BrightRedScream

[eflort]

In the bottle: Sweet, sweet honey

 

On appliance: Still honey, but with a dry wood note

 

On drydown: Oh how this morphs! At first the honey mingles with florals and ivy, a minute later some warm woods re-joins the party, and finally some lemon manages to come in to play!

 

I love it; it's perfect for spring/summer happiness!

[Bagfish]

I hardly know how to describe Litha as I don't really know any of the notes well enough to pick them out. All I know is that Litha literally sings from my wrist - it is a bright yellow sun blue sky morning all golden and fresh and full of flowers. This is SUCH a happy grounded scent. Its not at all ethereal but is bubbling with the richness of life and summer.

 

I really can't do a much better description than that, other than it is incredibly complex. Heavenlyrabbit posted earlier that Litha reminded her of Khajuraho in its complexity. Khajuraho is one of my favourite BPALS and whilst this smells nothing like it, it has a similar "feel" to it. Wow, what a complete masterpiece, this will definitely be a summer favourite.

[Scrangie]

Mmm... Smells nothing like I had expected.

 

From the bottle, this smells like a crisp, fragrant outdoorsy scent, which actually kind of reminds me of honey lemon tea.

 

In fact, that's exactly what it smells like on me. Honey lemon tea. Not sharp, not sweet, just right.

 

After a little while the lemony impression fades away, and what's left is a beautiful, lively outdoors smell. Like rolling in the grass. Not really grassy, but the scent of everything in your backyard combined.

 

Sometimes I get mead, sometimes I don't. It seems to fade in and out of the scent on my skin. The mead scent is stronger in the bottle.

 

I didn't expect to love this as much as I do.

[wolfie13]

This one is quite changeable on me.

 

In the bottle: Honey mead - it smells drinkable! Lemony, sweet, sparkly.

 

Wearing: Still honey mead, but joined with a grassy note.

 

Wearing about 20 minutes later: The same as above but just a touch of summer floral - getting the honeysuckle for sure and something almost chamomile-esque (the daisy?). But I would not call this a "floral" blend on me at all. And this phase doesn't linger

 

Later drydown: By far and away the most lingering phase of this scent is a lovely herbal honey. Smells like the honey in bengal.

 

I am REALLY enjoying this. It makes for a blend that just says "summer" but in an unexpected way.

[seamor]

Oh ... my... (pant, pant) ... YES!!!

 

Flowers and crushed herbs (I think someone has been rolling in them) under a very hot, bright sun.

 

Exactly, gloriously, right!!!

 

Beth, once more I bow to your amazing abilities.

 

This 5 ml. certainly won't last long ... Will you do it again next year? Please?

 

About 90 minutes later ....

Wow! The scent has now settled down into a warm honey mead with herbal notes. Just scrumptious! I am really loving this!

Edited July 22, 2006 by celtimor

[couscous]

Litha smells like a hot, scorching sunshine blend, characterized by a big appearance from the lovely and underrated carnation (lots of spice here), and thick with honey and unidentified grains.

 

I didn't get any "green" from this- no ivy, no herbals- and I wouldn't call it particularly floral, either.

 

Liking honey is a prerequisite for enjoying Litha- you're not going to get this one tempered- but being afraid of spice and fire is not. I'm not sure what gives Litha it's fire- I'd recognize heliotrope right off the bat, so perhaps it's cassia or a clove and resin mix? Whatever it is, it's quite an unusual sort of spiciness in that it does not create what I'd call an overly "foody" scent. Instead, it smells just like mythical fires burning in the backdrop of a festival.

 

Litha is highly attuned , not only to the Sabbat, but to the season. If the florals start coming out in spring, this should start coming out during the heatwaves that follow. VERY well done, extremely evocative.

 

I'm glad I bought two

[angharad]

Fermenting honey with the added tang of herbal medicine. It does make me think of summer -- and reminds me of all the reasons I don't like the season. I'd hoped for honeysuckle, carnation, and copal, but the honey mead (heavy on the mead) and other notes take precedence. It has very strong throw on me, but I don't know how long it lasts because I washed it off both times I tried it on. Poor Litha is not for me.

[mountainwitch]

Honey and more honey--I think I'm in love with the smell of honey mead! At first there was a strangely sweet, sharp note, but it mellowed out almost immediately. This is a perfect, warm-summer fragrance, and I'm very glad I gave into the last-minute temptation to order it.

[cuervosueno]

I got this because I have to try all the sabbat oils, but also because I was hoping for some copal and carnation.

 

I didn't get that at all. What I get is rich, slightly drunk honey--obviously the honey mead. It smells like a drink they have in Poland called Miod, which is not what is generally considered mead (ie. a brewed beverage) but is rather a honey liquor. It is crazily sweet and boozy and while I get a hint of very sweet floral--no doubt the honeysuckle--mostly its just sweet intoxicating honey mead.

 

Luckily, I love Beth's honey notes. I had a bottle of honey sn for awhile, which I adored, and by far one of my fave blends (and definately my fave lunar blend) is honey moon, which has that sharp herbal tang of thyme to make it more complex. While I don't love Litha quite as much as Honey Moon, it certainly is wonderful, and I'm glad to have it as I know my Honey Moon won't last forever.

 

this makes me feel like a honey drunk bee!

[savage_rose]

It smells lovely and clean...like Jolly Roger, but without the citrus note that ends up smelling like bad B.O. on my skin.

 

Just lovely...

[maijasu]

 

Wow. This scent is sweet, complex, and utterly delicious. It's slightly spicy (must be the carnation talking), slightly herbal, a bit boozy, and sweet without being over the top. I am just blown away with Beth's talent when I smell blends like this.

 

Can't write anymore because my nose is glued to my wrist.

[lookingglass]

Litha is a sharp, bright floral at first that reminds me of Eos. Very sunny and spring-like. On the drydown, the florals turn to honey. A sweet, happy floral. Dried out, there is a bit of dry resin lingering, but it is not the incensy blend I was expecting.

 

Too happy for me.

[gypsybaby1]

honey.... yummmmmmmm. it does indeed smell of mead upon opening the bottle! Fortunately for me, it's one that stays true and changes very little on my skin. I smell honey mixed with a light touch of herbs and a lingering heat somewhere in the background, almost evanescent.

 

[Alchemy21599]

In the bottle: sweet light floral with a touch of thyme.

 

Wet: raw clover honey!

 

Dry: honey and summer wild flowers warm from the sun. A very pretty scent, but a bit too sweet for me. The label is gorgeous so I may keep the bottle anyway.

Edited July 28, 2006 by Delphinine

[aestien]

Bottle: citrus floral

Wet: honey, citrus of the vervain, spice floral, summer, carnation, bonfire, incense, wood

Dry: warm, sweet, golden clover honey with a hint of thyme, honeysuckle, spicy carnation and yauhtli, a little daisy, copal and frankincense and a little wood

 

This completely embodies high summer to me. It's so very warm and filled with honey, the clover smell of raw beeswax, and as it goes through its stages, I definitely get the oak surrounded glade with bonfires and incense burning, spicy carnations scattered about, wearing daisy crowns, jump the fire for luck, sun god golden, SUMMER

[czuba]

In Vial: Lemon honey, a little alcoholic (boozy) in the back, and some daisies, violets.

 

On Skin, Wet: Lemon honey base (mead?), some spicey earthiness - sweet, but clean. in the dry down floral and wood scent appears more

 

On Skin, Dry: Warm sweet, incensy with hint of the mead. After most of the day the scent is still there and smells a bit like sex.