Bayou

[aquazoo]

A lazy, warm deep green scent with a thick aquatic undertone: Spanish moss, evergreen and cypress with watery blue-green notes and an eddy of hothouse flowers and swamp blooms.

Oh, this is very nice! Very pretty greeny scent. Now I’m getting the florals. I like this a lot! Wow, yes I would wear this.

[rhubarbbear]

bayou is pretty. very languid, humid southern summer kinda feel to it...just as i'd imagined. warm, floral, feminine....a magnolia tree dripping spanish moss. i don't get any kind of swampy-ness or decay from it (beyond the decay scent of the magnolias).

[steffanina]

Bayou-

 

In Bottle: Soapy, flowery, a little bit of sweet berry. Pretty!

 

Wet: This is like a beautiful tropical soap.

 

Dry: Oh, dear, that sour floral note is coming out on my skin. Disheartening. I have to go wash it off. (What IS that? It bums me out!)

 

Overall: Not for me.

[sofiaviolet]

Such a pretty aquatic! I only smell the aquatic, though. It's got a lot in common with City in the Sea. If I have found a GC substitute, I shall flail merrily.

[theseagrows]

i wasn't sure about this one, as florals are often good to me but not always. this smells very green, wet and earthy, but earthy in the sense of dirt and moss. i smell white flowers...maybe magnolia or gardenia? that's just a guess, though, i can't seem to place the florals. i am surprised that i like this one as much as i do!

[tempestteapot]

I've tried this one several times and I can't tell if I really love it or I really hate it.

 

It's definatly green and aquatic at the same time. I really do smell the swaplands, but there's a darker almost rotten smell underneith (which would complete the swamp I suppose)

[forspecial_plate]

I still can't tell many flowers apart....but Bayou starts out reminding me of strong, sweet jasmine. Or maybe gardenia...some floral anyway, with a very tart lemon-like note behind it. Very interesting. After a while the flowers back off and it becomes aquatic, with the tartness still in there. The lemon aspect sort of changes but it's still something tart in there. It's very strong, with a lot of throw. It reminds me a lot of a heavier, darker Sea of Glass (which is a scent that I love). I'm not sure I ever got any moss, evergreen, or cypress...but maybe those are contributing to the tartness. I can't really decide if I would wear Bayou...it might be appropriate for a hot and humid day. But if I had to choose I would pick Sea of Glass over Bayou, probably.

[corvidae]

This one, the first BPAL I ever tried, has really grown on me.

 

I *love* the magnolia when I'm feeling feminine. Some reviewers have called this masculine, but it's more feminine than what I usually wear!

 

I grew up in Houston (nickname "the Bayou City") and have visited New Orleans, so I know this smell. It's very much a sultry southern summer. The good part about that, rather than the part I hated. A screened-in porch with flowers.

 

Also, my skin generally eats florals but this one lasts a bit better.

[oh_the_horror]

Wet: It smells slightly soapy on me at first. For some reason I keep thinking of a cactus with flowers blooming on it when I smell my wrist, although I don't even know what a cactus would smell like.

 

Drying down: The aquatic notes and moss smell nice together. I normally think aquatic notes smell harsh, like bathroom cleaner, but the moss really balances them out. The flowers are faint but they really add a prettiness to it.

 

Conclusion: Swampy flowery moss. It's pretty.

 

I need to get more blends with moss in them.

Edited December 5, 2006 by oh_the_horror

[Musamea]

In the imp: A little lemony, a little piney (though not like cleaner), very masculine. And… jasmine? *reads description* hothouse flowers. I'm willing to bet one of those is night-blooming jasmine. Yup. The one Lab component that absolutely hates me. Sigh. I'll be passing this one on.

[Gorgansmorker]

I'm a little new at reviewing, and I may have a wacky nose, but this smells like wet horse. Not sweaty, that's a bit different. Just a wet with water horse. It's like summer, and I've been riding through a stream with lots of calm flowers all around. Keep in mind that I've lived in Southern California all my life, never been to the South, and have never been in a real swap, so I have few relevent asociations to use with this blend. I quite like it.

Edited December 10, 2006 by Gorgansmorker

[KassiK]

Bayou

 

I'm reviewing this one without looking at what's in the mix or what others have said here.

 

In the imp: an aquatic scent with a mossy/grassy undertone. A murky deep green water.

wet on the skin: a pensive aquatic scent and that mossy/grassy scent. Could that be clover?

dry on the skin: hasn't morphed much on me. It's a certain mood, I believe something that could bring hyperness down. It's calming. Something that I'd wear when I'd want to write. I'd only want to wear this to provoke a very specific mood. That said, I don't think I'll be ordering a big bottle of this, but I will be wearing it a lot. Maybe after a while, I'll change my mind and get a big bottle. I really do like it.

 

Edit: Turns out the mood this scent puts me in is actually a good thing. I find myself loving this scent more and more. It's a very exact mood that is calming and helps me focus. I'm ordering a big bottle with my next BPAL purchase. I completely love the scent now.

Edited February 12, 2007 by KassiK

[supremegoddessofall]

Aquatic grapefruit with florals underneath. Eww. Very sharp and tickling my nose. Not for me.

[nancybridget]

Swamp blossoms and sweaty greens.

 

Morphs into super florals.

 

Not my flavor.

[monsteralice]

Two words: Swamp Thing (that's not a complaint, btw)

 

Bayou is one of the more interesting scents I've tried; it delivers all that the description promises, and more so. The first notes to come out are yummy, heady flowers with something else woody. When first on the wrist this one is strong! Then it calms down into a watery smell with lighter flowers. The finish was sweet and muddy, like mud between your toes.

 

I don't think I'll keep it, it wasn't really my thing, but I admire how well the concept was played out.

[euterpe414]

This may the murkiest scent that I have tried yet from BPAL. It is so evocative of a swamp to me- stagnant water with algae, flowers and...a bit of rottenness. Now, I appreciate it being quite accurate for what the scent is supposed to depict but, I really don't wish to smell like a ton algae and such. Also, after a while it goes a tad soapy, too. Oh well.

 

All in all no for me, but an interesting one to try out nonetheless.

[femmefatale]

Oh, wow, this stuff is potent! Caught be by surprise how strong it is.

 

Bayou is a very interesting aquatic. It's not a fresh clean aquatic nor is it a deep dark one. This one is definately murkier like a swamp.

It reminds me summertime in Fla, canoeing under a canpoy of trees, hot and humid, somewhat dank, with a touch of swamp flowers and moss and wet vegetation.

I think I really like this, though it does make me feel a bit homesick.

[cinderfallen]

First on, it's a strong aquatic floral that reminded me of Fragile. STRONG throw--I dabbed only a bit on one wrist and I could smell the waft when I was walking. Then dries down to generic floral perfume. Sadness.

[lapillus]

In bottle: Sweet herbal/floral

 

Wet: still sweet, but a bit more floral than green. There is a background sharpness (cypress?) that cuts the sweetness. Tastes, but doesn’t smell, soapy. Gets stronger all the way around as it starts to dry.

 

Dry: sweet floral but a clear green, wet one, not powdery or soapy. I’m really starting to like this, although I think I’d like it better if it were a touch less sweet. The clear green is great, though.

 

Summary: Closer to what I’m looking for in an aquatic than Okolun. Would love it if there was a touch more sharpness.

[stellans]

Oh man, I wanted to like this one so much! It has evergreen and cypress, both favorites of mine, plus I was really curious about Spanish Moss. Aquatic notes are generally kind to my skin, so I can only thing it was the floral notes that reacted to my body chemistry to produce: insect repellent!

 

Ick. Ick, ick, ick. It brings to mind the trucks communities used to send out on hot summer nights to emit clouds of insecticide to kill off mosquitos, and we kids were dumb enough to dance in and out of the clouds. Fortunately, I personally know noone who suffered for such idiocy, but one never knows.

But, back to my review.

 

In the imp: Deep green, murky water. This smells interesting!

 

Wet on skin: hmmmm... there's an odd citrus-y note coming to the front, and that's not a good sign. Lemon is not one of my 'good' notes, and this is definitely more lemon than lime, grapefruit, or orange -- all of which work better on me. And it's getting stronger! Eeep. This is ramping up so much it's making me feel a little sick. A very bad sign, indeed.

 

Dry: I could hardly stand to wait for drydown, this was making me feel sick to the point of a headache, but I persevered. It did not improve for me enough to keep from washing it off. The lemon/citrus smell diminished slightly, and I could smell a little florals coming up, but not enough. Not nearly enough.

 

Verdict: I'm going to throw this in my "Try Later" box and hope it was just some odd hormonal shift that caused my reaction today. If not, well...there's always the swaps.

 

Is it a keeper? Not yet. Not by a long shot.

Edited June 5, 2010 by stellans

[black_and_bloom]

This is a sultry scent - damp, overripe and slightly mysterious. In the imp and at first application, I am surrounded by the scent of the hothouse flowers & swamp blooms - jasmine? honeysuckle? magnolia? Not sure, but the effect is heady, sweet and slightly narcotic. It's balanced by the warm aquatic base - this isn't a crisp, clear aquatic - it's deeper and fuller and very very beautiful.

 

At first blush, I wasn't sure how the moss, evergreen and cypress would fit in. They are there, but very subtle. If I press my nose to my wrist and sniff, I can detect the crisp green note, but its overall effect is swirled into the eddy that is Bayou.

 

Very nice!!

Edited April 4, 2007 by black_and_bloom

[CiCi]

This reminds me of a long, hot summer day when I was a teenager, and we would go deep into the forest to get away from the heat. We would sit on a boulder with our feet in the water and watch it move sluggishly along. Bayou smells like the water did when we would kick up the bottom of it and the silt would come to the top for a minute and you could smell that dirty earth. The sun would peek through the dense forest and heat up the tress and the flowers growing wild there. We would pick the flowers and that yucky sticky fluid would get everywhere and smell so strange. Add together all those scents and throw in a little crushed ferns and that is Bayou. A pleasant surprise!

[StormtrooperPrincess]

A languid, humid day. Spanish moss dripping from trees, and sunlight-dappled water at the base of cyprus trees.

 

This reminds me of driving to New Orleans to visit friends who still live there, and that first moment of smelling the bayou & swamps along I-10—we always rolled down the windows so we could breath that scent in deeply.

 

 

A definate keeper for the summer months, although I don't normally wear florals or acquatics.

[Gemini noir]

It's with Bayou that I've realized I might love moss. I started looking into what other BPAL blends contain it and found one/more moss(es) in more blends than I realized, including some BPALs I like a lot. There should be more moss blends because it's wonderful stuff! My predisposition toward the stuff is now fully disclosed.

 

I've read a few of the Bayou reviews and was surprised it was described as masculine. It isn't "pink-girly" but I found it very green-lush-feminine. The difference in reaction is likely at least partially due to chemistry, as well as scent preferences/differences in what's perceived as feminine. The green-mossy-floral feels happy and relaxing. It impacts me rather like sunshine impacts a cat, causing closed eyes, a smile, and a good stretch.

[camaro199183]

Beautiful! Spanish moss and swamp flowers. I LOVE all of my Wanderlust perfumes.