Thirteen (13): January 2012

[portalkat]

In our paean to all the mysteries surrounding this enigmatic number, there are thirteen lucky and unlucky components in this fragrance: cacao absolute, Holy basil, Jamaican ginger, High John the Conqueror root, lucky hand root, manzanilla, nutmeg, Queen of the Meadow, star anise, thyme, frankincense, Irish moss, and huckleberry leaf.

The west coast will call reviews kept mentioning something about this being a very woody blend. When I first saw the notes when it went live, I could not understand how this could possibly end up smelling woody - but it does! It's very woody with the cacao and ginger peeking through. I love all of the 13's and this one is no exception. It just keeps getting prettier and prettier the longer that it's on and it will also have a special meaning to me because this past Friday the 13th is the day that my FIL passed.

[DahliaHayashi]

My initial thought that there is to much stuff in it was right.

Its starts out chocolaty but the thyme overshadows it on me

This actually reminds me of velvet quite a bit with its woody chocolate note. And like velvet it calms down to a sweeter, nearly vanillary note on me but its still not quite right.

However I dont give up on it just yet. I guess aging will do wonders for this baby and make it more rich, dark chocolate

 

Edit april 2012: I was right letting it age.now i like it quite a bit. chocolate became the main player with woody spicyness as his sidekick. i will keep the bottle and will dust it out for autum again

Edited April 18, 2012 by DahliaHayashi

[Unauthorized Cinnamon]

I don't usually seek out highly complex blends, but I bought this on impulse, and it's really lovely! After a thyme blast of Listerine proportions while wet, this settles down very nicely with cocoa and and a woody note, peeks of ginger and nutmeg, and a melange of subtle elements I can't identify, but which keep this from being very foody.

 

It's worth noting that woods usually amp like hell on me, drowning everything out with pencil shavings/tongue depressor dominance. But whatever is creating a wood tone in this (the roots maybe?) is behaving itself. Oh, and the anise in Kabuki was ridiculously strong on me, but I'm not smelling any anise in this (that is a good thing IMO).

 

I think this is a keeper!

[ReallyZeb]

Like everyone else I get a blast of chocolate and thyme to start, but on drydown I don't get woods I get the herbs, the Holy Basil in particular - which is good as that what what made me buy this one. There's still a back note of the cacao and a slight citrus note which I think is a muted ginger. Quite lovely.

[SheriffJoe]

As 13 is my lucky number (turned 13 on Friday the 13th...found a $20 bill on the floor of McDonalds!!), I HAD to try this.

 

I was NOT expecting such a powerful blast of spicy chocolate. It's almost overpowering in the bottle, but tones itself down quite nicely after applied. On drydown, the spicy chocolate is still there, but I get the mossy anise smell as well.

 

Ten hours later, it's still there on the wrists. Subtle spicy chocolate. This is really an amazing blend, one I wasn't sure I'd like when i first sniffed it...and one I've learned to love the longer it's on, and BOY does it stay on a long time!!!

 

I am SO glad I picked this up when I did!!

Edited February 11, 2012 by SheriffJoe

[karykeion]

Received a tester of this with my Shunga order from tkannon a while ago. What a lovely surprise!

 

In the tester: It's pretty close to a dead ringer for a tea I have. This is Yerba Mate Latte from Republic of tea, as a perfume oil, but spicier.

 

On me, wet: I have two absolute favorite smells in the world: petrichor, and the delicious onslaught of smell that happens when you open a spice cabinet. Because of the second one, a lot of the oils I buy have combinations of bunches of different spices in them, and Best Friend (who is my second-opinion nose) thinks that everything smells like Renfaire. I have never agreed with her more. Wet, 13 smells like spices, earth, and chocolate, and it's so interesting and absolutely beautiful--it really is Renfaire without the sweat! The chocolate and spices dominate, but there's definitely an assertive kind of earthiness to it that I don't usually care for but absolutely love here. I hope it keeps this up--it'd be a great cold-weather scent and if this is the only amount I can get my hands on, I'll be in real trouble!

 

On me, dry: The chocolate is mostly gone, replaced by a spicy kind of smokiness close to the skin. My overall impression, which I guess I get from the really authentically Renfaire smell, is "I smell like adventure!" I think it's an amazing cold-weather scent and I'll definitely use up the tester.

 

 

I'm not sure whether I like it enough to hunt down more, but I guess the good and bad news simultaneously is that ginger and holy basil like me fine--and this is really, really not helping my curiosity about the dark chocolate/tulsi/tumeric/ginger blend from the Box of Chocolates.

[zankoku_zen]

This one is one spicy chocolate blend. I smell anise, ginger, nutmeg and then a swirl of herbs, with a hint of chocolate. Out of all of the thirteen blends, I have to seem this is the one with the strongest 'vibe'.

 

It smells like something you would use in a ritual. Not entirely decorative chocolate.

 

This is the chocolate that you use to bribe gods with. But when bribing gods, one has to be careful...

[Blood onmy hands]

My bottle of this doesn't have any blobs of chocolate absolute, but it does have a strong, sweet, dark chocolate smell to it. I get a fresh little burst of the ginger at first, like lemon and gingerbread cookies, but it quickly dries down to something like dark chocolate, dry, dark wood (like a dark sandalwood almost) and hints of dry, herby thyme and what reminds me of dry oakmoss. A very dark, woody, masculine sort of chocolate. I really like this one on my hubby.

[ajansuz]

This is so good. It's the same dry chocolate of Calaveras without the booze or burnt caramel. I also tend to amp wood notes, and what I amp in this comes out smelling like a sandalwood pendant I bought years ago before it faded. There's a definite spice cabinet quality to this, too, that another forumite mentioned. Nothing goes sweet on me with this at all. It's all very dry but also warm and somewhat comforting. I like it a lot. The chocolate stays strong throughout without being overtly foody.

[milo]

Herbal, creamy milk chocolate at first. Still creamy after a bit, slightly herbal, milky chocolate. This is a really weird '13' on me, probably my least fave of all that I've tried. The herbs have a spaghetti sauce vibe. Not for me, but nice to try!

[LizziesLuck]

Initially this is everything that I wanted it to be - Cocoa and Ginger, two of my favourite notes. But eventually all the herbs come out, and this becomes way to herbal and woody for me. I do think I will try other 13's though. I love Cocoa.