Sweet Alyssum

[Dedee]

A lush carpet of foam-white and dusky purple blossoms: this is the gentle, joyous scent of spring-blooming sweet alyssum.

I was so excited when I saw this was the new Single Note at Will Call a few weeks ago!!!!!! I work with Sweet Alyssum everyday (I work in a garden center) and Have even said out loud a few times I wish Beth would make this a scent!!

Wet: wow, flowering honey, very sweet, stronger than I expected

On skin: still sweet, but the flower is starting to come to life

Dry Down: Oh wow, it really is Alyssum!!!! Stays fairly close to the skin but every time I move my arm I can smell my garden

Verdict: I LOVE this scent, it is like putting the tiny little flowers directly on your skin. This is the most perfect floral single note I have found so far. It is truly Sweet Alyssum, light and airy, reminds you of Spring and Sunlight and Honey Bees with it's delicate floral honey scent. The perfect warm weather scent! Thank You, Beth!!

[violetblue]

This is so strong and lovely! I agree with the review, very authentic and love the throw on it!

[heygraycatbird]

I really love a good floral perfume, so I needed to try Sweet Alyssum since it's 100% floral. Also I was curious about the flower itself because I don't think I've ever knowingly smelled it.

 

I've tried this twice with the same results:

 

While wet, it is slightly nectary, at first almost citrusy even, but it is not very sweet and doesn't smell like honey to me. I do like the scent because it reminds me of white florals but is a bit different than others. It's not as creamy as tuberose or gardenia, yet not as sharp as lily.

 

Throw is quite strong at first and a bit heady. I can usually be quite liberal with my application of floral blends without a headache coming on, but this one brings me close to edge during the first 10 - 20 minutes of wearing.

 

After about 30-40 minutes the sillage is pretty much gone and I have to put my nose to my skin to get a whiff. The scent is gone completely after an hour.

 

It is a nice fresh floral scent, even if it wasn't as sweet as I was expecting. The combination of almost-headachey and short wear-length is unfortunate though, for it means I can't slather to make it last longer.

[puck_nc]

Origin: Straight from the Lab

 

Initial Thoughts: As long as it's not rose or lily, I will try almost any predominantly floral blend that Beth makes.

 

In the Bottle: This is divinely pretty. Sweet and rich and floral and I keep opening the bottle for another sniff. It suggests a carpet of lovely flowers on a day that is warm but not quite tipping the balance into hot. If it doesn't work well on me I'll probably keep the bottle just to put this in a scent locket.

 

Wet: There is a faint trace of artificiality or plastic and some of the green in the floral comes to the surface. If this were a rose scent, this would be the point where the scent not only went green, but stinky-cooked-collards green on me. It's not at all that bad here, but it is harshing my squee over the bottle scent a bit. Darn my skin chemistry.

 

Drydown: The green note backs off and lets the flowers come back in. The sweetness isn't coming quite back to the level it was in the bottle, but it doesn't have to in order to be swoon-worthy. A lush carpet of flowers that fades enough to cling to my skin but not much more, making it an excellent candidate for wearing to work.

 

Verdict: There's just enough of that honeyed undertone that it feels like it might be close enough to sub for my beloved wisteria single note. I'll have to pull out my precious half-imp and try them side by side. Very glad to have this bottle.

[hlinspjalda]

So far none of the new SNs have captured my heart, but Sweet Alyssum is one of my favorite garden plants. Wherever I encounter it, I stop to smell it. I was thrilled to see it come out as a SN and bought a bottle unsniffed.

 

In the bottle: Really does a good job of capturing the sweet, soapy, almost minty delight that is sweet alyssum flower.

 

Wet: A lot like night-blooming jasmine, only sweeter and less astringent on the back of the throat. There's a bit of sharpness to it, like it might want to veer into headache territory, but even as I sniff it's warming up to me nicely and that sharpness is diminishing.

 

One hour: This has blossomed on my skin into a warm honeyed floral. If it can hold on and not go overripe, this will be quite a triumph.

 

Two hours: I like this quite a lot. It is a little indole-ish, not quite crittery, rather like honeyed musky floral. Some of the nuances I smelled in the bottle are not present, but it is much more wearable this way: no potential for headache. I will try it in the scent locket too and see which way I like it better, but I'm pretty sure I will want to wear this one. It is definitely a keeper.

 

I think this is my new favorite SN!

Edited May 9, 2013 by hlinspjalda

[JazzieCazzie]

Originally I was going to pass, because ... well, I wasn't familiar enough with Sweet Alyssum to make a full bottle commitment. But after reading some reviews and one forumite invoking the name "Wisteria single note" I decided at the very very very last minute to buy a bottle ... and am SOOOO glad I did! This is actually my first SN purchase from the Lab in as long as I can remember (I did buy a bottle of Spanish Carnation from a forumite, because I missed its release when it was live).

 

IN THE IMP: Gloriously sweet and honey-ish and floral without being cloying, in-your-face or soapy.

 

Dabbed on wrist and in crook of arm from the tiny droplets remaining in my dropped after decanting an imp for myself.

 

WET: This somehow manages to combine the lovely white floral scent of the Sweet Alyssum and also have a fresh spring outdoorsy feel to it.

 

DRYDOWN: Very light, sweet and lovely. Even my hubby, not a perfume fan and not a floral fan, liked it on me.

 

OVERALL: This is a fantastic single note. I can see wearing it on its own and also experiment with layering it with some other blends.

 

On a scale of 1-5, a 4.8.

[OctoberGwen]

This is beautiful.

 

A sweet, honeyed floral note. There is absolutely nothing "high pitched" or green about this. It lasts a good long while, too.

 

Not a scent I will wear all the time, but I am happy to have it nonetheless.

[zankoku_zen]

Sweet, honey floral note. Slighly smoky, delicate, very perfumey.

 

White floral, redolent, traditional.

[yeahbutnobut]

Sweet Alyssum

 

In the imp: a sweet, endearing floral. Very springy!

Wet on skin: now it’s a bit greener and also a bit soapy (in a pleasant way).

Dry on skin: a sweet, slightly greenish, slightly honeyed, bubbly floral. It has a kind of ‘soap suds’ or ‘children’s bubble bath’ that I quite like. It has a similar sweetness to some other floral scents like heliotrope or hellebore, but it’s a bit more of a nectar scent, it could get too sweet for me. I am sure this is one of the flowers in Chaste Moon (both versions). There is something underneath it all that could turn to plastic or bitterness, but I hope that doesn’t happen. I must say this is very accurate, it smells like real alyssum!

After a while: this unfortunately develops a slightly bitter plastic with a slightly cloying sweetness. The bitterness underneath reminds me of a similar reaction I got with Evening Stock, but not as intense. I much prefer this to Evening Stock. It still manages to stay quite alyssum-y despite the hints of plastic. This would be much nicer if it wasn’t on my skin! Though with a few more wears it does improve a little, smelling more like the warm and pleasantly soapy smell from before.

Verdict: my friend recently got some alyssum to plant in her garden, and I couldn’t resist the chance to smell it…and I have to say, this note is spot on! It smells just like the sweet, honeyed, candied but also earthy/green smell of real alyssum. The word that comes to mind is ‘frothy’, because it reminds me both of an almost effervescent mass of tiny alyssum blooms bursting from the cracks of garden paving, and also because it reminds me of bubble bath! It’s a very pretty and complex single note but my skin does some strange things to it, making it a bit too soapy and sweet. I have a feeling this would be even nicer as part of a blend rather than on its own. As this smells much nicer before I apply this to my skin, I think I would love this in a room spray or even a candle!

Is it a keeper? on its own with nothing added, probably not, having said that, it is growing on me…I’d love to see more blends with alyssum in it.

If you like this, try: Fairy Hordes Attacking a Bat spray, Chaste Moon (both), other floral single notes such as Devil’s Trumpet and Evening Stock

[seussala]

When this single note came up I was crazy excited! The little house I grew up in had these tiny white flowers EVERYWHERE, and I never knew what they were! I would sometimes catch the scent of those nectary little guys while walking around abandoned lots in the East village and always stop to pick some and carry them around. I just loved them. So when I googled the name of the new single note and saw the picture of that little white flower I was like

 

This is a super fab floral - like others have said, nectary and reminiscent of honey. It has an almost soapy quality that lends the description frothy. I believe it is aging into a deeper and sweeter note than it was when I had it lab-fresh (back then it almost gave me a headache) and now I wear it happily during the day - it reminds me of spending hours running in our backyard attacking my cousin with bunches of alyssum. Its a gorgeous, complex white floral with a hint of green. The longer you wear it the more comforting and lush it becomes.

This would go great with a white sundress and lemonade.

[milo]

I do love the smell of Alyssum, so I was looking forward to trying this one. Color me disappointed. Yes, it smells like alyssum from wet to dry, only a fake bouquet of the real deal.

[Ajila]

In the bottle - A sweet slightly heady almost booze like floral

 

Wet on me - Washing detergent; there is a hint of soft lush floral beneath, but mostly I get washing detergent

 

Dry on me - A sweet hazy musky floral

 

Overall - I love the dry down, but the washing detergent wet stages not so much

[sunlitgarden]

(I'm going through some of my old notes. I tested this at Will Call when it was new.)

 

I wasn't really sure what to expect from this, other than something in the floral spectrum, as I wasn't familiar with the Sweet Alyssum flower. I liked it well enough, though. It's a light, sweet, "fresh" smelling floral, with yellow to light green color associations in my mind. I got a drop of it on my notebook and a day later, it smelled pleasant and sweet, if a bit soapy.

[dementia_divine]

In the decant: I am not familiar with the scent of the actual flower, but it does smell sweet and purple in the decant!

 

Wet: Definitely a sweet, purple, springtime flower. And it’s a strong one, too.

 

Dry: It’s softer now, but still going strong. The lush carpet of flowers in the description is spot on! And it really does smell purple and white.

 

Verdict: I’m glad that I got to try this. This is a lovely, sweet, purple springtime floral, and I look forward to pairing it with other floral single notes I have and experimenting with it! I don’t think it’s a single note I’d wear on its own, though.

[Lucchesa]

Sweet Alyssum SN was generously frimped to me. I love single notes to educate my nose, but sweet alyssum is one flower I'm very familiar with, as every yard in suburban Sacramento in the 1970s had some in its border, so at a certain time of year there was a cloud of alyssum scent everywhere. It's a really unique fragrance, sweet but a little dusty, hard to describe. And Sweet Alyssum SN does not smell at all like my recollections of the flower when it hits my skin. I can't quite articulate where it goes wrong, and now I need to go to the nursery to refresh my nose, but the SN is a strong perfumy floral on me that just doesn't capture how I remember the flowers smelling. It's much nicer about 90 minutes in (and I am not a lover of pure florals, for whom it would likely be gorgeous all the way through), but it's not what I was hoping for.

[Ghost of a Rose]

Gorgeous fragrance, but doesn't last very long on me. I'll have to try it in a scent locket.