Visions of Autumn VII

[Ina Garten Davita]

Tobacco absolute, myrrh, opoponax, black sandalwood, and black pepper.

I love tobacco, LOVE! This is the note I love in Black Lace and Havana. Sweet, a little smoky, a little chewy. Wet, it's ALL tobacco ALL the time. After it dries, there is a hint of the black pepper and a whiff of woods. The longer it dries, the sweet tobacco and woodsy spice gets rounded out and goes all smooth and resinous with the opoponax and myrrh.

Autumn VII morphs quite a bit, but stays gorgeous the entire time. Decent throw and staying power, this is one scent I wouldn't mind reapplying throughout the day.

[Bluestblood]

As I was reading Ina Garten Davita's review, I was thinking "how the heck is a scent 'chewy'?" I get it now. While there is nothing caramel-like about this scent, something about the richness of the tobacco evokes the feeling of biting into a rich coffee licorice caramel candy. There is something about this scent that reminds me of candy-coated black licorice.

 

The tobacco is very dark, rich, and a little sweet. As it dries, it mellows out and becomes a much more well-rounded scent. The opoponax and tobacco share the spotlight, and the other notes (especially the pepper) are detectable and refine the scent into something beautiful and quite evocative of Fall. It is similar to Achluophobia, but more of a dark brown (rather than pitch black) scent.

Edited October 11, 2014 by Bluestblood

[OctoberGwen]

YUM. This reminds me of another BPAL, but I can't think what it is. Maybe Pinched With Four Aces? I love the tobacco/black sandalwood combo, and the myrrh gives it just enough sweetness to smooth it out. This one came home with me from NYCC. It is going to age like a dream.

[MuskWitch]

I love, no, I LOVE this scent! I LOVE the tobacco, and tobacco LOVES my skin! I knew this one would be a winner!

 

This is a resiny-tobacco dominant-woodsy-sweet-pepper/spicy scent that only gets better the longer I wear it. I think it will age beautifully.

 

I ordered two more bottles. Maybe it should have been three . . . . .

[glitteringoracle]

I got this on a whim after seeing all the talk about it selling out at Will Call. I'm so glad I did! I tested it on my right wrist and I keep stopping to sniff again as I type.

 

I think the pepper sharpens the blend just enough to keep it interesting. Wet: resinous sandalwood with some tobacco starting to assert itself. Dry: Definitely trying this one out on my love. I think it will work perfectly on his skin. The tobacco is beautiful and rich. You know the mouth-feel of honey that's been stored just a little too cool? That's the way this smells without any of the actual honey. It would be a perfect cuddling/naptime scent.

 

Like the reviewers above, I think this is going to age into something incredible. It's tempting to buy a bottle to hide from myself for a couple years just to see what happens.

[holborne]

This had kind of an unpleasant sharp note to me when I first tried it on my skin -- kind of like Tide. But when it dried down, it was warm and lovely. I actually thought it was indistinguishable from French Tobacco once it dried down. So yeah, this was a winner for me.

[quickdrawkiddo]

Caveat: I just got my lab order yesterday (yay!) so this one hasn't had time to settle down yet. With that said, I'm getting straight up cardamom, like Indian-food-style. I'm kind of flabbergasted that there's none in here! It's pleasant and very different, but not what I was expecting at all. I wonder if it's the tobacco and the pepper combined that are reminding me of cardamom. I've had similar reactions to scents I ended up loving later on, so I'm not worried -- these are all notes that work on me, so I'll try it again when it's had a chance to settle down. Still very wearable though

[samarablackcat]

Tobacco and burnt. Not burnt tobacco, just something obtrusive to my nose. I swear I get a little bourbon vanilla.

 

Drying this mellows and becomes tobacco and bourbon vanilla; close to the skin I still get the burning smell; that must be black sandalwood.I was hoping for a little bite of pepper. Much sweeter than I imagined, but not something I would reach for. I thought this would scream multiple bottle purchase, but alas, it was not meant to be.

[strahlend]

First sniff – I get the tobacco and a hint of pepper and some of the resin and a faint hint of black musk.

Skin testing – very sweet and chewy tobacco scent. I also get the pepper. What started out as a tobacco single note has softened into a tobacco that has a slightly soapy muskyness to it because of the resins and sandalwood. The tobacco note is still out front and talking kind of loud. In comparison, French Tobacco single note goes on a bit more high pitched, VII is much more sweet in comparison. They both end up in the same ballpark, but VII initially has a lot more dimension and roundness to it, as would make sense when comparing it to a single note. In the end, it's a lovely scent, just not for me.

[schneagl]

This one was for the boy, and even though this isn't my kind of note list, I of course tested all the Weenie imps we got I didn't look back at the note list but just tried to write down what autumn-y smells I got:

 

In the bottle: Maple-golden and a touch sweet, with incense spices.

Wet on my skin: No sweetness now, an astringent maple with green vines. It's risking going to "cleaner" on me, but the notes in the back are keeping it together. Sort of a smell of plants ready to harvest, too.

Drydown: Dark maple sap.

Interesting thing to try for me. This is way out of the norm for tobacco or other notes; no idea how any of this became "maple", but I'm sticking to it. The throw was low on me, and stuck around for the average time, a good few hours. This is the first BPAL I can remember that smelled like a plant, even a green plant, but not wet or bright green - it really had the notes of picking squash or other late-season vegetables. Wish that complexity stuck around a little longer.

[poofie]

I ordered a bottle before I even got my decant. Now that I'm wearing the decant, I'm glad I did. I get mostly tobacco and wood, with a bit bite from the pepper. Overall, I like it very much and I anticipate wearing it a lot in cooler temperatures, and I agree that it should age spectacularly!

[Roogna]

very close to the skin, tobacco, woodsy/spicy/incense. Turns to a tobacco/hemp like note with a soapy bite

[LiberAmoris]

The tobacco note in Visions of Autumn VII is so beautiful. The opoponax is also perfect here, sweet and resiny—one of my favorite notes in the BPAL catalogue. I can pick out the myrrh, black sandalwood, and black pepper, and they round everything out but don't step forward. There's something restrained and elegant about this blend...I think it would pair just as well with a beaded dress as it would with jeans and a t-shirt. It has a classic feel, like it would be at home in some gorgeous art deco flacon. Lovely!

[Jangzonrice]

in imp: black peppercorn (strong!), sandalwood, and myrrh

 

will update when I get to try it on!

[Balame]

Kind of like a cross between French Tobacco and Penitence. All the sweet richness of tobacco with a dark, incense-y background

I don't smell the pepper individually, which is a good thing since it can make me sneezy.

For me it's just gorgeous resins, tobacco and soft woods, which is surely a winner in my book.

Sadly the longer I wear it, the more it muddles into a baby powdery sort of blend.

Edited November 30, 2014 by Balame

[Monster]

This is by far one of the best of the 2014 Halloweenies. <3 Visions of Autumn VII opens with a thick and sticky French Tobacco single note. As it settles into my skin, it becomes more complex with dark resins and has the barest kiss of pepper. This is a rich, black, multi-faceted scent. It's sophisticated, smoldering and unisex. If you liked the French Tobacco single note or scents like Minotaur, you NEED to purchse a bottle before it comes down. I may need a back up, I've been wearing this for the past couple of days and have already received a compliment. A true beauty. <3

Edited December 1, 2014 by Monster

[zankoku_zen]

Dark tobacco and myrrh. This is dark, smoky and autumnal. Slightly masculine. Decent throw and decent wear length.

 

Off to find mr. zee_zee for this.

[Ethaisa]

Tobacco and black sandalwood for the win! They perfectly balance each other. Smooth and dark and resinous with a smokey edge (though the pepper was slow to open up, and remained subdued on me.) Lovely wet, and phenomenal on dry down.

[milo]

I find Tobacco SN a bit much on its own, but blended it can be quite nice. This one, definitely tobacco here, along with something even more gritty, musky and resinous. The whole effect is a masculine blend for sure, so it's not something I would wear out. It's a tad sour for me, but I'd still like to smell it on a guy.

[Poenari]

I understand the chewy description! The tobacco is initially the most obvious note, although it melds with the myrrh to become a dark resinous and yet slightly powdery tobacco. In some ways, it reminds me of a sweet pouch of pipe tobacco that my dad used to stuff into his pipe- so that is where I get the chewy feeling. It doesn't smell like smoke, or pipe smoke, or even actual pipe tobacco, but the chewiness reminds me of the pre-smoked tobacco that is slightly moist in the pouch. As it dries, I can detect the pepper and sandalwood coming more forward. After about a half hour, this has a very dry waft to it, similar to the way La Lugubre Gondola wafts on my skin, although this is not the same scent at all. But if you love La Lugubre Gondola, I could see you loving this one too. I bet it would smell great on a man, but it is not overly masculine. I predict that by next Halloween, this one is going to be even more amazing to wear, as these notes will age beautifully.

[patina]

My favorite of the Weenies! Dark tobacco, smoothed and sweetened by opoponax and myrrh with just a hint of black pepper. The sandalwood gives it a clean slightly woody edge, but it doesn't smell soapy. Lovely for the resin lover, this does remind me of La Lugubre Gondola, but a much darker version (Edit: And with myrrh/opoponax instead of amber, of course!)

Edited December 21, 2014 by patina

[gentle-twig]

Opens with a nicely bracing black pepper over a warm and cozy tobacco note. As it dries it settles into a more resin-dominated place, which is just gorgeous. I need to try a few more of the lab's tobacco/resin scents because this is just incredible. Out of my collection I guess it is most comparable to Gaueko, but this is much greater than the sum of its parts, which I can't say for Gaueko. Nice last and sillage. It makes me feel like I'm enveloped in golden light all day.

 

Edit to update 5 months later:

 

This is definitely one of my favorite BPAL blends that I have. Now that it has settled, the tobacco has backed down a little. I like tobacco, but I'm happy about this because I also like sandalwood and ADORE myrrh and now these two have a time to shine. The tobacco sticks around, though, and keeps things from getting too dry. The black pepper also has been sticking around after the wet stage, adding a bit of spice, which I'm happy about. Stunning.

Edited May 14, 2015 by gentle-twig

[annemathematics]

visions vii is made up of big and powerful notes, yet they all come together to make a graceful and elegant whole.

I adore tobacco and opoponax, and the former is clearly the star on my skin, with the other being a subtle supporter. the black pepper is noticeable when wet, but then dries down to add an edge of spiciness.

 

warming, rich, elegent

one of 2014's weenies that I reach for the most

[Blood onmy hands]

Mmm. This is so good. Syrupy, resinous, sweet, thick myrrh and opoponax with earthy, slightly smoky tobacco and hints of warm sandalwood that's not going to powder, and a little bite of sharp black pepper. Dark, golden, warm, sweet and resinous.