Dormouse

Oh, it's Red Lantern's little sister but she's growing up fast. Very similar caramel, coconut and booze thing going on but the peach makes it lighter and less cloying. This is just gorgeous, warm, boozy, foody and very, very sexy. It's a keeper for sure and I might have to look for a bottle.

This reminds me a lot of The Scales of Deprivation. It opens with a bright fougere, lilac here as opposed to lavender and then fades to rich, dark resins. Beautiful!

I had hoped for something more like the original, which is one of my favourites. Unfortunately it is very different and I'm not liking it at all. On my skin I get very little of the grapefruit and vanilla and lots of sweet rice and a dry ginger note that reminds me of the powdered stuff you use in cooking. It makes my nose prickle in the same way too. This actually reminds me a little of the dry down of Gunpowder, which I also can't wear. The sweet rice here is very similar to the oats in that and the apple always burned off fast leaving an odd, sweet, spicy smell which the vanilla and ginger is giving with HGM. After a while of wear the wisteria comes out quite strongly but that is not one of my favourite flower scents and it's not helping here at all. The original HGM was light, bright and sweet and made me think of those little chinese lychee candies, this is much heavier and quite cloying. By the very final drydown the rice has gone, the ginger is just a hint of warmth in the background and the fruit, flowers, musk and sake have blended with the woody base and it's really quite nice. I won't want to be waiting for 3 hours to get to this point though. I think if you like the foody, cereal based scents from Halloween and Christmas then you'll probably adore this. It is very much the summer version of those.

It maybe a little hard to find now but MVJBA: Spring Training 2008 is peanut brittle caramel popcorn and the scent is totally dead on.

Funnily enough the top left hand corner of the label has been torn off. Thanks everyone for your replies confirming my suspicions. I am quite cross though. I really, really wanted cherry pipe tobacco and really didn't want chestnuts and sugar.

I just bought a bottle of Hearth 2004. When it arrived it was in a cobalt bottle with a picture of a log blazing in a fireplace. It smells quite sweet and nutty, no cherry pipe tobacco at all. I've got the 2005 version haven't I?

I had no idea what Ash Manna was but on googling it I found that it was the sap from the Flowering Ash Tree so I was expecting something very sweet and sticky butthis scent is actually very green and sappy and not very sweet at all. Wet this is almost citrussy with a little floral. A couple of people have mentioned linden flowers so I wonder if Ash flowers have a similar scent. I know we've got some in the park down the road so I'll have to remember to go and sniff them later in the year. Gradually the citrus fades and the flowers and honey become more prominant but the heart of the scent is still this spicy, sappy, balsam type scent. Quite unisex, even tipping towards masculine possibly. I get wafts of very light honey at a distance but not up close if I sniff my wrist. It's really very lovely and I think it will be perfect for warm, early summer days.

Bread, lightly buttered, with weak tea, cream, and a lump of white sugar. This is not at all what I had hoped for. On first application it is very buttery with a ton of sugar and almonds (???). Almond is not a listed note so maybe I'm smelling the tea but it's coming over clearly as bitter almond. My skin hates almond, it's one of my notes of doom, and it's quite unpleasant here too. As the scent morphs on my skin the almond fades slightly and a liquorice/anise note comes to the fore clashing badly with the slightly burned sugar note. No bread or tea. On me this is quite bitter and acrid. Burned sugar, bitter almond and liquorice with buttery cream. Sad now!

On first sniff this is very much like Snow Bunny. The 'snow' notes are high, airy and delicate. Very sweet light pine and not too much mint. On my skin the flowers are a lot warmer than Snow Bunny's. I'm not totally sure I would recognise narcissus and to my uneducated nose the flowers smell very similar to the honeyed lilies in Tiger Lily. The contrast between the warm flowers and cold snow is lovely and I keep getting wafts of it and it makes me smile. I know it's the First Soft Snow but it's making me think of the first days of Spring, cold and chilly but with a hopeful warmth to the sun. This is such a pretty, happy scent and I'm really enjoying it.

I hate to be recommending a LE but Poisson d'Avil (lenten rose, crested iris, Virginia bluebell, primrose, moss phlox, blue crocus, daffodil, and dewy tulip with a touch of sugar blossom and honey) is very much like Amsterdam but better. It's clean, fresh and wet with a little hint of happy sweetness. The sugar blossom and honey in the description makes it sound richer and sweeter than it actually is. It truly is like a spring day in a bottle. It's from back in 2007 but you do still see it up for sale from time to time.

This is a very odd scent. It starts out smelling of herbs and warm bread and makes me think of sunny kitchens but as it dries the cumin comes out to the fore and it begins to smell like sweat. Fairly fresh and not too unpleasant sweat but sweat non the less. I don't think I'll be wearing this one.

This was all berries when I first got it and didn't grab me at all. I wanted leather and booze with just a hint of sweetness, not blackberry jam. Getting it out now to test it's much richer and a lot closer to what I was expecting. The leather is a lot more prominant and sexy and the cognac and fruit give a wonderful sleazy feel to it. Definitely one for going out and making an impact. A keeper, in fact I almost wish I had got a bottle.

Aw, I was hoping for rose and vanilla but I get the same nasty plastic smell that I get from Snow White instead. I can tell there is rose hovering in the background but it's being overpowered by the almond or whatever it is that smells so bad on me. It's a shame but total fail on me. I can see this being massively popular with those who's skins play nice with Snow White though.

Held on December 5th, this is the festival of the Horned God of the Forest, one of the di indigetes of Rome, god of cattle, fertility, wild, untamed nature, and prophecy through dreams. The scent of a thick, starlit, unspoiled forest, with a burst of wild musk, opobalsamum, black bryony, mandragora, and hemlock. When I opened the box from BPAL I could smell a wonderful scent. After opening all the bottles and sniffing, it turned out to be Faunalia. It had leaked the tiniest amount and just that little bit scented the whole package. It is by far my favourite of the Yule blends. Soft evergreen (but not pine air freshener/cleaner), fuzzy musk and something bright and effervescent. It smells exactly the same on my skin from first application to final fading. Lasts a long time too. To my nose it's like a cross between Dublin and Ivanushka. Perfection!

The First Soft Snow made me think of the White Witch. Really pretty and cold without being fir trees or mint. If you're ok with mint then Nuclear Winter is very pretty, cold white flowers and icy mint.

My youngest is now 13 and loves his BPAL. He likes scents with funny or macabre names so Day of the Skulls was a hit (probably more floral than you'd want) and so was Zombie Apocalypse and Cthulhu. Scent wise he likes fruits, chocolate, marshmallow and sweet florals. Favourites include Samhain, Lambs-wool, Boo!, Pink Plastic Flamingo, most of the 13's, El Dia de Los Reyes, El Dia de Los Muertos, Mother Shub's Toothsome Banketstaaf, Kali, Queen Alice, Cockaigne, Hell Cat and Anubis. The eldest is a huge fan of Baghdad, Villain, Danse Macabre, Whitechapel, Tristan and Mole. My husband suggests that clean aquatics are often a good choice for boys when you don't want them to smell 'girly' or too foody. Cthulhu in particular smells great on my boys.

I didn't expect much from this one. Although I love peach scents I amp jasmine in that horrible cat's pee way. In the bottle it smells cold and slightly herbal with a rush of tart peach. On my skin the peach blossom is cool and tangy like peach and white grape juice, backed up by a really yummy musk and a tiny bit of warm wood. The jasmine is staying firmly in check, not even a hint of cat and I can't spot the chrysanthemum at all. As it dries down the musk and wood becomes stronger and the peach/jasmine floral is rich and round, reminding me of honeysuckle but it still has an astringent note, the white tea maybe, which is holding it all together and stopping it from becoming cloying. This is really beautiful and I think I'll get quite a lot of wear out of it.

Oh no! I was expecting to love this but it smells like Honey and Lemon Strepsils (a type of cough drop, not sure if you get this brand in the States) which makes me think of having a cold when I was a kid. Not at all what I wanted.

I can't vouch for the luck bringing properties but I rather like this scent. It's a warm heady gardina/ylang ylang based floral. Maybe there is a little rose too. On my skin it develops a slightly fruity edge that might be lotus. Underneath the flowers it has a bitter herbalness that stops it from becoming too cloying or sickly. It's bright, happy and quite wearable if you like florals. I'm just waiting for my luck to change now.

The grapefruit in Baobhan Sith lasts a really long time on me. Also seconding Pinwheels. It's incredibly bright and fruity, almost fizzy and lasts really well.

Vanilla can sometimes amp badly on me but I love lilies and honeysuckle, carnation usually works, well on my skin and I've been really liking rice flowers lately, so I took a chance with this. I'm really glad I did. It is a beautiful rich, sweet scent with the lilies as the main player. As it dries the honeysuckle and rice flower begin to appear with the vanilla providing a deep grounding base to keep all the flowers in check. A little later there is a slight feel of spice which must be the carnations. It lasts and lasts, finally becoming a delicate skin musk and vanilla with just a breath of stargazer lily. Absolute perfection. It's tied with Black Lace as the most perfect vanilla scent ever! I have another imp on the way already and I'll be searching for a bottle.

My husband ordered this one but as he's out of the country on business I thought I'd better test it. I always skin test without looking at the notes list first and my initial impression was of cloves, cloves and more cloves with a hint of something sweeter in the background. After a few minutes there is a nutmeg or allspice note coming through too. It's nice and will smell great on himself. Then I looked at the notes... and looked again. Dust, tumbleweed, cedar??? Huh? I checked the imp to make sure I'd picked the right one, then I looked at the notes of the other Velvet blends thinking that there might have been a mix up in decanting but none of the others had clove either. Finally I came here and looked at the other reviews. Thankfully I'm not the only one smelling cloves and spices. On full dry down this smells of sweet tobacco and cloves, I've never smelled clove cigarettes but I'm sure they smell like this. If I really huff I get a tiny bit of cedar but nothing that I'd identify as dust or tumbleweed. It's lovely and pretty unisex and I can't wait to smell it on my husband. He was loving the clove in Red Rose so I think he'll enjoy Velvet Bandito.

This reminds me very strongly of No 93 Engine with roses. Must be the beeswax and frankincense giving that impression. I'm not getting any sandalwood, which is unusual, as I generally amp it strongly and no tobacco either, sadly. I'm not at all sure what cocoa leaves smell like but there is a richness to the scent that possibly hints at chocolate. I also have no idea how the other flowers smell but if this is anything to go by, they smell like roses. Lots and lots of roses. I'm a huge rose fan and No 93 Engine rates high in my top 10 so this is heaven to me.

In the imp it is rather herbal and slightly medicinal with that bay rum tang. On, the bay rum and spices really come out . Someone mentioned Valentine of Rome earlier in the thread and I can see the comparison. This is less clove and more bay rum. Thankfully I'm not getting much vanilla, it just rounds out the background and gives a feeling of completeness to the scent. I love it on me, I've been snuffling my wrist like a crazy woman and can hardly wait until Friday to try it on my husband. Wishing I'd gone for a bottle and not just a decant.

This is beautiful. I was making apple butter, plum jam and hedgerow jelly yesterday and this smells just like my kitchen. It's spicy and fruity with a hint of smoke and that wonderful dead leaf smell that is in the L'Autunno room spray. Possibly the most perfect Autumn scent ever.