heartbeast

Wet, I got a nasty, cloying sweetness--I wonder if that's the Dragon's Blood? Whatever it was, when it dried down it was just fine! It may have been smoothing things over, but there was nothing remotely sweet about the scent for the rest of its long life. The spice took over, and wrapped around the vetiver in a beautiful way. I've tried two vetiver fragrances recently, and though I loved the smell I found them a bit too masculine on me. The spices in Serpent's Kiss smooth over the boyish edges and make a scent that's truly unisex and stays powerful all day! I wouldn't describe it as cold-blooded but seething with passion; I would describe it as the eruption of emotional turmoil when a person who tries to "play it cool" finally falls in love or is otherwise forced into feeling something. I tried to think of an example, and it came right to me: This is the fragrance that Faith wore when she and Buffy went out clubbing together in "Bad Girls". Ultimately, though, for me it sheds all those psycho-emotional, metaphorical trappings and just hangs around as a damn fine spicy scent, that cheers me up, is great for belly dancing, and makes me want to eat red meat!

Wet: What is this?? I know this!! Sniiiifff...sniiiiffff...there's pine, but that's not it--this is a very familiar smell--it's a fruit! A greenish-smelling fruit! Is it kiwi? No...close but no...wait I've got it! Wet, this smells exactly like a fresh guava pulled right off the tree and dug into with a spoon. Dry, it's a piney herbal blend. It really clears out my sinuses, almost painfully so, and I was afraid for a little bit that I was going to have a profound allergic reaction. But that backed off, and then I smelled a tiny bit of floral in all the green. Like going through a big, lush, wet pine forest, then coming upon a clearing with a whole lot of ground-covering green plants starred with tiny white flowers. Very lovely, but mostly dominated by the pine. Not purchase-worthy for me, but use-up-the-imp-worthy for sure. Never got that guava scent back though. Pity, that was fun.

Not cinnamon for me--clovey clovey cloves! Luscious wet sort of cloves--maybe the open blossoms instead of the dried buds we're used to? Anyhow, wet it was all cloves. As it dries down, I get baby powder--only nice and comforting, with a little spice, not nasty cloying baby powder--and then a little freshly baked white cake steals in. There's a little bit of floral in there too, but it's off in the distance and impossible for me to identify. For most of the day, it's a pleasant and comforting blend of clove, baby powder and white cake, until at the very end of the day it's all blended together in a cohesive sweetness like the marischino cherry at the very bottom of a glass of cherry coke, after it's been sitting in there awhile. I like this one very much!

I would recommend Endymion... Can you tell us which ones you've tried?

Wow! This one is a serious shapeshifter! Okay, wet in the bottle and on, this was almost exactly like my first ever magical oil: Spiritual Sky's African Violet. I started using it in rituals before I was old enough to really wear perfume! Quickly, though, The Raven lightened up so that it wasn't quite so dark and rich, but maintained that deep violet note. Within a half an hour, it had lightened up so much that it reminded me of Lilac Vegetal, a very light old-fashioned men's cologne that my ex-husband used to wear. Within another half hour, it was gone...or so I thought. It was just that pause before the next movement in the symphony! When The Raven came back in, it smelled so much like Old Sybaris that I kept sniffing for the tonka bean. It was a lighter violet than the one in Old Sybaris, with a delightful smoky note--is it the sandalwood? Is it the musk? Is it the sandalwood combined with the musk?--that grounds the violet the same way the tonka bean does in OS. The Raven and Old Sybaris are fraternal twins, brother and sister. They both have dark hair and violet-blue eyes. She is curvy and voluptuous, with a generous, sensual nature and a wicked (but kind) sense of humor. He is tall and slender, and a bit of a loner. He's not depressive, just very, very serious. It's actually not that hard to make him smile, but his sister is one of the few people who can make him laugh out loud. He lives in a Victorian apartment in the Haight. Sometimes he locks himself in there for days on end, burning candles and incense and writing poetry. When that happens, Old Sybaris comes over and drags him out to Kanzamaan to get some dinner and smoke a hookah. (Although that light, smoky violet is all around me and on my wrists, if I bend down and stick my nose in my cleavage it is nothing but sweet, sweet violets. Which tells me something about what that young man is like in bed. )

Don't apologize--I feel like a big doofus because I didn't see your sub-header and I thought you were asking about all of Europe! (I still may do that cross-referencing spreadsheet eventually though...) Of the ones you have, I would think Jolly Roger, Mercury and Viola would be generally evocative of a wandering adventuresome spirit, Laudanum, Le Serpent qui Danse, O and Wanda would be generally evocative of European literary decadance, and Hymn and Water of Notre Dame would be particularly nice for looking at cathedrals.

Yes, please--before I get fired for halting work altogether to create a giant spreadsheet cross-referencing all the oils by culture, which is what my obsessive data-management brain wants to do!

After my middling experience with Hurricane, I was nervous that this would be another day of smelling like a teenage boy's deodorant. What a pleasant surprise! The first thing I got was the whiff of ozone tang when lightening is very nearby. When the scent was wet on, there was a nervous "lemon cleaning product" phase. This quickly settled into crushed lemon leaves, and an overall bright citrus scent that was exhilirating and happy-making! When a storm is approaching, especially if there's a lot of wind involved, I get a kind of joyful energy that is somehow serene and excited at the same time--it's a wonderful feeling, and this lovely scent filled me with that same sensation! As if that weren't enough, the crushed lemon leaves stepped back and allowed more of a lime scent to come forward--and suddenly it became a very slightly feminine version of the lime cologne my father used to wear. This will be what I wear when I want to feel like Daddy's girl. Next, more and more lime flower came in...it made me want some lime flower tea! However, for the first time ever, I experienced the phenomenon of the scent being completely gone by early afternoon. I don't mind so much, though--it's such a pick-me-up, it's good for mornings! I can't wait to try it when there's an actual storm coming so I can get a double-dose of that wonderful kinetic energy!

My first whiff of this reminded me of the Ananda brand China Rain oil I wore as a teen. "Oooh", I thought, "a yummy walk down memory lane!" But alas, it was not to be. The scent quickly morphed into a more natural and pleasant version of my ex-roommate's stanky "XXTREME SPORT!!!" deodorant--natural and pleasant, but still too "sport boy" for me. (Or my boy, for that matter.) However, a good 4 or 5 hours into it, I got the same indefineable lovely sweetness that Thanatopsis did...but it faded back into the Xtreme Sport smell by the end of the day. I think it can be encouraged to stay in that lovely sweet place with some judicious layering...I have a lovely single note violet cologne from Spain that might do the trick, or maybe BBW's Limelight body spray.

For some reason, I really expected the lilac to dominate this scent, and it didn't at all, in the bottle or on. The first scent I got, in the bottle and wet on, I at first couldn't place--it was totally familiar, and I kept thinking "What is this?? I know this!!" After a few seconds I realized it was rose! I felt like a big dope for not recognizing rose, but it really was different from most rose scents--it wasn't rose the flower, it was rose the herb. It took me straight back to when I was a freshfaced little Junior High School witch, studying herb lore and being socially outcast. I know the other notes were there, but they were like the support staff of a public personality--this is almost a single rose note for me, in my favorite incarnation. Rose is actually my birth flower and my lifelong favorite, but I don't tend to wear it as a fragrance because it can be so overpowering. The rose that Cancer becomes on me is perfect. This is actually how I expected The Empress to smell, after reading its reviews. Cancer and The Empress are sisters. The Empress is the elder sister who is more sophisticated and reserved; she was a business major. Cancer is the baby sister who is more laid back and bohemian; she has a Liberal Arts degree.

Hello and welcome! I would recommend Desdemona and Endymion. (They might make you feel yearny too, but in a good way!)

This wasn't quite what I expected; my personal interpretation of the card coupled with these reviews led me to anticipate a "full frontal rose" sort of scent. But this fragrance was, for me, a great deal more refined, reserved and elegant than the motherly femininity I normally associate with this card. The rose was the main event, and the lemon tea was there, with a slight vanilla spice note, as others have mentioned. But it's like a very elegant tea with a Southern lady, very reserved and not effusive like some Southern ladies can be, on the veranda overlooking her rose garden. She's got a big bouquet of freshly cut roses on the table, and she's serving you lemon tea with a vanilla spice cake that is not overly sweet, very mildly flavored like madeleines. After tea it gets a little warmer and the roses intensify, and she takes out her sandalwood fan. Then she seems a little more sexy and slightly less reserved, but she never really lets her hair down. A very lovely and complex scent. Edited to add the comparison to Cancer, which actually smells how I expected The Empress to smell, after reading the above reviews. Cancer and The Empress are sisters. The Empress is the elder sister who is more sophisticated and reserved; she was a business major. Cancer is the baby sister who is more laid back and bohemian; she has a Liberal Arts degree.

This was the worst experience I have had with a BPAL...wet it was vanilla cake, not too terrible a thing except that it was cloyingly sweet with something bitter lurking in the background--not nice bitter like campari, but nasty bitter like earwax. Sorry if that was too gross an image! After awhile this throat-burning smoky smell established itself firmly behind the too-sweet cake. I tried to go a whole day, but I wound up scrubbing it off as much as I could and gagging when I did catch a whiff! Here's the thing, though: I really slathered it on, because it was the last BPAL I tried in my first shipment, which was all light scents that needed a liberal hand. I think maybe, under very specific circumstances and applied correctly, that this scent might work for me. If I wore a white shirt with slightly poofy sleeves, my black brocade vest and my black silk twill trousers, with my hair in a loose bun on top of my head, smoked a Swisher Sweet and drank a scotch on the rocks or a snifter of cognac, and played poker with just a tiny dab of Three Jacks between my breasts, I think we might get along just fine. I don't do that sort of thing often, though, so until I have such an opportunity Three Jacks will stay nestled in the back of my box of imps.

On me, Endymion was all lily of the valley with little whispers of white rose. I'm not crazy about white musk, but two of my favorite BPALs--this and Katharina--have it and I think it just anchors them nicely without asserting itself. Sort of like onions in some dishes. As for the pear, I couldn't detect it at all at first and I was a bit disappointed....but at lunch, I went to the BeneFit store to get my eyebrows done and let the salesgirl play with my face a little. She gave me a little dusting with their new "Georgia Peach", which is a blush/brightner with a pretty peach color and a tasty peach smell. And what do you know, with that peach scent hanging around, that shy little pear finally came out to play! So if I start wearing Endymion on a regular basis, I may have to pick up some of that peachy stuff!

Add me to the legion of fans who have no idea how Oneroi smells on the drydown. I don't dream much, though; just sleep deeply and well. The only thing I have to add is that on me it smells like lavender root beer. Which, believe it or not, is a good thing...I recently received a gift of 3 kinds of incense in a wooden box--lavender, cinnamon, and Nag Champa--and I haven't had the heart to take them out and burn them because they smell absolutely heavenly together in the box, like some kind of crazy spicy exotic root beer. Oneroi is like the milder, softer, gentler version of that.

Sad to say, Queen Mab is one of the few scents that didn't work on me. I get bug spray and cherry candy. The bug spray fades after awhile, but the cherry candy stays, and it's not even a good cherry candy, it's flat and blah. Have you ever had that red cake icing that has too much artificial color in it and it gives it a bitter flavor? There's a bit of that too. I'm going to give it another chance one of these days, but for now I'm having too much fun with the scents I love.

I loooove Incantation!! I find it comforting, empowering, and relaxing. It sort of pulses throughout the day; it hangs back with a comforting smoky fireplace or bonfire sort of smell to it and then the vetiver will surge forward in such a way that makes me think "Hmmm, this is really masculine; do I want to be wearing it as a perfume?" But I love it so, it's hard to resist! At the very least I will save this for magical work. Oh, and staying power? This one hangs around on clothes for *days*! The longest lasting of any of my BPALs so far. It is as if Herne or Cernunnos or some other very strong, powerful and wild yet gentle and nurturing male deity is following me around all day. The pulse of the vetiver is when he squeezes my shoulder and whispers in my left ear "it's okay, sweetheart; I've got your back."

Snake Oil smells similar to Shalimar to me, under all the vanilla. It also layers beautifully with Shalimar (my friend at the office said "You smell GORGEOUS! Is that what you're going to name that scent, 'Gorgeous'??"

I've always said "shy-pruh", but come to think of it I'm not sure that's right.

Jezebel is one of those "stick it out" fragrances for me. Wet, it has an acrid sweetness that reminds me of nothing so much as bug spray. However, once it dries down, it becomes an uber-girly perfume that makes me feel like a cross between the Benefit "Bathina" girl and Marilyn Monroe. It begs to be a bubble bath. Shaving my legs in a tub full of Jezebel-scented bubbles, I am certain I would look exactly as glamourous and coy as the Bathina girl, not remotely awkward at all. It makes me want to parade around the house in a pale, pale pink long satin nightgown with a slit up to there and a matching peignoir and those high-heeled maribou slippers. Drinking champagne. A very odd thing about Jezebel, though: Once it really settled in, I kept thinking "Huh. This smells like baby powder, except that I like it." I loathe the smell of baby powder; at least, I have for as long as I can remember. I kept sniffing myself, trying to pinpoint what the key difference was that made this smell lush and yummy and yet somehow like baby powder. Never did figure it out, but a week or so later my sweetie and I were powdering up for a hot and chafey day at the Renaissance Faire, he with plain ol' Johnson & Johnson, me with their lavender & chamomile scented powder which I always get because, of course, I loathe baby powder. Except I caught a whiff of him and thought "yum, Jezebel!" Huh??? So, Jezebel seems to have reset my baby powder button. Weeeeeeiird...

I think this is my favorite BPAL scent thus far. A lush, wet, light (in color not weight, this is slightly heavy in weight but not at all dark) floral with a lot of emotional content, for me. I don't get innocent, virginal purity from this; I get innocent as in "not guilty", and pure not as in virginal, but as in pure, true love. This is a woman with a sexuality, but it's a romantic sexuality totally wrapped up in the one man she is in love with. This isn't Desdemona at the beginning, this is the whole play. There is a deep sorrow in this scent, but it isn't because she's been killed, or even because her beloved thinks her false--it's because her beloved is in pain. Even with this sadness, there is no darkness to the scent. The spiciness of the carnation speaks eloquently to Desdemona's adventuresome streak; that she fell in love with him for his tales of derring-do, that she was excited to go be with him when he went to war again, that he called her his "little warrior". This is a pale, young, passionate woman truly, deeply in love with a man she can no longer touch, and she aches that she cannot ease his pain.

Okay, I'm overdue for a bunch of reviews, but I'm posting this one first because it's just so...odd. On me, Snake Oil is a fairly pedestrian vanilla scent with a mild spicy element. Nice, but nothing special. After a few hours, it settles into a scent that is sort of like pie dough in its comforting blandness, yet somehow not really foody. It's enough like Shalimar that I'd probably layer a spritz of that over it to wear it out, just so I felt like I wasn't going out in my sweatpants, metaphorically speaking. I'm sorry and I don't want to insult Beth's genius, I fully believe that this scent is enchanting and exotic on others, it's just not on me, not this first time anyway. But. Then I took a nap while wearing it. I consider myself a pretty sexual person; I've had some erotic dreams in my life. But, um. Nothing like this. My sleep felt very deep, very heavy, and the dream was very vivid and very detailed. Did I mention that it was vivid? When I woke up, I was actually shocked to find that my arms were flung over my head, my hands lying innocently above my pillow. When I went to bed that night, the scent was almost completely gone on me, but I had another dream...this one wasn't so sexual, but a very romantic, very detailed and plot-heavy science fiction love story. I don't want to go into huge detail because I'm verbose and my posts run long anyway, but I may have to write it out and try to publish it. I've heard about writers doing that, but although I have some very interesting dreams, I've never had anything remotely like this experience. So, yeah. I'll be purchasing Snake Oil at some point soon.

I have the honor and great good fortune to be protraying the historical character of Penelope Rich at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire in Devore, CA this spring, and I'd like to give her a signature scent. I find that assigning a fragrance to a character I'm playing is very helpful to me as an actor, especially when it comes to interactive improvisational theatre. I'm afraid a custom blend is beyond my means right now (I'm still paying for my costume! Is there a fainting emoticon?), but I'd like some suggestions for existing scents that might be good. My plan is to order a 6-pack of imp's ears and choose from among them, and I have 2 picked out but I'd like help with the other 4. Elizabeth I was often compared to Diana, the Virgin Huntress of the Moon, and when the metaphor was extended to her court and they were also associated with dieties in the Roman pantheon, Penelope Rich was Venus. It was often said that the Baroness Rich was the closest thing in England to a Venetian Courtesan (for this reason, my first choice to sample is Old Venice). She was educated, musically adept, a renowned dancer, and astonishingly free with her love life. Her guardians arranged a marriage for her to Lord Robert Rich, a Puritan who seems to have been universally disliked but who lived up to his name. For this reason, Penelope's family thought they were doing right by her, but she did not agree: She created a scandal by loudly and articulately protesting the marriage as she was led into the church and at the very altar. Nevertheless, the marriage took place, and it turned out to be an unhappy one. Lord Rich was both physically and emotionally abusive. However, because of Penelope's considerable influence at court--her younger brother was Robert Devereaux, the Earl of Essex and the Queen's favorite--she was able to reach an agreement with her husband: She would make sure he got what he wanted from the queen, and in exchange Penelope was allowed to spend most of her time away from home at court and do exactly as she pleased. Her public reputation was that of an elegant, witty and glamorous wanton. The Elizabethan comic stereotype of the beautiful young hot-to-trot wife cleverly cuckolding her nasty old husband was largely fueled by her. As public reputations often are, it appears to have been less than accurate; Penelope took only two extramarital lovers during her lifetime. The first, in her youth, was the renowned courtier Sir Phillip Sidney, who had been her late father's choice to be her husband. Sidney wrote the poem "Astrophel and Stella" for Penelope, but there is some doubt as to whether their relationship was ever consumated, although there is no doubt that they did develop an intense romantic friendship, tinged with regret, when they were at court together. In spite of the late Earl of Essex's aborted marriage negotiations for his daughter prior to his death, the two had never met until after Penelope was married to Lord Rich. She met the man her beloved father had intended for her, and fell in love with him. It's a deep romantic tragedy; I'm astonished that no movie has ever been made about it. However, Penelope moved on and met the true love of her life: Charles Blount, Lord Mountjoy. (You can bet there were just as many puns about "Mountjoy" as there were about "Rich"!!) Penelope's brother, the Earl of Essex, provided the lovers with a sumptous bedchamber in his London house; there are lavish descriptions of the huge bed draped in black satin with curtains in cloth of silver. Penelope and her circle of friends were devoted adherents to the "Cult of Beauty". Poetry, music, art and above all, love were considered the highest ideals one could aspire to. There is evidence that her friend the Earl of Southampton was William Shakespeare's patron at court, and there is little doubt--owing to puns in the text--that the character of Rosaline in Love's Labours Lost was modeled after Penelope. Also, the characters of Beatrice (Much Ado) and Kate (and hence Katarina is my second choice to sample) are speculated to have been influenced by the outspoken and vivacious Devereaux sisters. Another interesting bit about Penelope and her younger sister Dorothy: When it seemed like Dorothy might be up for another arranged marriage similar to Penelope's, the older sister masterminded an elopement for Dorothy and her sweetheart, whose wealthy family had been balking at the under-doweried match. If Penelope had been cheated of a happy marriage, she was determined that her sister would escape that fate! Okay, that's plenty enough to go on to get an idea of the lady's character. :oops: I'm really in love with her, and when I start going on about her I can't stop. Scent suggestions requested. :roll: Many thanks, Deirdre

Yes! Either and both. Thanks for the suggestions! I'm definitely looking for more "sensual" than "sexy", but I might try Jezebel as well. I also wondered if Tears would layer well with any of the more heady scents, to give that wistful undercurrent to a basically headstrong and sensual person.