WillowWoman

Disclaimer: I don't like fruity smells, nor do I like florals. This was a frimp with my first order. I think they were on a sweet rampage, because my four frimps were Dana O'Shee (beautiful, surprisingly so), Aglaea (a total bust) and Tum, which my nose isn't quite sure what to do with, but definitely doesn't like. That leaves me with the final frimp, Endymion. In the bottle: Sweet, but intriguing. Not unpleasant. First couple of applications: I was putting it on to try at the end of the day, after other scents had (mostly) worn off, so these may have tainted the experience. It was vaguely pearish, in a not altogether unpleasant way, but there was something that didn't quite mesh well. So, I decided to try again. After a long hot shower, I applied to both freshly scrubbed wrists and got several impressions, one right after the other... literally in a matter of seconds. First impression: PEAR. I'd like to eat it, but not necessarily wear it. Second impression: Why, hello flowers. Why did you chase away the tolerable pear? Third impression: The flowers turned to soap, like they always do on me. Flowers are great but never ON me for some reason. I smell like dove soap... I smell like how dove soap tastes. It's unsettling and not very pleasant. I'm having childhood flashbacks of learning just why you should NEVER tell a lie. Fourth impression: Flowers are back and soap is fading, so it's not dreadful. Just not something I would wear. I can still smell the soap, the pear is GONE, and I smell like... well, like flowers. I've had much worse floral experiences, so overall it's not that bad. However, this just isn't something I would ever pick up and put on voluntarily. Off to the swaps for this one. Beth works wonders with sandalwoods, and she turned me on to sweet things with Dana O'shee, but I don't think even she can make flowers work well with my skin. Which is sad, because I really do love how flowers smell... just not ON me.

Word of warning: I am biased and do not like sweet scents at all. This was a frimp with a bottle of my glorious Dragon's Claw. In the bottle: WOW that's... sweet. And peary. I know the description says it's peach, but I'm getting pears. Strong pears. Wet: Pears pears pears! It's like overscented lotion, it's too strong, it's terrible! Drydown: This may be the wine part, but here I stunk like rotten pears. I'm all for trying to last at least an hour to get the full complexities of a scent, but this is just plain unpleasant. I washed it off and tried Dana O'shee instead, another frimp with much better results. This scent got rave reviews from a lot of people, but we'll just say it was a bust and move on. Back to the sandalwood for me.

I could barely smell this in the imp. I put it on after washing off Aglaea (which, I swear, turned to rotten pears on me) and it took a few moments to warm up. Normally oils go on too strong and then tone down, but for me it was the opposite. It's such a light scent that I wasn't sure if I put any on. The oil is thin and clear, which, in my limited experience, is a rarity. However, once I got the stuff on my skin and it started to work with my skin chemistry... sugar cookies. I swear to god, I smelled like sugar cookie dough all day. Understand, I am a solid sandalwood devotee. Normally I hate sweet, foody scents, but this one was amazing. I'll definitely be using this imp and might even go for a bottle!

The description hits all my buttons. The smell in the bottle was a strong zap to my nose. A sharp, pungent overload. If I forced myself I could identify the different notes. It smelled like sharp, sharp earth. On the skin- and this may be because I was wearing snake oil this morning- it turned to pure salt. Which was... strange. I'll add more when I try it fresh on the skin. Edited to add: Tried it on again, and sure enough... salt. It's so strange, because I adore the smell of fresh earth and I have SUCH a dried rose fetish. You should see my apartment. However, on my skin, it just goes to pure saltiness. It gives a whole new meaning to Salt of the Earth, I suppose, but on my skin, it's just a very unpleasant experience. It makes me very scared to try Death Cap. I'll edit again once I try it as a room scent. Final edit! Tried it as a room scent tonight. Oh dear lord, my room smells musty and damp and crumbly and cold and pensive and just like a plot of earth at night. It's amazing. Oh, man, so my Zombi imp has found it's right and proper place in my life. Mmm. I might have to get a 5ml of this when I make my next order, just for the room scent! Oh, this is great! I guess my skin chemistry does something super strange to one of the notes here, but I don't smell anything salty in the air. It smells like weeds, pulled out of the ground and left in a big pile, with dead roses thrown in. It really is great, exactly what I hoped it would be on my skin.

In the bottle: Very masculine. Not necessarily unappealing, though. Just strange. Application: Oooh. I would love to smell this on the boy. Drydown: It's getting less masculine, mellowing out into something quite nice. Dry: Powder. Pleasant powder. It reminds me of an old woman, somehow. For some reason, oils don't really seep out from my skin. It's almost like my skin sucks them all up. I put on three swipes of this and I can smell it vaguely as I type. Conclusion: An interesting experience, but not one I would jump up and down to repeat. I will be assaulting the boy with this scent, though, to see how it works on him.

In the bottle: How... pungent. How... unappealing. Application: Soap. Soap. Sharp soap and dear god, I think it's making my eyes burn. Is this possible? That's got to be the rosemary. I've never noticed that reaction before but it makes my head hurt and my eyes hurt and it's too strong and I must get it off! Drydown: (I stuck it out, like a good newbie) Still soapy, but much less eye-shriveling. It's interesting, strong and strange. If this were something other than perfume, I might even like it. Dry: After three hours of misery, it's settled into a lovely, near-divine scent. The rose is soft and mixed with something that might be the orange blossom. The rosemary is nowhere to be found. I would almost say that I can't stop smelling my wrists, but the catch is... I can only smell it if my nose is crammed against my skin! The scent finally settles into something that smells amazingly good, but it's barely there! I would have to swim in this stuff to get a lasting scent that would waft even an inch above my skin, and after the misery I went through while it figured out what it was doing, there's no way I'm doing that. In summary: Catherine started out as a b*tch, and ended up as a tease. I wore my first BPAL scent yesterday, the glorious Dragon's Claw, and I put it back on tonight after a hard day. I think I'll be sticking with the sandalwoods and try rosy scents some other time. As long as rosemary is in no way involved.

My first BPAL review ever! In the imp: Wow. SWEET. Very sweet, very strong. I don't smell any sandalwood, just... a very strange sweetness to my untrained nose. Application: Sharper than I thought it would be. Good, but still STRONG STRONG STRONG. Drydown: It has no idea what it wants to do. I get flowers. I get powder. I get flowers. I get a headache. Dry: So worth the headache that I got while it was figuring out what to do with my skin. The sandalwood comes out, and oh, is it glorious. I smell so delicious that I can't stop sniffing my wrists and it's such a dry, warm scent. Vaguely sexy and not overpowering at all. Very womanly on me. Warm and real and earthy and I think I want to smell like this for the rest of forever, amen.

I'd recommend Cthulhu for Cold Water, and Wilde and Saint-Germain for Axe. BPAL is pretty different from Axe though, so it still might seem weird to him at first...pick out some imps that sound good to you and encourage him to try them, even if it means branching out a bit from his usual tastes. Some of my other favorite "masculine" scents are Whitechapel, Golden Priapus, Lear and Dee. Thanks for the advice. I'll definitely check those out when I get my next check!

The boyfriend loves Cold Water. Anything similar in the GC? He's an Axe body spray man, and I'm eagerly awaiting my first ever imps. I want to see if there is anything I can get for him.