cinderfallen

It's a fairly balanced scent. The rose is lush and rounds out the sandalwood, with the patchouli serving as a light anchor to the blend.

Seems more suited for aromatherapy or spa uses than for perfume. A little sharp, thin scent.

It was a miasma of lily and high citrus before it calmed down to the heady opium and sandalwood, sweetened by the vanilla and brightened by the light touch of citrus and lily. I think I detect minute traces of the same vanilla used in Antique Lace. It reminds me of a very light version of Red Lantern, one I could wear. I like that the lily is a very light touch in this blend--though who knows if I'll still like this time next week when my body chemistry might turn on me regarding the death lily. ETA: I grew to absolutely adore this. I bought a bottle which is superficially very different from the imp I had. My imp was a lot of lily and opium, a little piercing at first, but dried down really nicely, with an emphasis on bold lily. <3 the opium bouquet in this. The bottle is very soft and pretty in comparison: it reminds me of orange creamsicle on first application, drying down to the familiar, but gentler opium/lily/sandalwood/touch of citrus concoction I love.

My hormones must be having an off day: a non-dreadful lily?! The scent is very much a twining of lily and cherry, white floral and flirty red fruit (cherry juice), which makes this an interesting, if slightly disconcerting test. I'm not much in love with the weighty presence of the waxy lily, which I recognize from too many disaster amapage occurences, but it would certainly strike the right person. Personally, I think it an off-putting balance.

I seem to amp the champaca, and Temple Viper ends up smelling a lot like Khajuraho. It's less sweet, but considering that Khajuraho has ingredients like dates and vanilla, that isn't to say Temple Viper is anything approaching dry and fully resinous. It's definitely restrained in comparison, though. I want to get more Snake Oil and resins out of the blend to ground the sweeter aspects, so I'm thinking of holding onto my imp. However, I wouldn't mind swapping for a bottle for my experiment, either. I do quite like both Temple Viper and Khajuraho. I can also see where people are making their Snake Charmer comparisons. It's the juicier, champaca sweet version.

Went sour. Nail polish remover....

It's a very clear, crystalline scent of fruit gums and poisonous sweet flowers; it does feel a little dark and grounded by a slight musk and what smells like the same green, tea-like patchouli leaf of Mme. Moriarty.

I get plum and coconut with the backlay of the Egyptian amber that I recognize from Pumpkin Queen. I notice that with aged Snake Charmer, the coconut fades out, and becomes more resinous than fruity. But either way, I think this is a really lovely blend, smooth and softly spiced and rounded scent. No sharpness at all.

Night-Gaunt reminds me of Love Spell, especially once the citrus burns off and the florals take over.

It's a quite juicy grapefruit-kumquat scent, ripe like Hungry Ghost Moon without the soothing aloe-ish undertone. It's tart, but not crisp--more like a refreshing pool of water you can dunk into rather than a thin, citrus-sour scent. Slight hint of flowers help bring that aspect out. Big recommend for citrus-lovers. I think it'd make a great room scent.

Three words: cinnamon rice pudding. Reminds me a bit of Bengal, but with a basmati rice grain note and cream.

I get mostly the orange floral, but it gets strangely powdery.... Not super compatible with my chemistry.

When I first got the bottle, the fruit was brash and overpowering; I felt stifled by an almost air-freshener flat sweetness. (From a swap--year old bottle.) I let Mme. Moriarty take a rest, and after a few days, the scent was pretty amazing. Still very fruity, but with an undercurrent of the patchouli leaf, almost tea-like. Very much reminds me of berry fruit tea in its wet stage, in fact. Dry, the vanilla comes to the forefront, and turns the scent from bright and wet to a cream--this is when the red musk peeks out. No incense associations at all. The imp I have is a little darker--the patchouli leaf and red musk is more prominent, and it's a sexier blend. Who knows, maybe my bottle will get there. This is the first time that I am seriously planning to get a second bottle in my 2.5 years of BPAL history. It's great that my skin chemistry changed (and stays changed--PLEASE), because when I first got Mme. Moriarty as an imp, I amped the patchouli leaf like whoa. Dry, dry, dry; only the slightest hint of sweetness, no fruit, no musk. Now I see what the hype is about. ETA: as I found out, the throw is insane. ETA2: So my first bottle of Mme. Moriarty seems to have been a sport. I think people at the Lab forgot to put in red musk? The two bottles smell completely different; the first is very fruity and tea-like and the second is heavy with a redolent musk. Since I think the first was a mistake, I think I'll be using that sparingly. I do love both.

Seems like Candy Butcher should be at the top of your list, if it isn't already. It seems like it ranges all the way from solid fudge chocolate to cotton candy, with or without a hint of sugared flowers. Personally, it smells like hot chocolate with cream or cotton candy ice cream, depending on the day; one might think the topnote is a bit flowery if your perceptions run that way, but I really think it's all about the perception of the different notes blending together.

Selkie looks like a romance novel cover. =)

I don't smell chocolate at all! If you've ever had cotton candy ice cream with the pink and blue swirls? This is exactly like that--creamy, sweet, and sugary with almost a floral overtone.

In sum: Champaca like whoa. This is a very pink scent, albeit with a sandalwood-incense tinge. Overall, I get a creamy, almost fruity, candy-sweet scent from the champaca; it's softened by the vanilla, and lightly balanced by what seems like the vestiges of smoldering incense. Flirty, pink, a little heady but grounded, too. It smells like LUSH's sweeter scents, actually, and brings to mind Dragon's Milk. The throw is outrageous. Sometimes, it's way too sweet. On my friend, who amps florals, this is shockingly green rose, almost sharp. ETA: I layered this with some Scherezade, and it really helped to tone down the sweetness and add more depth. Also works fantastically with Smut for a rounded, infinitely sniffable scent.

I was afraid that this would be pure Smarties candy on my skin--that sweet, shallow smell of red sweets, and it does smell like that on the first few seconds of application. However, it almost immediately softens into a "pink" candy musk; the sweet pea and honeycomb does a good job of pulling the candy aspects of the scent into something wearable as a perfume, and the result is something snuggly and sweetly enveloping. A good day to wear for those limitlessly blue sky spring days.

I remember reading about this in my psych class, actually. I think it was that your body is "disconnected" from your mind when you're sleeping (so that your body ISN'T actually punching/rolling/etc in life that you're doing in a dream). Sometimes, it takes a little longer for it get it together, so to speak. There are ghost stories/boogeyman elements to this phenomenon: it's not uncommon for the person to feel a pressure on her chest, unable to move, with the feeling that something is watching them. (In Korea, this is called "scissors.")

Oh, disappointment. I was so excited by the citrus and lychee, but got foiled by the flowers. It's very fruity and tart at first, but dries down to a very characteristic Bath and Bodyworks smell.... ADDED 3/5/09: I'm finally getting to review this after losing the first bottle somewhere in transit. Well, it's a burst of citrus and becomes a pleasant fruit-floral, soft, with the citrus bite, but due to all these qualities, it reminds me more of Bath and Body Works than a unique perfume, especially for BPAL. It smells exactly as if I'd tried on one of their body splashes.

I thought it was a very humdrum rose, like a lotion my grandmother uses that smells like rose. Maybe as a layering note?

This vanilla in Morocco is very similar to Antique Lace--AL with a little sandalwood and gentle spices to make an equally comforting and warm scent. Smells exactly like Burberry perfume. Exactly.

VERY faint on me; reminded me of LUSH's Demon in the dark soap: faint apple and mint.

First on, it's a strong aquatic floral that reminded me of Fragile. STRONG throw--I dabbed only a bit on one wrist and I could smell the waft when I was walking. Then dries down to generic floral perfume. Sadness.

This was pretty terrible on me, to get that out of the way. Very sharp citrus, cleaning liquid citrus, with a sticky-sour underbite--must be the amber. It dried down 5 hours later, forgotten on my wrist, to what a friend described as "expensive perfume!" Nuh-uh, no thank you. Faint citrus, but enough to remind me of the horrors of Haunted wet on me.