Little Bird

My favorites don't seem to be the typical favorites, lol. The Hamptons is probably my absolute number one favorite from Wanderlust, followed closely by Kostnice. The Hamptons is just such a refreshing, sweet lime and cranberry scent on me. Very edible and great for summer. Kostnice was one of my first BPAL loves, and it remains a favorite <3 I also really enjoy Bayou, Florence, Glasgow, Versailles, and Whitechapel. Bayou just amazes me because it manages to be both swampy and a lovely floral perfume at the same time. Florence is a golden, spiced berry scent. Glasgow is just as beautiful and true as the description. Versailles is a sunny-citrus rose perfume, and one of the only perfumes where the jasmine doesn't overpower everything else. And I love Whitechapel more on the boy, as it seems to go soapy on my skin lately.

I wish that I had gotten the mossy-earthy tree smell that others have gotten from the Redwood singlenote . On me, this is pencil shavings and waxy-sweet chapstick. It makes me think of the inside of my school desks when I was younger. In the drydown, this reminds me of the wooded drydown that I got from Carceri d'Invenzione. A dry, masculine, true woods smell. And, like Carceri d'Invenzione, this singlenote works out much better on my boy's skin than mine.

Calla Lily was sharply perfumey and soapy on me, and it gave me an awful headache. Thankfully, Stargazer Lily isn't that bad on me. First on, this has a slight sharpness to it, but it's a sort of green, fresh sharpness. It smells like wet flower stems. Then it quickly dries down to a soft floral on me, slightly powdery and with a sort of sticky sweetness that makes me think of pollen. After about a half hour, this has dried down to a faint, sweet floral-powder on my skin. Very pretty.

Lotus Moon is so interesting and lovely in the bottle. It has an intoxicating bubblegummy sweetness mixed with a spicy greenery that is the pine resin. It smells somewhat edible. I was in love with it. I was worried about buying a bottle of this one, because opium gives me vicious migraines (as in Stardust or Opium Poppy) and amber can sometimes smell off on me, but I adore lotus and pine notes. So, of course, on my skin this is allll opium. The opium completely devours the beautiful lotus and pine . Opium smells like the cheapest and most horrible hairspray from the 80's, so sharp and metallic that it makes me feel like I'm getting a nosebleed. I waited it out for over an hour, but this may as well be evil opium singlenote on my skin. I have such a bad migraine now, even after washing it off, and I feel heartbroken. For almost a year now I've been eagerly awaiting Lotus Moon, because it's one of the only florals that I love. It was my most highly anticipated and longed for lunar blend on the preview. And it smells so good in the bottle, but so horrible on me, thanks to the addition of opium. This is so crushingly disappointing

Carceri d'Invenzione was the first bottle that I snagged from The Salon, because I absolutely love frankincense & black pepper and have a deep fondness for red sandalwood. In the bottle this is sweet, spicy, warm, and exotic. First on my skin, this is mostly sultry red sandalwood (a warm, spicy woods on me that sort of reminds me of cassia) and a musky tobacco, with a hint of black pepper dancing around in the background. Over time, more of the redwood comes out and it takes on a true woods smell as the spice and sweet sandalwood fade. The spice is still there, but it's a peppery spice, not a sweet one. I'm not really getting any of the frankincense. This isn't as resinous as I was hoping for, more of a woods and tobacco scent, but I still like it. I'd probably like this one even more on my boy.

I was intrigued by The Isle of the Dead because of the black rose, and the mixture of notes just sounded so unique. In the bottle, this smells dark, slightly sharp, and kind of menacing. I can definitely pick out the juniper. On me... the juniper is very much present. Sort of herbal and with an unattractive spearmint sort of undertone to it. After a few minutes, the benzoin also comes out and takes on a warm amber-like quality. Dry, dusty, and powdery. It makes my throat feel dry and unhappy just from smelling it. And that's how this one stays on me. It clings pretty close to the skin, but I still keep catching whiffs of this one as I work. I'm not liking this at all. It's too dry and strangely herbal. It's nothing like the exotic or pretty notes that I was hoping for.

You might just want to try out some of the other 'boozy' scents. The Hamptons is wonderfully fruity and refreshing, and Twenty-One is another martini scent that's fizzy, citrussy, and cool with the juniper-ish bite. They're all lovely and very different from each other, but in the same sort of category in my mind.

I love the Lotus singlenote, it's one of the few florals that I genuinely like. I'd probably even get a full bottle of this one if I could. First on it's the sweet bubblegummy note that I've come to like in so many blends. But it's a sort of watery sweetness. It dries down to that same sugar water, bubblegum, and happy brightness. Watery, sweet, pleasantly soft floral. The closest that I've come to a blend that matches the singlenote is Forbidden Fruit, which I also find to be very soft and lovely

Bess didn't strike me as being boozy or smelling of wine at all... the grape in that was very herbal, sweet, and pleasant... it reminded me a lot of grapes hanging on their vines rather than grapes turned into alcohol. The only scent that I've really tried that smelled like alcohol to me exactly was Roadhouse. And it smells interestingly like cheap beer, lol. A lot of the boozy scents don't smell boozy to me... the red wine in particular smells like very tart, heavy fruit on me. The peach wine in Aglaea just smells like lovely, sweet peaches on me. The apricot brandy in Grand Guignol smells like sweet apricots on me. The Hamptons is limeade, cranberry, and a boozy edge on me. Anyhow, most of the boozy scents don't really scream "alcohol" to me... except for Roadhouse.

Wine notes often go really 'off' on my skin. They tend to smell sort of like thick, rotten, tart fruit on me. Most often though (on other people, lol), the wines just smell thickly fruity, not really boozy. I try to stear clear of the red, dark wine notes just because they're so strong on my skin, but you should definitely try a few blends just to see how the note works with your skin chemistry .

I'd been trying so hard to track down a bit of this one after reading the description. I was hoping that it would be mostly juniper, nutmeg, and black cypress. A great foresty blend. Unfortunately, it is the opposite of what I was looking for Arkham on me is Lemon Pine Sol. Cleaning products. Lemons. Not at all foresty, it's just a very sharp citrus. The only thing that I'm really picking up is the verbena, and my skin has amped it up into floor cleanser. It dries down and fades pretty quickly. So disappointing...

Golachab is one of my favorites of the Qliphoth blends. It starts off smelling peppery with a hint of something fruity in the background. I'm not sure what sort of fruit this is here, but I'm leaning towards saying it smells like plum with the tiniest hint of orange citrus. In the drydown I don't get as much pepper (drat) but I still smell that interesting fruity note and am getting a spicy, smoky incense fragrance as well. It smells warm, light and playfully sweet. I like this one a lot

My little half-decant of Mimosa was neither great nor awful on my skin. First on, it was a bit sharp and bitter... but it quickly dried down to a light floral, slightly powdery and with a hint of fruity sweetness. But it was so light that I could barely smell it, even with my nose against my wrist where I applied it. This fades *fast* on me.

Temple of the Trickster smells of lemongrass on me, but pleasant and sweet instead of sharp as it can sometimes be on my skin. It reminds me of lemonhead candies and the drydown smells exactly like LUSH's avobath bath bomb to me. It's simple and light in an airy sort of way, but I like it

This smells like a mix of earthy, powdery vetiver and sweet oranges. Strong and has a lot of throw. It doesn't smell awful, but it's not something that I'd normally wear as a perfume. Goes very powdery on me after a while. I have been wearing Blessing of Isis and using it as a room scent since my boy came back from New York. He was gone for months and I wanted something to comfort me as we went through the process of connecting with each other again. Strangely, the one day that I actually wore this when the boy came to visit, we ended up getting tangled up in an old issue of ours... rekindled an old (I don't want to call it a problem, but for lack of a better word) problem that we had. It didn't go badly though. I got weepy again and he completely softened towards me in that way where I just felt really in tune with and protected by him. At the time I really did feel like we went back a couple years with each other in terms of our emotions. Interesting.

I'm not sure what plum wine smells like exactly, but the best plum scents that I've found are Oya and Hymn to Proserpine. Hymn to Proserpine was sweeter than Oya on me, but they are both gorgeous

The smell of Aegis is herbal lavender and sharp lemon to my nose. Very unpleasant and kind of strikes me as a bitter scent.

I'm a teenager... and I wear pretty much anything, lol. And I hope that these aren't the best years of my life My teen years have been mostly about figuring out who I am and who I want to be or emulate. I try everything that I can get my hands on and am constantly trying to pinpoint exactly what a 'me' scent is (Voodoo has turned out to be that for me so far). Alice always stands out for me as the scent that I wore to all of my college orientation functions during my senior year of highschool. No other scent felt really right. I felt like Alice was a shy kind of grownup but not really sort of scent. Playful, but subdued and cautious. Which is how I was feeling. A lot of my perfume choices are about matching my moods. I only wear Underpants and a few other favorite BPALs when I'm seeing my boy, I have a few colder scents that I wear around my male friends, and I have depressed scents and happy scents and calming scents... I kind of always viewed the teenage years as a time to figure out what you want in adulthood and what works for you and what you like... and that's kind of how my approach to perfume has been. I try anything and everything, and now I'm starting to figure out what I really and truly like. If I was putting together an imp pack for a teenager or something, I would just try to pick out a wide range of scents for them to sample from different categories. /end rambling

I had such high hopes for this one, because orchid is one of the few florals that I have had good luck with. I loved the black orchid in Phantom Queen, The Premature Burial, and Shadow Witch Orchid. Unfortunately, this is much more perfumey on me than the orchid that I've come to love. I like florals that actually smell like flowers... I don't like scents that smell like floral perfume. And this is the sort of sharp, heady floral scent that makes me think of the dozens of cliche floral perfumes that line up department store shelves every day. I digress. On me... this smells like floral. Not really like the orchid note that I've come to recognize, just that nondescript floral mishmash. Perfumey and kind of metallic floral. It smells lush and slightly fruity for a second, but then morphs into that classic perfume scent that I loathe. The drydown is slightly powdery. It's not necessarily an overpowering fragrance, but it's strong enough to give me a headache. Black Orchid was a huge disappointment for me but at least there are still plenty of yummy orchid scents in the BPAL lineup that I *can* wear.

ETA: Ordered two bottles of this recently, and figured I should edit my review, because the two bottles smell nothing alike (and I bought them at the same time and they came in the same box together :/). Most of my imps and bottles of Black Lily are very pale yellow, almost clear, and smell like a vanilla-y, dark lily with hint of green stems. Somehow dark, spring-like and a perfectly wearable floral with just enough sweetness for me. When I got my recent lab order with two new bottles of Black Lily, one of them was clear and smelled as usual, and the other one is orange and smells *completely* different (honey, soapy red rose, berries and warm spices?). The orange colored version gives me a headache.

Peace is a light, rather sweet, slightly powdery lavender. Simple.

Jinx Removing seems pretty much like pure peppermint oil to me. Sort of like Lick It, only not quite as sweet. Unfortunately, I really do not like the smell of peppermint.

After having this on my wishlist for forever and a day, I finally got a chance to try it out. First on my skin, Noir was the dark and seductive fragrance of my dreams. It was all floral incense and myrrh, smoky and dark with a hint of sweetness and spicy clove in the background. Then, after about five minutes, it morphed into an unremarkable powdery scent with a horriby sharp, bitter floral at the helm. And it stayed strongly perfumey and powdery until I washed it off after an hour. I guess that the good news is that I won't have to mourn the fact that I'll probably never get more of this one, though it started off so wonderful.

Master smells completely amazing. I originally bought an imp of it for my best (timid) male friend... and when he tried it on, I was practically swooning. So then I ended up buying a bottle for my boy. It smells amazing on both of them, and really works especially well with my boy's skin chemistry. I love his natural scent, so I love that this isn't overpowering, just adds a subtle sexiness. On him it smells like misty pine and cool eucalyptus, plus a clingy, sexy, clean musk. It starts out very foresty and then dries down to that sweet heavenly musk. Cool and light and perfect. My guy friend confirmed that this was a major confidence booster for him, mainly because he got so many compliments on it from random girls when we went out. And I can't get over how well the subtle scent works on my boyfriend. Master is the kind of masculine scent that I adore and would love to wear myself, but I am content to curl up with the boy when he wears it

Hymn to Pan smells just like sweet lavender and limeade on me.