Little Bird

Bonfire smells like the charred, smoky bbq variety of vetiver that bpal sometimes uses. It makes me think of cedar planks, bbq sauce, woodsmoke and ash. It's intensely smoky, as expected, and is too much for me to pull off.

On me, this starts off as sticky maraschino cherry juice, powdery sweet tarts candies, and a hint of cinnamon. The drydown just smells a lot like cherry kool-aid powder on my skin. It reminds me of a less cinnamon-y Hideous Heart.

This is a weird one. I agree with the review that mentioned grapefruit soda. There's a sharp, clean, citrus, slightly soapy thing happening in this one, but it's very light on me. It also smells slightly perfumey/musky and white floral-ish in the drydown. After an hour, it just leaves a faint hint of musky-ish powder on my skin.

I was hoping that this would be like a pile of fallen leaves in autumn (similar to Falling Leaf Moon), but it's more green, cold, and aquatic smelling on my skin. It smells more like tearing green leaves off of a tree after a storm to me, and dries down a bit masculine and cologne-like on me.

This smells pretty much the same as I remember the original Graveyard Dirt smelling. It's like rich, damp, black potting soil with decaying mulch and a hint of green moss.

To be fair, I have a hard time wearing cinnamon when it's in perfume oils, as it tends to amp up and go crazy on my skin. I wasn't really expecting to like this. It basically smells like cinnamon potpourri with a weird waxy, plastic-ish undertone. Reminds me of craft stores around Christmas time when they have all the plastic wreaths and holiday spice candles out. I don't even like this type of scent as a room fragrance, and it doesn't work on me as a personal fragrance at all. It gives me a headache and makes me feel queasy. This is crazy strong on me, though, and lasted even after several attempts to scrub it off, lol.

A potent and passionately exciting love oil. Rub onto your hands before meeting a potential mate. Brings out sexual desire as well as romantic inclinations in those you encounter. Use with caution as this blend brings out amorous reactions without discretion. This was my first big bottle purchase, and I'm insanely pleased with it. I only ordered it five days ago, so I was shocked to find it in my mailbox that quickly. Anyhow. I rubbed a bit onto my hands and sniffed. At first it has a light minty undertone to it, like crushing fresh mint leaves, and it also smells a bit rosy. Mostly though, this is a very warm and pleasant musk on me. Musk and light rose. My sister-in-law walked past me after I had first put this on, and she stopped and sniffed me. She told me that my new perfume was completely amazing and that it actually gave her goosebumps. Everyone in my house seemed to be gravitating towards me and were acting a lot nicer than usual. I hope that this isn't bringing out any amorous reactions in my family members, but they do seem to be more loving towards me than is usual. I cannot wait to wear this around my boy. I do not see him again until Monday night after he works and goes to his night class... and he has already warned me that he will be too tired to 'fool around with me'... so I'm going to wear this and see if I can get him to change his mind I will update after my Monday night trial. ETA "after my Monday night trial" Second time that I wore this, I got the mint again for the first few minutes and then the drydown smelled of musk, rose, and grape juice. The boy came over Monday night, as planned, and was exhausted and completely out of it thanks to his allergies (which I am also having a bad time with myself). When he came in the door, he was complaining about how his eyes were red and watering, and he didn't even really hug me. Lame. So I remembered to put on some Blinding Glory of Love... I'm not sure if it has anything to do with the perfume or the amazing backrub that I gave him afterwards, but he became very playful, romantic, and joked around with me a lot. We had a very good night, allergy problems and all.

I was hopeful about all of the resins in this scent, but the vetiver comes in strong and smoky and ruins everything for me. This winds up smelling like a smoky bbq scent on my skin mixed with an extra bit of sharp woodsmoke. The drydown turns a little powdery. This one was really strong, but I wound up scrubbing it off after about a half hour. Too smoky and sharp smelling for me.

In the bottle, this smells strangely sharp, white, and soapy. Like a crystalline, soapy white musk. On my skin, an herbal, dry cedar immediately leaps to the front. It smells a lot like the cedar shavings used in animal bedding - dry, slightly spicy cedar - but it has a weird, funky undertone that reminds me of body odor. I also smell a hint of weird fruitiness that keeps making me think of bananas. As it dries down, that sharp, unpleasant soapiness creeps back in. I don't like this scent at all. It's sharp, unpleasantly dry, soapy, and a little BO-ish. It's really discordant and off on me. Starts off very strong, but fades quickly and has entirely disappeared after about 3 hours.

This was the Metamorphosis scent I was most excited for this year, and I think that it's beautiful <3. I wonder if this has batch variations, though, because it seems like a lot of the reviews say it's all patchouli, and my bottle is mostly vanilla. It actually reminds me of House of Matriarch's Coco Blanc, but better. It's a rich, thick, slightly buttery, almost coconutty vanilla smell to me, with an undertone of soft woods and smooth, dry, sweet patchouli. I'd buy a second bottle, but I'm too afraid of the batch variations.

This is the metamorphosis bottle that I was second most excited about, but it's pretty bad on me . I love the lab's black currant note (smells like dark, sweet, berry jam) and get along well with clove, pepper, incense and most varieties of vetiver. The only iffy notes were the honey and iris. So, of course, this is all about honey and iris on my skin. The honey is a very natural smelling honey, rather bitter and medicinal, and the iris adds a perfumey, sharp floral note underneath the honey. As it dries down, I get a little bit of a dry, dusty spiciness that's rather nondescript and not sweet at all. Nothing about this scent is really sweet on my skin, not even the honey. I don't get any fruitiness in this blend and, surprisingly, I can't pick out any vetiver either. Realistic, almost herbal-bitter honey and a little iris and dusty spice...

For the first half hour, this is a strong, realistic orange. It smells just like peeling an orange and getting the juice and bitter rind scent on your hands. Reminds me of the King Mandarin single note. After a half hour, this goes through a phase on me that's very creamy and delicately sweet (like a not-too-sweet vanilla). It reminds me of an orange creamsicle. The tobacco and hay come out to play with the orange and add a toasted, warm, slight spiciness to the whole thing. The scent starts to turn more dry and cologne-like and less creamy into this phase, like a mix or orange creamsicle and spiced orange pomander over dark tobacco and dry hay. Finally, after an hour, the fragrance has completely settled into a dry, spiced orange pomander, dark and slightly smoky tobacco (reminds me a bit of burning leaves), and dry hay scent. I like this one. The orange is pleasant and then the drydown is dark, tobacco-y, masculine, slightly spicy and autumnal. I think that this would be great on a guy. In fact, I am setting the bottle aside for my husband

Red-Spotted Purple is mainly yuzu and white musk. It's like a sharp, bitter, white grapefruit, but the white musk makes it dry and perfumey instead of juicy smelling. I think I smell a little of the cedar in the drydown, because there's a weird undertone that makes me think of sharpening pencils and the smell of fresh notebook paper. I was hoping that there would be more plum in this, but it's a very white, sharp scent.

I liked this for the first five minutes, where the tobacco is rich and sweet and I can smell hints of cinnamon and myrrh with a bit of sharp orange blossom (it actually reminded me of two of my favorites - French Tobacco single note and Priala, but that impression crashes pretty quickly). After about five minutes, it's like the whole fragrance breaks down and becomes really discordant. It smells like soapy dryer sheets, bad, sharp, intensely chemical-y musk, dead leaves, burnt coffee, and sour orange blossoms with a gritty slap of harshly smoky tobacco. It's a very sharp, scratchy, unpleasant fragrance on my skin.

I love the sweet, creamy, smooth mix of tonka and orange blossom in this (almost smells a little like fruity pebbles cereal on me at first, which I loved). The brown sandalwood amps up and drowns out the other notes for me, though, and is unfortunately very baby powdery on my skin. It quickly becomes a warm, baby powdery sandalwood with a hint of creamy orange blossom as it dries down.

This smells just like the vetiver that bpal uses that reminds me of mesquite bbq. It's like smoky, charred cedar planks with sweet bbq sauce. This is even more reminiscent of the bbq sauce part than usual, though, and is slightly less smoky. It starts off strong, but has faded away almost entirely by the 1 hour mark.

Southern Cloudywing is a warm, powdery, slightly cloying scent on me where none of the notes really stand out from the fragrance as a whole. It reminds me of Tyler Candle's 'High Maintenance' fragrance, so I keep thinking that it's more of a room scent than a perfume one. This scent is mostly sweet powder on me with a very light dusting of nondescript spiciness and slight citrus tone from the mate. Fades quickly, only lasting about a half hour on me total.

I tend to hate bpal's jasmine and lemon notes, but this isn't anywhere near as bad as I was expecting it to be. It starts off as a very tart, sour lemon that reminds me of bitter lemon pith more than juice or zest. The jasmine is yellowy and sort of creamy and soft smelling; definitely not the sour, aggressive variety that I'm used to in bpal scents. In the drydown, Phaon Crescent really does smell like the herbal scent of marigolds and a slight darkness from the tobacco, mixed with that yellowy, soft floral and a hint of lemon dish soap. It's not bad at all. Sort of creamy and clean smelling, like an expensive French hand soap.

Black Swallowtail is my least favorite of this year's moths & butterflies offerings. In the bottle and on my skin, this smells primarily of dryer sheets. It's intensely dry, sharp, high pitched, white soapiness. I can smell a hint of licorice underneath the soapiness, but it smells weird and dirty/off in this blend (like the smell of dust when you first turn on the heater in winter). The drydown is mostly the same soapiness and dust, but also something very sour that reminds me of red currant or rosehips. This is unwearable to me and makes me feel sick to my stomach.

I was hoping for more coffee, but I don't really get any coffee from my decant. On me, this is a dusty, dry, heavy spiciness that reminds me of cheap potpourri sachets. The drydown is a little smoky and earthy, which must be the tobacco that others have mentioned. Mostly, though, this is an overload of cinnamon and nutmeg spice on my skin.

I get lots of tart pomegranate and sweet plum from this, with a hint of saffron spiciness. The amber makes it a little powdery in the drydown, and it reminds me overall of sweet tarts candies.

Golden amber, bourbon vanilla, and sweet oudh. I read that there was a lot of batch variations with this scent, and I'm not sure which version my decant is from. Mine is mostly a light, powdery amber with a hint of a chemical-y edge that reminds me of bugspray (which I get from some companies' oud notes). I don't really smell any vanilla. Faint and only lasts about an hour on my skin.

The Sick Rose is too much vetiver for me, and it's the dark, smoky, harsh, ashy variety. I smell a hint of perfumey rose when this is first applied, but the drydown is all vetiver and a hint of sharpness from the opium.

My decant is mostly tuberose and beeswax with something like a salty, slightly soapy aquatic undertone. I was hoping for more of a red rose, because tuberose is always too sharp and I don't get along so well with white florals. The beeswax tries to sweeten up the sharp floral, but I don't like its waxy sweetness here. The drydown is slightly soapy on my skin. I don't really smell any of the cream of fruit notes.

I don't smell any mandarin, almond, or really any vanilla sweetness from my decant of this. The version I got is all about sharp, heady, white floral tuberose and perfumey white musk. It gives me a headache.