ResinManiac

HEDONISM He who allows his day to pass by without practicing generosity and enjoying life's pleasures is like a blacksmith's bellows: he breathes but does not live. - Proverb Awaken all of your senses with a bath that reawakens the passion of the soul. Patchouli, ylang ylang, grapefruit, lemon, and myrrh. The patch in this is just overwhelmingly powerful, in fact it's the only thing I really notice at first before ylang ylang follows close behind like a doddering attendant to some important royal personage. Soft in the tub, a quiet presence. For a while the scent becomes vaguely reminiscent of Ignis, damp, warm, freshly upturned earth. Then all the sudden, the swift light shock of lemon and I'm put in mind of the lemonade sold at the local summer carnival. Grapefruit remains MIA. It makes for a weird effect all put together, like the notes can't quite seem to get along. I think I would've been happier had the Lab decided to make Omen into a bath oil instead, this one just isn't working for me. But hey, if you love love love Patchouli and/or are an earth sign, I say go for it.

FRANKINCENSE & MYRRH BATH OIL O Sanctissima, O Piissima Dulcis Virgo Maria Mater amata, Intemerata Ora, Ora Pro Nobis Somalian frankincense and Ethiopian myrrh. Shea oil, olive oil, apricot kernel oil, fractionated coconut oil, rosehip seed, evening primrose oil, vitamin E, isopropyl myristate, glycereth-7-cocoate (derived from coconut), oleth 3, Boswellia carteri, Bursera graveolens, Santalum austrocaledonicum, Liquidamber orientalis, and Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab perfume blends. Just received my Frank and Myrrh the other day, and I was so happy to get it! Upon first sniff I caught the characteristic bitter murk of Myrrh and I confess I was a little worried Myrrh's depth had smothered Frank's sweetness. Until I added it to the tub that is. Immediately it blossomed into fullness, like being there at the moment the censer top is lifted (ting!) and the smoke cloud billows out at Midnight Mass. It smells *exactly* like fresh burning incense, and shows up as a comforting blanket on the skin that automatically banishes stress and worry. Stepping out of the tub I feel downright sacred and silky, and I have a friendly little wisp of smoke that follows me everywhere I go. Anyone can feel like a Goddess/God while wearing this! I'll have to apply a little of it dry and see how that goes. I Lurve this! I will definitely get more while I still can!

Reading about gnomes & seeing they are defined primarily by curiosity, tinkering and humor I immediately liked them, and coupled with the awesome notes for the scent I felt like I was BORN TO GNOME! So I tried some and as soon as I opened the bottle I got a big pepperyness like a one two punch from both the black pepper and ginger combined, with a soft barely there nutmeg. The ginger might as well be the root itself and it is spunky and assertive! I don't mind it because I like it and it really revs you up when wearing it. For that reason I don't recommend wearing it to bed, I made that mistake and couldn't sleep for a good while! I don't get any gear lubricant or smoke but I have high hopes that aging may help bring those notes to fore. I'm in love with this one and it will have pride of place in my stash,

I tired a frimp of this and I'm so glad I did! Previously I had thought of skipping it because halflings seem like such a cliche go to character, but I should've known better than to underestimate them. ( I still think elves are snobby and elitist though ) Halflings smell like good sustaining food, a comfortable, loving home and peace and happiness. It honestly made me think of childhood, it IS very comforting and snuggly. I unreservedly Love this scent and everything about it. It's good aromatherapy for the blues and what ails you. Highly Recommended... :wub2:

A wearable feminine musk, white flowers and roses, could have stronger roses but that's just my opinion.

So many things are so so right with this blend, roses, wine, leather... but those violets and myrtles make a low key sickliness that can still be dectected from time to time. I don't think I can wear this, and that makes me very sad.

I'm really pleased with how this turned out, warm, smoky and bright like tramping through red leaves in pleasant autumnal sunshine. I was worried it was going to be bitter but I bought a bottle anyway because my intuition kept telling me to and wouldn't leave me alone about it and I'm so glad I listened! Red musk is so pretty on me when it works and this is just beautiful!

Dirty vetiver and cloying ghosts of lillies, (sigh) and usually vetiver works on me too...

When I open the bottle I get a huge coffee breeze from it, which isn't great because I don't care for coffee. When I wear it the rum and wine mix about as well as oil and water and the chocolate gets hidden behind the resulting maylay. Dragon's Blood doesn't seem to help this blend at all, in fact it just lays dead upon all the other notes giving it a kind of fake plasticy feel. I want to believe that aging the bottle will improve it some and i'm willing to try even after all this, but boy do I feel dissapointed now.

Hot cereal and comforting, domestic, snuggly cinnamon. It's very cute and homey and feels like comng in by the fire in the fall. Adorable!

Leather makes its happy well anticipated appearance, clouded by all the smoke and possibly ambergris. This becomes really masculine really fast on me, with a hint of bitter medicine floating around somewhere close in the background. Some leathers and musks work well on me but this is sadly not one of them, maybe a guy could pull it off more adroitly?

Lovely blooms and fruit with a fulsome champagne flute sitting next to them, this is defintely my favoite Grace! Might have to see how it ages in a bottle though, the imp doesn't do it justice, aging in a bottle may improve it yet more still.

Pale golden musk, honeycomb, amber, parma violet, hawthorne bark, aspen leaf, forest lily, life everlasting, white moss, and a hint of wild berry. Berry lilly, lilly berry, soft and sweet but ultimately just not for me.

Wanted to like this one, but all I got is the terrible murky scent of fresh cut grass. Some folks like it, but I don't, I guess I must keep searching for the perfect RPG...

Definately licoricey and bitter, although I do have an aged bottle to sample with here. Its a masculine scent to be sure and for that reason I wont be trying it again. But maybe it ages better on someone with more testosterone in their system.

Started out ok, with the leather and rosin nicely balancing each other out, but then rosin took over and made it bitter/sour. Might be alright in small doses but any more and I'll have a headache. Other characters I foresee are better suited to my personality(and skin chemistry!!).

Warm, spicy and a little overwhelming. It kind of smothers on the skin, musty and murky. Not what I expected, not really my scent. Saffron makes everything go yuck on me anyway.

I get pure unadulterated grape champagne from this, perhaps in a little bistro in France somewhere. Classy, but soft and understated, improves with aging.

ANTHESTERIA BATH OIL Anthesteria, one of the four central feasts of Dionysus, is held for three days during the month of Anthesterion-- the time of blooming. It is a celebration of the birth of spring, expressed symbolically though the ceremonial opening of the pithoi containing the previous year’s vintage. A time of joy and drunkenness, it is both a celebration of earth’s renewal and springtime’s bright passions and a festival of the dead. During the three nights of Anthesteria, the ghosts of our ancestors roam the streets. This commemoration of death and rebirth, passion and springtime was one of the few, precious moments when all were equal in the Hellenic world; during Anthesteria, man, woman, and child, free man and slave, human and spirit were all unified under the auspices of Nature’s great cycle. Dénthis wine and Bibline grape, with honey and a touch of thyme and oregano. Shea oil, olive oil, apricot kernel oil, fractionated coconut oil, rosehip seed, evening primrose oil, vitamin E, Acai berry oil, mel, red wine, isopropyl myristate, glycereth-7-cocoate (derived from coconut), oleth 3, and Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab perfume blends. I can smell that wonderful Bpal wine note when I sniff the unopened bottle, in the tub it transforms into...suckers!! Lolipops ahoy! http://www.bpal.org/public/style_emoticons/default/icon_neutral.gif I should've expected this, it's a candy sweet brew. When I lift my hand up to my face I can catch the honey more clearly. I don't smell the herbs, although I may just not recognize them right off the bat. The wine is never able to just breathe and bloom in the water it seems, I'm also surprised that the color of the liquid is clear and not red like I was expecting. This improves a lot after you've had it on out of the tub for a while, letting it breathe in fresh air makes it more balanced. All in all, suckers were not the first thing that came to mind when I thought of a Bacchanalia. 3 out of 4 stars.

Piney and not much else gets though, just not for me, sorry.

Lilac has always been a favorite childhood flower for me, and tuberose I learned to love in soaps and shampoos so this is darn near perfect on me, violet is very subtle, just a trace bit of sourness announcing its presence. The effect is that of a moonlight sonota drifting through gossamer curtains late at night. One of the few Ars Moriendi scents that work on me.

Orris always comes off as unbearably dusty(?) and aged on me, it's bizzare, I love it in powdered form but can't stand it as an oil. Add to that the terrible sickening lily (it actually makes me l ) ghost that fills out the rest of the scent and it becomes totally unwearable. Odd that, considering ars amatoria just about always ends up being a winning category for me....

I've found what makes red musk wearable, sweetness, tons and tons of sweetness! The Dodo has banished all my red musk fears and taught me something in the process. Oh and it's nice and fruity too.

Fresh clean linens + detergent. Bath and Bodyworks comparison is their Cotton Blossom line. Honestly I fail to see what's so seductive about this, it's puzzling. :huh?:

I've always looked askance at red musk, it was always too sour of a note for me to enjoy. But now I know how to make it wearable and pleasant, sweeten it up! Honey and Caramel combine to make this scent lovely, I can't explain it but once it hits the skin it starts to bloom into the most perfect incensy exotica on me. Everything I was looking for in an itinerant caravan of wonders :wub2: 4stars.