astridclaire

Hope is a pretty sugared rose but it's just not special enough for me to wear. There are so many other BPAL rose blends that I adore that I can't justify keeping this one around.

The most delicious, fresh, ripe balckberry smeared with lavender and honey. This is sweet without being cloying and has an almost vanilla-ish base. This will be perfect for summer and I'm glad the florals in this aren't overwhelming. This blend reminds me of warm sun, gingham and calico cloth made into aprons, and making jam or pies. Definitely a keeper!

This was the one Lupercalia I was most looking forward to. The description sounded right up my alley-- honey and sandalwood and such-- but when I put it on my skin it just vanished! Oh well, I've had good luck with the other Lupercalias though!

I don't get any lemon from this at all. Just lovely, delicious, dark and sexy ginger. It's sweet without being overwhelmingly so and not too foody either. It's sexy, sexy ginger and I love it!

Oh! How yummy! Not too much orange or too much cinnamon or too much anything! This is very well blended and smooth- and upon drydown the cardamom is fantastic. I wish I had bought at least 2 more bottles of this stuff! Warm, spicy, sensual, golden, sweet goodness!

Very herbal and brown-green at first, but then it turns into more of an after-the-rain kind of scent. It makes me imagine sitting under a tree after a good spring rain while drinking a cup of chamomile tea. This scent isn't something I'd usually go for, but it's very refreshing and earthy with just enough benzoin to give it a bit of resinous sweetness. It's growing on me!

Wet, this is very juicy and sweet... almost berry-ish. Dry: I love the champaca in this and it reminds me of Khajuraho quite a bit. Khaj however has a thick layer of honey sweetness while Vasakasajja is lighter and has more of a floral thing going on. The vanilla isn't as strong as I'd like it to be and I think I prefer Khajuraho for my champaca fix.

On Wet: Whoa. This is screaming high-pitched florals. There must be jasmine in this because only jasmine can do such horrible things on my skin. I'll give it a few minutes to dry out and find the cream and musk... 5 minutes later: Soapy, soapy, soapy jasmine gone bat-shit. 10 minutes later: I can almost barely maybe detect the cream I was so looking forward to but it's overpowered by the soapy florals. I have to go wash this off... it's giving me a headache.

Yep, this starts out really, really soapy- but light. I have to huff it to get the soapy smell. But once it dries down this beautiful honeyed wood incense wafts up from my skin. It's familiar in a way I can't place. It has a comforting ancient quality like antique linens stored in a beautiful old wooden chest. Add a layer of honey, sunshine, and the smoothest, lightest incense and you've got something like Svadhinaopatika. There's also a citrus quality to this blend. Am I confusing you yet? That's because this blend is confusing me as well, but in a good way. Also, this blend is very light with little to no throw on me but it's growing on me. I want my entire house to smell like this! Happy, serene, ancient, sweet, grounded, and mystical!

Golden vanilla and gilded musk, stargazer lily, white sandalwood, grey amber, elemi, orris root, ambergris and sea moss. In the Imp: I get the lily and the musk and the orris but that's about it. On Wet: The vanilla comes out to play with the sandalwood and the amber but I have to put my wrist directly under my nose in order to smell it. This stage lasts all of 60 seconds before... It vanishes. Completely. I've never had a BPAL oil do a vanishing act on me so quickly and suddenly.

Ok, so I have a dream rose blend that contains rose, amber, and sandalwood. Rakshasa is the closest Lab blend that I could find to this dream... In the Imp: Pretty much all patchouli. Wet: The rose is starting to fight with the patchouli but doesn't look like it's going to win Dry (20 minutes later): Wow, what a morph! Now the patchouli is almost non-existent and the sandalwood is at the forefront with the perfect amount of rose layered over it. This is a beautiful blend featuring a dominant sandalwood note. I love it!

I'll have to second Destroying Angel. Pure dirt.

First of all, I just have to say that the clove in this is amazing!!! This scent is absolutely perfect on the boy-- spicy, smokey, mysetious, warm, dark, and intoxicating with some enchanting sweetness lingering in the background. Yep, this does smells cologne-ish, but in a GOOD way... mixed with the very best clove smoke. It's distinguished and a little naughty at the same time. Must.........Go........Smell.........Boyfriend.......

Holy Mother of Juniper and Pine! This one is waaaaaaaayyyyyy too strong on me. Really overpowering, and I can't help but think of Pine-Sol. Off to swaps.

This is much, much lighter than I expected and dissapears on my skin pretty quickly. Before it vanishes though I get a mixture of sandalwood, ginger, vanilla, peanut butter, and hazelnut It smells divine in the imp though!

'06 Version I too got a plastic note with this one. Plastic with candied fruit. Not my style so I swapped it for hopefully something more suited to my skin chemistry.

~THE 2004 VERSION~ I happened upon a decant of this right before we found out it wouldn't be released with the Yules this year. My intention was to try it and see if I liked it enough to buy a bottle when it came out this winter. But now that it's not available this year, I *almost* wish I didn't get the decant because then I wouldn't know what I was missing! It is so f-ing beautiful!!! It makes me want to cry that I can't buy a bottle or two or three! Rose Red captures that just-cut, rich, sweet, intoxicating smell of these almost black red roses my mother grows in her front yard but intensified 10-fold. This oil has amazing staying power and throw and just makes me feel so safe and girly and innocent. Why oh why didn't Beth re-release Rose Red this year?!?!

I have a few that I am compelled to add to your "to try" list: 1. XIUHTECUHTLI: Copal, plumeria and sweet orange and the smoke of South American incense and crushed jungle blooms. This one is amazing. Not too sweet, not overly knock-you-out orange, not too floral... and the copal and incense notes are gorgeous. This one is rich and complex and juicy. It's on my top 5 BPAL list. 2. CALLIOPE: lavender and bright mint with bergamot, verbena, thyme and a touch of sweet orange and warm almond. This one is like homemade lemonade with springs of lavender and bergamont sprinkled on top. It's really more of a spring/summer scent, but I use it to keep me awake and clear headed on those all-nighters I pull for my schoolwork. It's really beautiful and sparkling... clean and bright. I hope that helps!

Imp: It smells like very ripe pears dipped in sugar with a few lilac blooms sprinkled on top. Wet: The pears turn into berries and the gardenia comes out to play... and oh, there's the roses... the sweetness is hiding behind the florals... Dry: The sweetness comes back out and I can smell the smoky opium mingling with the florals. I'm very surprised that the florals aren't overwhelmingly heady-- they're really behaving quite nicely-- but this blend is mostly a floral on me for sure. Overall: This is very feminine and aristocratic, definitely suits a Countess. I like it, but I'm not sure if I would wear it much. I'll keep the imp around for a while and see what happens.

Oh champaca, how I love thee! I couldn't resist getting this one. Champaca, tonka, AND sandalwood? Yum. This is a gorgeous blend, but much lighter and drier than I had imagined. It's a lot like Khajuraho but not nearly as sweet. Speaking in wine terms, Khajuraho is like a thick, wet, sweet port while Dr. John Seward is like a dry, light, smoky white wine. After it dries down and sits for a few hours, the champaca fades quite a bit and becomes a very dry sandalwood/ginger/pepper smoke. The color I get from it is a very dusty lavender when wet, and a beautiful cashmere gray when dry.

I was a little worried about the "thuggish musk" because BPAL musks almost always go horribly rancid on my skin, but I decided to try it anyway because of all the other lovely sounding notes. And thankfully, the musk in Devil's Night '06 behaves itself quite nicely! This is so beautiful... smokey and sweet with just a touch of booze and (behaving) musk... a sugared campfire!!! I'm pretty sure I'm smelling some patchouli in there as well. Also, it doesn't change too much from wet to dry down. Some of the sweetness fades and the smokeyness comes out to play a bit more. This is damn sexy and warm and perfect for doing no good in the middle of the night.

... This is a Mexican paean to La Huesuda: dry, crackling leaves, the incense smoke of altars honoring Death and the Dead, funeral bouquets, the candies, chocolates, foods and tobacco of the ofrenda, amaranth, sweet cactus blossom and desert cereus. The description of this sounded so lovely, but all I get from this blend is evil florals from DOOM!!! I'm guessing there is jasmine in this blend, because every BPAL blend with jasmine in it goes completely headache-floral ape shit on my skin. Oh well, off to swaps.

On wet: This definitely smells like cocoa powder but it's rounded out by the dragon's blood which is sweet and almost cherry like. Dry down: Wow. This really dries down into an interesting mix! This is the first BPAL wine note to actually smell like wine on me and I love it. The cocoa has taken a back seat but it's still there and I get just a hint of the rum and blood. I'm pleasantly surprised by the throw this has too. I put a dab between my cleavage and a dap or two on my wrists and I have this lovely cloud of wine/cocoa/rum warmth around me. This is strange for me because dragon's blood usually has no throw at all on me. And the funniest thing? I made my boyfriend take a sniff and he said, "Mmmmm... smells like warm whiskey!" Considering that whiskey is his liquor of choice, I'll probably be wearing this to bed with a silk nightie on from time to time

Severin is pretty much black tea on me because the leather notes never develop on my skin. I'd like to second White Rabbit for a beautiful black tea note with milk and just a touch of honey. Embalming Fluid is very nice for green tea but it is heavy on the lemon.

PINE, PINE, PINE and nothing but PINE!!! (which is too bad because I was enchanted by the thought of the other components-- almond milk , sasparilla, and tobacco? yummmmmm....)