nome

I may be too immature to wear this... it's a lovely, lovely scent, but so strong an commanding I keep coming back to sniff and then turning away very quickly. Definitely pepper in this -- quite obvious in the bottle and on first application. It's so warm and musky, though, the pepper verges on reminding me more of cinnamon without the vanilla-and-cream associations. There's some sort of very mature, sexy floral in here as well. It's strong, it's dominant, and it will take you down before you can take it (innuendo intended). On the drydown, the pepper really blooms. It stays very interesting, but I don't think it's for me. I'd recommend it for someone else.

At first, I get hit with the strong, sweet, green fruit/floral smell of fig which my skin adores. Underneath it I think there's a hint of coconut. After only a minute, though, honey (dripping, sweet, fresh honey, not sugared or ambery) comes through. Sandalwood gives this a bit of dryness, so it's not as eye-wateringly sweet as it sounds. Amazing smell. This sticks around for most of an hour before tapering into a straight fig. I do think I amp it, so it probably just needs something else I amp harder to mesh with (Strangler Fig did that beautifully, with the woody/green notes to balance the sweetness) over time. A bit of coconut creeps up around the edges, and the dry sandalwood seems totally gone. Not sure what happened here, but it faded by hour four, so it wasn't a keeper for me.

I'm one of those odd people for whom this smells horrific right out of the bottle. I bit the bullet, though, and tried it... to get this strong reminder of anise. And a touch of bathroom cleaner. Really medicinal, slightly like a modern version of smelling salts. Luckily, it went straight to powder after the first half hour.

I know my skin loves vanilla and cinnamon, but this is kind of ridiculous -- wet, this smelled strongly of spice, a la Snake Oil, with a tiny hint of something dark and floral. After drying, it smelled exactly like snake oil as the vanilla warmed up, no joke. My roommate confirmed it was a perfect match. Snake Oil's growing a bit on me, but I'm still not sure it's a me scent, and this has nothing to distinguish it from that, so not a bottle scent.

This was an amazing scent on my sister, who tried my imp before I did. It was soft and light and sweet and sandal-y, like berries and water and sandalwood. Unfortunately, on me, I got the cola smell a lot of other people did, like syrupy berries. During the drydown, it grew a lot more resiny, but then went pretty powdery. Sad. This would have been a bottle scent if it smelled like it did on my sister. ETA: 12 hours later I happened to get a whiff of my wrist and found the lovely scent I'd smelled on sis, if a bit more powdery and without much throw off the skin. Oh, how I wished it smelled like this all the time.

During the first phase, this was a very subdued rose that didn't scream FLOWERS to me at all, which is nice. The cinnamon seemed to have just toned down the rose, rather than going foodie. Just after an hour, this went very, very powdery on me, like an old lady's face powder brush. Only a hint of powdery rose on the edges.

An utterly feral, thoroughly rousing perfume. Red patchouli sweetened by orange blossom. In the bottle and wet, this is the strongest orange I've ever smelled without it smelling like orange-scented bathroom cleaner. A very nice, very juicy mandarin orange. Then after a few minutes, the patchouli warms up and blends this into a mix I can't pull apart -- a touch of citrus, definitely spicy, but something altogether different. Pretty good throw and time on the skin, before drying into a very dark, sweet food smell (but everything on my skin with a sweet note ends as vanilla).

Many other reviewers have said "musky floral" regarding this, but to my nose (perhaps because I tried Strangler Fig for the first time recently?) it smells very strongly of fig. Or plum. Something purple and juicy. It doesn't have nearly the creaminess others describe, which I get in the drydown of SF. Delicious, and rather powerful, but it's a very simple, one-note scent for me. I kind of want to pair it with Shub, since I got some VM Gingerbread House on my fingers while wearing this on my wrist, and the juicy smell with the spices is amazing.

For the first two hours, this is pure rose. Teas or hybrid teas. Pure rose isn't my thing, since I wore rose perfume way too often as a little girl, and any rose oil starts off so intense it bothers my allergies a touch. Just before the two hour mark hit, though, this suddenly dropped into an even frankincense/rose mix that was actually quite soft and lovely. It's fading, though, which may mark it as another short-term floral scent.

In the bottle, this smelled so bitingly, horribly bad (like fruity kitchen cleaner spray) that I put it on right before doing chores because I wouldn't mind contaminating it and washing it off. After the first thirty seconds of biting harshness on the skin, it softened into something rather pretty. The orange was still kind of sharp, but the sandalwood beefed it up into a warm, feminine, but not fruity or floral scent. After ten minutes, it was a nice blend of orange and sandalwood with maybe a hint of mango poking through. At least one of the notes is giving me a headache, I think the fruit, but it's still something I would recommend for others who don't associate the scent with discomfort. Fades fast -- half hour in, I had to sniff my wrists directly to catch it. Much more musky at this point. I like white musk, but the weird fruity-headache-note is still tugging at the back of my eyes. Two hours after application, it was completely gone.

Strongly fig out of the bottle, then a lovely mix of fig, honey, and some sort of wood. Not earthy or grassy on me, but something woodsy and creamy without being a gourmand. Very nice on me, but I think this would be even better on a man.

I think orris hates me. This hit my skin with an acrid, lemon-floral scent that smelled exactly like bathroom cleaner. Half an hour later is smelled exactly like dial soap. First bpal I ever washed off.

I've discovered my wrists are weird, and play up the notes differently on a lot of scents. On both, this started out extremely heavy on the rose, something that gave me a mild headache. After an hour plus, the left wrist was a moody, sweet amber with enough rose it was still a little itchy to the nose, and the right wrist was a lovely rose scent with spices to give it depth. I suspect I'm allergic to something in here, though, so it's not a keep for me -- a classic, traditional rose scent, good for someone else.

First impressions: This sent is sort of... dusty. It's brilliant in that I can smell all the notes, with none of them taking totally over -- definite strong sandalwood with the nose-itching warmth of cinnamon, a touch of sweetness from amber, and the spice of patchouli. Here, the patchouli/sandal/cinnamon combination reminds me really strongly of my hometown, where we have tons of sagebrush, but then the amber comes in and binds it all together with something mild and sweet. An hour and a half in, this really starts to blend. The spices are less itchy and the whole thing is a much richer, more complex sandalwood. It's starting to get really nice at this stage. This has some serious kick in the beginning, and lasts quite a while. Six hours now and it's still very clear. I would lay bets it'll last for another four as a beckon-in scent. I feel compelled to layer this with Perversion. I think the warm, long-lasting spiciness of Sin and the foodiness of Perversion in the way the rum and almondy-vanilla play on my skin will do amazing things.

It starts off very cinnamony, but after about an hour cools out so the cinnamon is only really aggressive if I have my nose pointed directly at it. The honeysuckle and myrrh really balance it out after that point, creating a slightly almond-cream-vanilla blend that wafts as I move my hand. Very sexy. It goes muted after the first two hours, but hangs on after that for quite a bit (over 5 hours now, total), sticking close to the skin and smelling a lot like creme brulee to me. Delicious, and definitely a keeper.

Wet, this is strongly lily. A very regal, classic, upright sort of lily that is very traditional and sophisticated. Within the first hour, though, it fades out to a very soft, wispy sweet cherry with slight floral overtones -- a pretty, graceful, feminine scent. It's barely there by hour four, though, so this would have to be a reapplication scent for me.

I don't think my skin likes peach -- that's all I smelled for the first hour. Sticky, sugary, peach, like peach-flavored cake frosting. Then it turned the play-doh, the first bpal to do such. Drat.

Inspired by the tragic, ill-fated love of Queen Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester. This is our modernization of a 17th-century perfume blend favored by British aristocracy: rosemary, orange flower, grape spirit, five rose variants, lemon peel, and mint. In the bottle, this was strongly rosemary with some definite floral undertones. Wet, the grape came out while rosemary took more off a backstage role, and the roses gave it a sweeter, traditional tone. There might be a little lemon in there, but I don't get mint yet. 10 minutes in or so, mint arrives, the rosemary cools down, and the lemon and roses bloom. I really like it at this stage -- sort of a clean, soft, bright floral scent with enough citrus to cut the flowers and modernize the aroma. It reminds me of one of the old herbal essences shampoo scents, but I'm not sure which one. An hour in and it's all but gone, two hours and not even a hint of it.

I thought I'd reviewed this, but apparently I missed it! Perversion is the first bpal scent I've had that made me want to gnaw on my own arm, and sent me straight to start a 5ml bottle list. It's lovely, smoky, vanilla with a coconut-rum scent that wafts up over the top. Unfortunately, it disappears on my skin after four hours, leaving only a vaguely creamy skin scent ( ). On my sister, however, it's a power scent with tons of throw that looks like it may be one of those long-lasting glories. It's also much more smoky coconut on her and made me want to snuggle up to her hand to keep sniffing. There's enough smoke and tobacco I think I would adore this on a guy.

I'm not sure if it's my nose or my chemistry, but in the bottle this smells medicinal, and on my skin it smells just as much so. Like someone was trying to make apple-flavored cough syrup. After two hours, it faded almost completely away, leaving a tiny caramel-oak scent. It might be a hormonal thing, but I'm on the pill and shouldn't get too much interference. I'll go try it on a friend and see what happens.

On me, this isn't evil gingersnaps, it's evil gingerbread -- the dark, molasses-filled kind strong on the spice and with a touch of orange peel. It's not foody, precisely -- I'm into gourmand scents, so I might have liked a touch of sweet to warm it up -- but it lasted forever (11 hours and the tiniest wipe of it was still clear to the nose). It also has a decent amount of throw (although it's not snake oil). I kept sniffing my wrist. It's not exactly me, but it makes me feel dominant with a bit of extra swing to my step.

Wet, this was like those dark chocolate candies with the cherry syrup center. More syrup than cherry, actually. On the dry down the chocolate got more and more cocoa-powdery and the cherry smoothed out a little, but it ended up smelling just more like stale, bitter cocoa. I'm not a big chocolate eater, though I love the scent normally... this smells like the kind of chocolate I'd spit out.

This was lovely and sweet on me, almost exactly like my own scent but better. Unfortunately, it also went straight to nothing, do not pass go, barely there at an hour and a half, nothing at two.

Not a morpher, fades within a few hours. Very flowery, with enough kick from the lemon to make my eyes itch a little. Reminds me of the flowery perfumes I liked when I was very little, although it's not a little-girl scent. ETA: I thought it had faded, but I discovered around hour 7 that there was still (or again) a very distinct skin scent, like vanilla and butter and a waft of gardenia. Very nice, if lacking any sort of throw.

I agree that the Yuzu is extremely strong at first, then settles into a sweet floral with a light citrus touch by the end of the first hour. Stays true to form on me until it fades -- utterly gone when I remembered to sniff at hour four.