Smaragdina

Oh, whoa, this looks interesting. My list: 1. Impressions of the Floating World 2. The Antikythera Mechanism 3. Streets of Detroit 4. Jareth 5. Père Noël

Oof. This is straight dark, filthy, animalistic oudh on me. Rub-your-face-in-the-dirt oudh. After about an hour or so it smooths out and calms down a bit, but I was hoping for more carnation; this is still too much for me.

Caveat: I'm one of those rare souls who's never liked Snake Oil because it does that weird plastic thing on my skin. This starts out promising - I can't even pick out Snake Oil under the thick wafts of creamy, poofy vanilla. If I hadn't just found the god of creamy, poofy vanilla in Cotton Phoenix, I'd be super excited. (To compare, Cotton Phoenix is a lot sweeter and floofier on me in its wet stage. There's some wax and maybe lemon here that reins it in) A half an hour later - boom. Plastic. Oh well.

This is a half-opened rose dusted with saltwater. For once, it's a rose that I don't amp to death. The downside is that my skin eats it very quickly... but while it lasts, it's lovely! Sidenote: I instantly wanted to compare it to The Waltz (which also has white rose and ambergris), but these aren't as close cousins as I thought. The vanilla amber and musk in The Waltz round it out and makes it a lot fuller and... not more feminine, but girlier. I have a hard time picking out individual notes in The Waltz. Trois is simply a dressed-down rose single note that the ambergris roughs up a little.

Nope. If I spend some time huffing and considering, I can pick out dusty hay and a few dusty threads of worn leather. But the top note on me is just musty cardboard. Not for me. EDIT: Alright - after an hour or more the cardboard is gone and this is a very pretty, sweet, dusty leather/musk. But the cardboard phase isn't worth it.

Am I smelling... anise? Seriously - the top wet note reads as anise on me. It mellows into smelling like a densely-packed box of unsweetened earl grey tea leaves. The tea is dense and maybe a little musty, but the bergamot props it up. I can't really smell much lavender, but I know I'm mentally comparing it to my stash of lavender earl grey tea that's very lavender-heavy, so take that with a grain of salt. And every once in a while, there's these wispy wafts of... am I really smelling anise? Huh. Lucky for me, I love anise. I've been searching for a good black tea scent. This might be a keeper!

CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CASSIA CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE CLOVE I sneezed.

This perfume is absolutely hysterical It smells like every generic perfume you've ever smelled. It smells like the perfume department at Sephora where you can buy concealer in fifty different shades of beige. It smells like the hair of a fifty's housewife. It smells like a fifty's housewife with lipstick stains on her collar because she's having an affair with Susie who lives next door. Susie wears pearl earrings and lipstick with a name like Immoral Coral and this perfume sits on her vanity counter in a disconcertingly rectangular bottle. It smells like Channel No. 5 and I need to stress that I have never smelled Channel No. 5, but it smells like the idea of it as seen in a Cosmopolitan issue. It smells like the little paper snips of sample perfumes that have been in your purse for the last month. It smells like those free samples if they were softer, and fuller, and weren't sodden with alcohol. It smells like pale pink and white roses and amber and more free samples. So many free samples. It smells like the light in that creepy Folger's commercial. It smells like the sales pitch of a diamond-jewerly saleswoman in a pencil skirt and a sensible satiny blouse when you know the price of diamonds is artificially inflated. It smells like a white convertible and a pair of Jackie O. sunglasses and a french manicure and a white-and-black polka-dot dress with a sweetheart neckline and Immoral Coral lipstick. It smells like a newscaster with Marilyn Monroe hair smiling at you on a jittery analog tv screen, which is exactly what it is supposed to smell like, and I am almost crying with laughter because they got this exactly right.

The Waltz – Not a complicated dance, really – The lady takes her place slightly to the left of the leading gentleman. Six basic steps – that is all. However – It is said that the true test of a perfect waltz is for it to be so swift, delicate and so smooth, that a candle flame will not be extinguished in the hand of the lead dancer… Now that requires the perfect partner. So swift, so delicate, so smooth: champagne musk, ambergris accord, white rose, rosewood, and vanilla amber. Fresh out of the mailbox, so here goes. In the bottle: more than any other bpal I've tried, this smells like (a very nice) perfume. I can't pick any notes out. Wet: Sweet, delicate champagne. Maybe some of the vanilla or white rose peeking around the edges. I amp rose like crazy, so I hope it behaves. Drydown: so swift, so delicate, so smooth indeed - this smells like perfume and at first sniff I can no longer pick distinct notes out, it's so well-blended. The white rose is there, swirling with sweet amber and champagne, maybe flash of ambergris around the edges to keep it interesting. This is feminine and classic and lovely.

Not sure how masculine you'd be willing to go, but have you tried Jareth? That was mainly white musk, sweet tonka, and leather on me. There's also Knight in Shiny Armor (which doesn't read as particularly masculine on me), which is lavender-heavy, though it may be too herbal for you with the oakmoss and sage. Seconding the recommendation for Jareth. It reads as Dorian + leather to me, and the scent is "white" enough that it doesn't lean too far masculine.

Tea and Music is missing the "music" note (music note? Huh? Get it? I'm so clever). This is a single note sweet tea on me. Which is a bummer, because tea + leather sounded like everything I ever wanted (I was thiiiiiiiiiiis close to blind-bottling this one and am glad I didn't). It's pretty, but I apparently amp bpal's tea note; The Dormouse, which I have a bottle of, is almost identical on me and The Dormouse has the added advantage of smelling like tea in a peony garden instead of just, you know. Tea. Tea and Music is also gone in about thirty minutes. I mean, I like tea. I just like other things with my tea, you know?

Uh oh. On me, the "thread" of jasmine is a bald-faced lie. I think I've just been socked in the face by a boquet of dripping, cloying jasmine flowers. It's literally the only thing I can smell and boy howdy, can I smell it. I had to wash this off my wrist after five minutes, no joke. The drydown may prove wonderful, but the wet stage "cause of death: drowned in jasmine" isn't worth it to me! ...Granted, I amp jasmine and was worried it was gonna do this. But I had to try it for the name.

To the hills we raise our eyes… A dark legacy: unbending teakwood and blood musk. I'm first? Yeek! Bear in mind this is fresh out of the mailbox In the bottle: This is SHARP (Sharpe, anyone? No?). On first sniff, I get very biting woods. On second sniff, there's the softer musk wafting around the edges. Wet: I'm being smacked in the face by a metal-sheathed piece of wood (it must be the blood musk that's giving me the 'metal' impression). There's something almost SOUR going on here. I don't mean that in a negative way, I mean "sour" in the sense that sour candies are sour, but it's... where is that coming from? What the hell did I just put on my wrist? Drydown: Whoa, this morphs quick, and in a good way. The punch-you-in-the-face metal/wood vanishes and I'm left with a very smooth, dusty musk scent. Almost sweet. It reminds me very strongly of some Lush scent. I'm still getting flashes of that cold sour-y bite, especially in the throw. I don't smell wood. In fact I keep huffing my wrist trying to figure out WHAT I'm smelling. Dry: It keeps morphing! The sour-candy note is nicely married to the sweet musk now. Good throw: I'm testing four Crimson Peak scents on my wrists and hands right now, and this is the one I keep getting whiffs of as I type. It's gonna take me a while to decide how MUCH I like this, but it's nice!!

So I need to preface this by saying that I ordered ten decants from this year's lupers. Nine of them I applied, sniffed, went "eh," and didn't give a second thought. This? Insta-bottle. Insta-TWO-bottles. ...Do you know how many other bpal scents I have backup bottles of? Two. That's it. (Streets of Detroit and the Antikythera Mechanism, but I DIGRESS). I don't hoard. Now I'm wondering if I should have bought three bottles of this. I am terrible at picking out individual notes, so you're just gonna get my impressions. Tl;dr, VioletChaos' review of "putting vanilla in a steamer and then steaming your delicate underwear" is EXACTLY RIGHT. This literally smells like STEAM - I have no other way to describe it! The scent is very "high" (is the benzoin giving me that back-of-the-nose impression?) and slightly fluttery-damp in a very good way. It's steam, and vanilla-steeped silk. It smells like a wood drawer of fresh-washed expensive silk lingerie. Completely innocent and lovely except that it's a drawer of unmentionables. It is stunning. It has good throw and lasts absolutely forever on me - I can put it on in the morning and still smell it at midnight. It's not really a morpher; by the end of the day it's a little sweeter (the silk lingerie has a light dusting of vanilla-tinted powdered sugar) but that's all. This manages to be all at once innocent, feminine, unobtrusive and work-appropriate, and DROP DEAD SEXY AS HELL. I AM IN LOVE

This is extremely potent chilly, crisp cucumber on me. No green tea in sight, alas. I second the reviews that say this smells like fancy Bath and Body Works / spa soap. I won't be upgrading to a bottle as it's basically a vaguely-minted cucumber SN on my skin, but it's nice. It has very little staying power on me (which I expected) and very good throw (which I didn't).

Wet and in the bottle, I'm definitely getting the "pink" quality of the ice. The rose is light and dewy, and every now and again I swear I get... strawberries???? As it dries on me, the pink-ness fades almost immediately and I'm left with what's pretty much an ice single note. My other experience with BPAL's ice/snow note is Go To Sleep, Darlings - this is softer, gentler, less-ozone-y and a little less sweet than that, which I'm putting down to the amber. Still, it's close enough to Go To Sleep, Darlings that I'm a bit disappointed. I wish the wet phase stuck around. Lovely, but off to the sales you go! When I... actually sell things...

Wow. I've never really understood what people meant when they said a scent turned "soapy" on them before now. This is aggressive, screeching soap on me and nothing but. Nope!!!

Fresh out of the mailbox! I amp rose, so I was leery about this one, but my search for a rose scent that's not ROSEROSEROSEROSEROSE on my demanded I try. In the bottle: creamy rose Wet: Rose. Definitely more of a white or pink rose than a red one. There's some grounding something in the background that must be the wood. Drydown: Rose. This is extremely delicate and faint. I'm going to have to try slathering to see if I can pick up anything beyond the rose, since right now it has a low enough throw that any background notes are escaping me. If I wanted a rose scent that wasn't PUNCHYOUINTHEFACEROSES!!!!!11!!! I succeeded, I think, but it's so fragile... Dry: Oh, there's the vanilla! Yay! In fact the rose actually moves to the background and I get mostly understated, creamy vanilla. Huh. Gonna have to test this a few more times.

This is fresh out of the mailbox, so I'll probably update this later In the bottle: I... I need a moment. This got a very big YES from me. Wet: Ooh, this is lovely. Very simple, and I wish it had more throw, but it's fantastic. Definitely a warm, sweet fougere. Like Dorian without the sugary tea. Drydown: So far it's not morphing, which I wouldn't expect it to. The throw's very low so I'm definitely gonna have to slather this. Please insert jokes about slathering yourself with Tom Hiddleston here.

This is A M A Z I N G. As in, I keep thinking I'll wear a different scent for today, but then I open up my BPAL cabinet and Streets of Detroit is in my hand and I'm not sure how it got there. On me, it's almost a Black Musk SN - it does that velvet dark lemon thing that Black Temple Burlesque Troupe does, but the motor oil gives it this sharp, slick bite. The motor oil is undeniably motor oil. If I didn't know that's what it was, I wouldn't be able to label it, because "motor oil" is brash and eye-watering and in-your-face and doesn't sound perfume-y at all; but that's what this is, and it adds just enough bite to give the black musk SN some teeth. Wet, this is slick and sleek and just a tiny bit gritty (not the scent, but the feel of the scent - I'm seeing a woman striding through a back alley, heedless of the trash blowing around her fabulous boots). But it's simple enough for day wear. Or night wear. Heck, I've worn this in the office (see below), and then I've slathered some more on to go out for drinks. Dry, on me, this turns soapy in the best way possible. This isn't baby powder soapy. You know when you go to the hairdresser's and they shampoo your hair with all their fancy stuff, and when you next wash your hair it's silky-soft and just lets of this wonderful luxurious clean cloud of scent? That's what Streets of Detroit smells like on me after a few hours. The most rich, pampered, I-want-to-bathe-in-this-forever soap scent ever. I should order another bottle. I should order another ten bottles.

In the bottle and wet this is almost straight leather, but after a few minutes... This is what I wanted Whip to smell like on me - sugared leathery roses! I'm sure the musks are there, but they just add depth; all I'm getting is sugar-glazed leather (warm, smooth, black leather) and deep burgundy-red rose in equal measure. It's very well-balanced and VERY sexy. There is no way in hell I could wear this during the day. Rose can amp to nauseating high hell on me, so I'm so glad this worked!

I was nervous about this - I like black licorice in small doses, but it doesn't take much before it becomes overpowering. I'm happy to say that this black licorice is nice on me! In the imp, it's buttery anise-y sugar. On my skin the black licorice comes to the fore, but it's very sweet (though it doesn't read as terribly edible to my nose; maybe this is because I don't like black licorice candy at all). It's undeniably warm, but the licorice makes it cool and slinky at the same time. After a couple hours the licorice dies down and merely adds a weird, intriguing depth to the dusty sugar/leather thing that's going on. All in all, what I'm getting is mostly the warm sweet gaufrette, with the licorice and leather swapping places as the secondary note as it dries and the dust adding a sort of grainy-ness along the fringes. This is sweet without being candylike. It's foody but it doesn't read edible at all, if that makes sense; it's more mature than that. There's a tiny bit of menace to it. It's really unusual. I'm so happy I bought a bottle. I think I'm in love.

I'm not going to be good at putting this into words, but I'll try. This starts out as pure, leafy, rose on me - I say 'leafy' because it has DEPTH, it's a dozen roses rather than a single flower. It's not cloying or overpowering at all, which is what I was worried about - I like rose but it doesn't seem to like back, and Harvest Moon seems to be the exceptoin. The leaf note comes out as it dries. I've never smelled BPAL's red leaf note before; my brain interprets this as dusty and clean at the same time. It's really gorgeous. I get an impression of golden autumn sunshine in the garden. It's a stunning daytime/work scent. have been wearing this NON STOP.

In the bottle, this is a blast of syrupy slap-in-the-face cherry-almond. Which just proves how important it is to skin test stuff. This dries to a sweet, deep, leather-wrapped wood scent on me. I suppose it's a combination of the almond and oak leaf that's giving me such a strong 'wood' impression. But that's what I'm getting: grainy, soft, lovely almond-y bark wrapped in luscious well-worn leather with the almond/vanilla hanging around for sweetness. Cozy and dark. It's close to the skin and doesn't really morph much. Not quite what I was expecting, but I'm going to be reaching for this a LOT.

This was an impulse purchase right before it went dark. I realize as I write this that I've never actually smelled pure tobacco before! I don't hang around anyone who smokes it; none of my many, many English professors were of the tweed-jacket Professor-Tolkien pipe-tobacco-smoking variety (curses!). I really don't know what tobacco *smells* like. But blends with tobacco tend to perform WONDERFULLY on my skin. I have a concept of tobacco as a kind of warm rich caramel-colored sweetness, that's all. So! In the bottle: Whoaaaaaaa, this is powerful stuff. Rich and brown and warm and almost... dare I say animalistic? It's kind of funky. There's a sharp, almost pungent citrusy undernote that's not entirely pleasant. I'd say there's a 90% chance I'm going to love this and a 10% chance said note is going to make me cry. Wet: This is... wow. Whatever I was expecting, this isn't it, but I mean that in a GOOD WAY. It's rich and earthy and almost CHEWY. That pungent note-sure-if-want scent has burnt down to a lingering tangy note. I think I'm going to like this a lot. Dry: OH. SO THAT'S WHAT GOOD PIPE TOBACCO SMELLS LIKE. I can't compare or reference other notes because this just smells like ITSELF. It just mellows out as the day goes on. It's smooth and very, very rich. It wafts. It enfolds. It nuzzles at you like a cat that desperately needs you to pet it and won't take no for an answer. It's not golden - it's brown, and FUZZY. This scent is a very insistent bear hug. The caramel is barely-there, just hanging around the edges, and it's burnt caramel (charred and smoky, not sugary). There's just enough of that citrusy twang hanging around to make it earthy and solid. This is strong stuff (I barely put on any and twelve hours later it's still going strong) and it's utterly lovely. It's raining today, and I'm wearing old ratty jeans and a very warm oversized cardigan and drinking a lot of tea, and this is the PREFECT scent for today. It won't be perfect for every day (definitely more of a cold-weather scent). But I'm so happy I have a bottle of this. I think it'll be great for layering, too.