Dymphna

Oh, wow. I thought I was okay with just getting a set of decants for the Ode to Mars scents, but now I wish I could afford a full set of bottles. Those labels are incredible. Thanks for the photos, Lycanthrope!

Wow, that's another one I'm just hearing about now. I need to stay current on these things, but I admit that I don't pay close attention to stuff that I'm not likely to get a chance to try. Which means I miss these awesome names. There's actually a thread here: http://www.bpal.org/index.php?showtopic=50003 that's made specifically to find scents! Dragon Pecker was a proto released during one of the trunk shows last year. You can find it under the event exclusive scents, I believe. Update: Oh, also, since it was a proto, there aren't any official note listings, but the reviews say there's dragon's blood resin with some woodsy sweetness to it. http://www.bpal.org/index.php?showtopic=62884&hl=Dragon

If there were a scent that smelled like freshly brewed coffee--no milk/cream, no sugar--I would snap it up immediately. I didn't have the funds for last year's Inquisition, so I missed out on the chance to try Bah! (much to my Scrooge-loving dismay). Actually, one of my dream scents involves all dark notes: black coffee, black leather, opoponax.... nothing sweet, creamy, or soft. And, since it's *my* dream, nothing that would smell bad on me, like black musk, amber, or patchouli. But really, at this point I'd try anything that had non-sweet, non-creamy coffee.

Disclaimer: Although I do remember a floral undertone to Candy Butcher, it didn't smell anything like Snow White to me. So I'm basing this purely on Snow White. I can't remember if this came directly from Beth, but I believe Snow-Flakes has the same lily musk as Snow White. I *think* someone reported back from Convergence...maybe?...back in 2007 that Beth told them Snow White would be back that year but Snow-Flakes would not because she couldn't source enough of the components for that musk to release both blends that year. I remember this because I was in the minority that preferred Snow-Flakes and was so disappointed. We got lucky this year! Anyway, most of us have found S-F to smell like SW plus a gentle mint, so if you're okay with mint, you can get your hands on some S-F right now and see if you like it. And if for any reason you can't get Snow-Flakes, I find The Macabray to be extremely similar, and I've seen others mention Cloister Graveyard In The Snow being similar, too. (By the way, while there may be batch variations from year to year, I've never heard about any actual note variations in Snow White.)

Has anyone ever tried a BPAL scent that reminded them of J. Lo Miami Glow? I hated the original Glow and haven't tried the others, but Miami Glow was one of the few scents I was actually willing to spend a ridiculous amount of money on. Even after I discovered BPAL, I still used it until I ran out. And I found a dupe by one B&B maker that was spot on, but I've used up all the stuff I bought except for a tiny bit of lotion--and they seem to be out of business. Anyway, here are the notes from basenotes.net: * Top Notes * Coconut water, Pink Grapefruit, Passion Fruit, Blackcurrant. Middle Notes * Sand, Orange Flower, Cyclamen, Heliotrope. Base Notes * Musk, Vanilla Orchid, Blond woods. To me, the citrus note in it does NOT smell like grapefruit, it smells like orange--I want to say blood orange. As a whole, this smells pretty much exactly like a day at the beach--the skin musk, coconut water, citrus, passion fruit, and even the sand are predominant. It's heaven. I need more. Help? I used to wear that sometimes back in the early 90s and (with the usual caveat about skin chemistry) I found that Lyonesse smelled very much like Soft Musk on me. It drove me crazy until I figured out what it was reminding me of. Unfortunately, the ambergris in Lyonesse killed it for me, but it may be worth a shot for your mom.

I managed to forget Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday. Last year, I think I wore Pumpkin Cheesecake. This year, I think probably Pumpkin Queen.

Winter Solstice, probably Snow-Flakes unless one of the new snow scents (because I had to get a decant of every. single. one.) seems more appropriate. Unless it goes horribly wrong on my skin, I have every intention of wearing Mother Shub's Pfancy Pfefferneusse for Christmas Eve. Because that's when we eat pfefferneusse. Christmas Day, I dunno. Probably still Pfancy Pfefferneusse (can you tell I love that name?), or maybe Flesh-Eating Reindeer. Or maybe Fruitcake. Maybe all three. New Year's Eve, it really depends on the weather. I want to wear Bon Vivant, but if it's really cold, I'll probably wear something spicy. Or maybe I'll just wear Snow-Flakes again. It's one of my top five. And I have no idea about New Year's Day. I can't think that far ahead!

One classic that hasn't been mentioned yet is Bastet. It can be spicy (cardamom and saffron), foody (almond), resinous (amber and myrrh), musky, you might even get a bit of floral from it (lotus), and it's a good introduction to Beth's uncanny ability to capture the scent of clean fur, in this case cat fur. It's not listed as a note, but I'm not the only one who finds Bastet to smell a bit like burying your face in the fur of a beloved cat. Others that haven't been mentioned: Miskatonic University (sweet, creamy coffee and polished wood), Katharina (if you like apricot/peach scents), Bon Vivant (if you like strawberry). And GC but not impable, from Stardust: Yvaine (my favorite lavender), Lady Una (a unique honey musk and blackberry blend), and Fairy Market (the best way I can describe it is strange candies smooshed in the grass).

Wolf is my totem, was my first totem, so I ordered an imp of this without even checking reviews. I was surprised to see the tell-tale red color, and when I sniffed it, yup, dragon's blood. I left it for a few days and decided to try it last night before bed because I needed it. Yes, there's dragon's blood. Yes, there's jasmine or honeysuckle or a similar heady, white/light floral, but it's NOT overwhelming and it seems to just blend right into the other notes. Yes, there's something spicy, but it's not sharp or bitter or overpowering in any way. And yes, as at least one person mentioned, it's like the scent equivalent of a fluffy, fuzzy blanket. I fell asleep nuzzling my wrist, feeling safe and calm, at least for the moment--and I applied more as soon as I woke up, before I even got out of bed. I'm getting a bottle as soon as I can!

In the imp: Very citrusy. The first time I sniffed it, I had to put the cap back on in a hurry because I felt a headache coming on, which made me suspect ozone of some sort, but there's none listed. I think it was just the strong citrus. On second sniff, I can smell the cedar and resin, too. This smells like polished wood. I could swear I even smell a hint of beeswax. Wet: A bit spicy, though I have no idea why. I think I saw a previous reviewer compare this to the smell of a church, and I agree. But where Cathedral smelled like being locked in a dark, empty church (and consequently scared me a bit), this smells like sitting in an empty church with afternoon sunlight streaming through the windows. It may be empty, but only for the moment. The quiet stillness is peaceful and I can practically see the dust motes dancing in the sunbeams. The amber and citrus give such warmth, without the citrus screaming or the amber turning powdery. If only the cedar--I think it's the cedar, there's no camphor in this--weren't smelling slightly like mothballs. Dry: Warm, spicy, polished wood. This scent glows. If it weren't for that hint of mothballs(?!), I'd be slathering this. As it is, I like it despite that odd note. I'll have to see how much I use the imp. I think this might layer well with other wood-heavy scents like The Forbidding Foyer, The Antikythera Mechanism, Sri Lanka…not sure how it would blend with the sweetness of Misk U, though.

In the imp: I can definitely smell the patchouli, molasses, and red currant. I think I'm getting a touch of creaminess from the vanilla cream, even though it doesn't smell like vanilla per se. This is a lot nicer than it was when I first got my decants a few weeks ago. Then, I opened this to sniff and just put it aside because the patch was so strong and heavy. It's much smoother now. Wet: The red currant comes out a lot more on my skin. The patchouli and moss make an appropriately earthy base, but it's not heavy at all, just the suggestion of dark earth and green growing things. The vanilla cream and molasses are sort of mixing together to form a middle ground of creamy sweetness that bridges the sweet, bright currant and the deeper earth notes. This is the definition of "well-blended": every note has its purpose and its place, and gets along well with all the other notes. Dry: I know it's part of a summer series, but this makes me think of an autumn "berry" (where "berry" equals "sweet red fruit") scent. It's earthy, but it doesn't smell summery to me. I'm not sure I'd need a whole bottle of this, but I can see myself pulling out my decant (why does that sound dirty?) on a nice autumn day when I want to smell like I've been wandering through the woods, picking berries and getting my clothes caught on brambles, and maybe meeting an actual gnome, an Earth spirit, along the way. It's a charming scent with a charming image attached, and it captures the concept really well.

(I would say that I can't believe I haven't yet reviewed this, my favorite GC scent, except that I totally can. I type up reviews faithfully whenever I try new blends, but I hardly ever remember to post them. ) Anyway, this is the love story of me and Morocco. A few years ago, I ordered an imp pack of popular GC blends that I hadn't tried yet, among them Antique Lace and Morocco. I tried Antique Lace first and disliked it, and to me Morocco smelled exactly like AL plus spices, so I gave away the imp. A year or two went by and I was frimped some Morocco by a forumite and I fell totally in love. I ordered a bottle immediately and in the meantime went through that frimp plus another imp. It's the first bottle I ever used up completely. I love it and wear it at least once or twice a week during the day, and frequently as a bedtime scent too. To me, Morocco smells like cream soda and warm spices and soft, warm musk. I saw red musk mentioned above and I have to disagree. Red musk almost never smells good to me, in fact it usually smells dirty (in a bad way) to my nose. The musk in Morocco smells light, warm, and clean. In fact, everything about this scent is light-but-warm. The spices are comforting, not at all aggressive or overpowering, and the creaminess is luxurious without being too rich or foody. Sometimes I record the synaesthetic effect a scent has on me for my own reference and for any other forumites who are synaesthetic. Well, Morocco has always made me "see" and "feel" fluffy, caramel-brown cashmere. It's happy, cozy, beautiful, sexy warmth in a bottle. ETA: Dammit, I always forget something and have to edit my reviews! I can't believe I forgot to mention the sandalwood. That's what gives Morocco its soft, cozy base. It's the best sandalwood blend ever.

In the imp: Hmm, there's something weird here. I do smell the sandalwood, which was my reason for ordering this, and I smell the cedar (which I generally fear, but it doesn't smell like pencil shavings yet), but there's also something rather soapy and almost green in a sour kind of way. Wet: Initially, it's that sour green scent (maybe that's what mastic smells like, since that's the only note with which I'm unfamiliar) backed up by cedar and sandalwood. The woods start to take over almost immediately, though. Huzzah! Now if only the sandalwood will win over the cedar, I'll be a happy camper. Guh, that sandalwood is glorious! Dry: As it dries, I'm smelling the powderiness of frankincense and myrrh (could be either or both, as they both tend to go powdery on me sometimes) but the sandalwood is still strong. I don't know why I've been on such a sandalwood kick lately, but I've been absolutely CRAVING it, so I couldn't wait to try this scent. The cedar has moved into the background, and the mysterious sharp/soapy green note is gone, so now it's just a battle between the frank/myrrh powder and the lovely sandalwood. They really are fighting it out. One minute I smell like powder, the next I smell like sandalwood. I think the cedar is backing up the sandalwood, for which I am grateful. Thank you, cedar, I'm sorry I expected you to smell like a pencil sharpener. In the end, this turns out to be a sort of sandalwood-frankincense blend. They keep switching off for first place, but after a couple of hours, sandalwood wins.

My immediate thought was Black Dahlia. It's mainly heady Southern white florals, but white florals as smelled perfuming the air at midnight, just as something dangerous is about to go down, if that makes sense. Like, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil Just Evil. My second thought, even before reading the other suggestions: Wanda. That is a little black dress and red lipstick in liquid form. And Loviatar, which is black leather pants in liquid form. Oh, and two very different (from each other and from the above scents) shades of black: Schwarzer Mond. It's the opoponax. Thick, enveloping blackness. Lune Noire. Kind of like being in a witch's garden on a moonless night, trying to figure out which flowers are aphrodisiacs and which are poisonous.

In the imp: This has a few notes of absolute doom for me--jasmine, neroli (), vetiver--but I wanted to at least try it. In the imp, it smells like jasmine, yes, but also incense. It smells like nag champa, but not too strong. Nice. Wet: Jasmine. Jasmine, jasmine, jasmine. ARGH, NEROLI! Dry: Don't know, washed it off. I can't take the horrible, acrid, nose-stinging nightmare of neroli on my skin. Ugh.

In the bottle: A light, pale floral that is indeed somehow smoky. Wet: My first reaction? Haunting. It reminds me of taking a walk on a humid but breezy summer night, smelling the flowers and the scent of rain in the air, clean and ozone-y. (Not a bad ozone, though it is the tiniest bit metallic.) I can smell the sandalwood and the nicotiana, and (unfortunately) the orris, which I just don't like, but it's not too bad here. I don't know what the rest of the florals smell like, so I can't really pick them out. The musks, which are very much in the white musk category, are present but not loud. This scent is more of a quiet presence than a conversation piece, if that makes any sense. Dry: That unfortunate orris becomes more noticeable as it dries, and the musk sort of wimps out and starts to smell more or less exactly like one of those drugstore white musk sprays. Boo. Smoky Moon started out very promising, so unique and mysterious, but my skin turned it to...this. Woe.

Okay, let's hear it for aging! I was just trying a few scents from my massive swap pile and decided to give Dia de los Muertos another shot. My decant is from 2007, and when I first tried it, it was heartbreakingly floral on me. I mean, seriously, it was a jasmine festival and jasmine does not like me. So, not a good scene. And I tried it again probably a year later with similar results. But now? In the vial, it's floral yet light and cool. On my skin, it's a bit of a bright floral at first, but it settles down quickly. And then? MAGIC! It smells like...autumn air and cakes and flowers and magic. The only problem is that it seems to fade quickly. I need to put on more, though I dread the initial burst of OMGFLORAL if I go too heavy. But it's really so worth it. And I only have a decant, of course.

In the imp: This was a frimp in my last Lab order. Unfortunately, it had leaked. When I opened the box, I was surrounded by a beautiful rose scent. I quickly wrapped the imp in a Starbucks napkin and put it back in the box with the other frimps while I checked out the bottles I'd ordered. Just now, I decided to give it a try, but when I unwrapped it I saw that the imp hadn't just leaked, it actually cracked. All but the tiniest bit has soaked into the napkin, which smells impossibly better than when I first sniffed the leaky imp. It's the richest, most velvety rose scent I've ever smelled. And it's gone. (Well, that napkin is going in my underwear drawer, anyway!) Wet: Rose doesn't tend to do well on my skin anyway, but I had to try this. (It was on my wishlist anyway for the lily.) OMG! It WORKS! I smell so damn good. It's that same rich, velvety rose scent that the napkin smells like. For the tiniest moment, I smell a sweet, fresh lily note, but then it's gone and it's all rose, all the time. It reminds me of the rose from Alice, but minus the carnation and milk and honey. Just sweet, heady rose. And it's not turning to soap or pickles or anything. *weeps with joy* Dry: I don't know, I took a look at the other reviews and nearly all of them seem to say that this is heavy on the lily and easy on the rose, but to me this is almost pure rose. It's almost creamy, like burying your nose in one of those enormous, showy crimson roses that are so scented that you can almost taste them, and they block out all other scents for a moment. I love this. I do wonder whether this smells so good because it was exposed to at least some air due to the vial being cracked, because I did catch a whiff coming from the box every now and then over the past few days and it didn't smell like this at first. It was a much thinner, brighter rose. I'd have said light pink, white, or even yellow. Now, it's deepest red, rich and intense. Spectacularly beautiful. How much do I love this scent? So much that, after doing this review last night, I threw another imp in with my Smoky Moon order to replace the broken frimp. I was seriously, seriously tempted to order a bottle, but I need to test it some more to see how much I like it. For once, my skin's tendency to amp rose has not been foiled by its tendency to turn it into soap. Oh, happy day!

OMG, LOKI! Now I'm going to have to get a CT for my husband, Mr. "I'm a child of Loki"--I'm thinking a Dorian blend since plain old Dorian smells so sexxxeh on him. Thanks for posting that, angelicruin.

In the imp: Well, I don't smell any chocolate of any kind. This is a very dark, almost medicinal cherry. I do find it too sweet to actually call it medicinal, but everyone else who sniffed my decant compared it to cherry cough medicine. I smell no chocolate whatsoever. And I rolled my decant to make sure the chocolate wasn't sitting on the bottom (and I trust my decanter, so I know she rolled the bottle before decanting). I think the cherry just overpowers it. Wet: Now it smells even sweeter, like the juicy red cherries in MB: Bloody Mary. Which is very nice, but still, no chocolate. Dry: Okay, it's not as sweet now, but it's still not medicinal...to me, it smells almost like cherry soda, like Dr. Pepper or something. Not really fizzy, but sweet-yet-dark, cherries plus something darker. But that something just doesn't smell like chocolate to me. That's okay, I'm not desperate for chocolate--Milk Chocolate Buttercream has filled that need beautifully, TYVM! I just don't know where the chocolate went. But I like this scent for what it is. Not enough to need a bottle, but enough that I'll hang onto the decant and wear it whenever the mood to smell like Dr. Pepper strikes. It's just that much different from Bloody Mary in the drydown that it feels unique and kind of whimsical.

Thank you for posting those photos, Tramp and Twilighteyes! Ohhhhhhhh, the Ode to Aphrodite labels are so beautiful, I wish I could afford to buy them all. And angelicruin, thanks for the pic of Miller V. California--now I really hope it turns out to smell as good on me as I think it might, because I want that bottle, too! And the Box O' Chocolates labels make it even more difficult to heed Beth's warnings about BPAL not being for eatin'. Or, uh, is that just me. Also, yay for having another reason to buy all the GC bottles on my big bottle wishlist! Those new labels look great.

Um, so. I first tried Snake Charmer when some of the CN scents made a comeback in...2006? The musk reminded me a lot of the musk in Snake Oil, which I hate, so I gave it to my best friend, who loves Snake Oil. Blah blah, a couple of years go by, people remark often about the wonder that is Snake Charmer, I roll my eyes because I just don't see the appeal. Then it was resurrected and I figured I should probably try it again because, while I still dislike Snake Oil, my tastes have changed, my skin chemistry has changed, and the only other blend with Arabian musk is my adored Anactoria. I asked my friend to let me try that decant and I liked it a lot but didn't love it. I ordered a bottle anyway. At first try, I still liked-not-loved it. And then a switch got flipped somewhere in my brain and I fell in love and have been wearing Snake Charmer almost every day since. It's just...magic. It starts out a musky spiced plum--I still don't love this musk at first, and it doesn't smell at all like Anactoria, but it mellows almost immediately into something very sexy and not Snake Oily--then segues through a sort of vanilla/plum/incense scent, and ends up in a deeply sexy amber that doesn't go bad on my skin at ALL. When amber works on me, it smells a lot like a Revlon perfume I wore in middle school called Intimate (yeah, I was a weird kid) that was sexy, musky amber heaven. This is like that, but about a hundred times better. It is LOVE. I have four backup bottles on the way and I'd have ordered more if I could have afforded it.

So, I've been lamenting the fact that Snow-Flakes didn't make a comeback since the 2007 Yules were released and it wasn't among them. I've stocked up as best I could, but I haven't been able to find more than a couple of bottles. I just bought a bottle from a lovely forumite last week. And I don't regret it one bit. However. If I'd gotten my Graveyard Book decants a couple of days earlier, I might not have bought it because The Macabray smells almost exactly like Snow-Flakes to me. This is the scent I've been wishing and hoping for--and it's GC! Snow-Flakes, to me, is a green-yet-icy scent, snow plus mint, a hint of vegetation, like the last snow of early springtime. The Macabray has just that little bit more greenness to it. It's exactly as described, flowers in the snow. Love!

I had really high hopes for this scent. I love the smell of gingerbread, I loved the frimp of Fruitcake I got from the Lab last Yule season, and I'm okay with rum as long as it doesn't take over. My only fear was the musk, as I was concerned that it might be too animalic (civety red or dirty-powder black). I needn't have worried. The first time I tried this, it was merely okay. I left it alone for a week or two and then had the urge to try it again last night before bed--having slathered on Villainess Embargo, I wanted something suitably spicy to accompany it. And did I ever get my wish! Wet, this is deliciously cakey, a rich, dark spice cake overflowing with fruit. As it dries, it smells more like spiced fruits with just enough cake to hold it all together. Then the musk moves in, and it's one of my favorite types of BPAL musk, that soft, downy, furry musk. It reminds me of the musk in Coyote more than any of the other fluffy, furry blends. It sounds like an odd combination, I know, but it works beautifully and is a very cozy scent. Also, very addictive. I think I fell asleep sniffing my wrist. Gorgeous scent, I'm so glad I got a bottle!

Scent: Rose, violet, and cucumber. Somehow, the rose doesn't go soapy and the violet doesn't go powdery. It smells like floral water, like the kind of cool, clean, naturally scented toilet water you'd find on a woman's dressing table a hundred or so years ago. The kind that would be used to scent handkerchiefs. It's really beautiful in a calm, gentle way. A quiet, pale blue-violet scent. I got this as a frimp from the Lab last...summer, I think. I liked it in the imp, but just dabbed it on my hair because rose doesn't usually work well with my skin. It smelled really beautiful and calming, so I kept it in case of emergency. Months later, I was having a cranky, crabby day and I knew any scent I normally loved to wear would just end up irritating me. So I dabbed a tiny bit of WoND on the back of my hand. And it not only made me feel calm and happy and relaxed for the whole day, but it smelled fantastic, even on my skin. It's now a go-to scent for me when I'm feeling cranky or a bit anxious, and it's extremely soothing as a bedtime scent.