bites_the_sun

This scent is a swirl of everything I felt, sensed, smelled, and saw right then, at that perfect point in time: Jasmine, vanilla, Spanish cedar, moss, marigold, purple verbena, candied tamarind, lime rind, a splash of margaritas on a nearby table, a little bit of Dorian, a little bit of Snake Oil, and a bright bouquet of mal de ojo. This is a really gorgeous, heady blend of the nicest jasmine I've yet to experience from the Lab, the lime that made me love Pirate Moon, a touch of vanilla, a touch of tea and a few other things I can't identify. It has a similar throw and feel to Snake Oil on me, while smelling completely different. I can see me using this throughout the summer months.

This is a heady mix of ylang ylang with a touch of almond that morphs somehow into a quite natural, summery and very feminine skin scent on me. It reminds me a little of Black Phoenix mixed with 'O' in some respects. Lovely scent, anyway.

This is absolutely beautiful. It starts off wet as quite perfumey with a faint tinge of something metallic - but not offensively metallic, then dries into a gorgeous smoky, woodsy, vanilla (and this from someone who reacts badly to many vanillas - I hate Antique Lace, for example), very well blended. I don't find is 'masculine' at all. Gender neutral, maybe, but it doesn't smell manly to me at all. Something about it - the vanilla and the mood it creates for me, actually reminds me somehow of Snake Charmer, my ultimate BPAL scent. I never order 2 bottles of anything, but after sampling this scent from the imp, I'm almost inclined to order two bottle of it with my next order, as I can see it being a scent I want to wear above most of my other cherished BPALs.

On me this is a surprisingly strong but pleasant floral with an occasional waft of vanilla. Throw is pretty good although wear length is relatively short for me. A very pretty, summery and subtly sexy scent. I like!

This turns into an acrid, bitter and quite unpleasant version of Red Lantern 08 on my skin. Had to wash it off after an hour because it was making me feel queasy. Shame.

Imp fresh from the Lab: I get a heavy blast of vanilla, followed by coconut on the drydown, changing eventually to a sweet-but-not-too-sweet coconut-and-something-else (maybe flowers?) blend. It's very nice, but doesn't last long. I'm very interested to see how this ages. Maybe after a while I'll actually get this earth note people are talking about?

I adore this scent. I've worn it every day since I got it. It reminds me of a much more sophisticated and complex version of O - a lovely warm, honeyed base with a cool waft of grassy, sometimes veering to mint-like topnote. It's very sensual and comforting to me rather than 'hot hot sex' but that's fine by me. I think I'll be ordering another bottle before it disappears.

A pounding heartbeat coalesced into scent: demonic passion and brutal sexuality manifested through myrrh, red patchouli, cognac, honey, and tuberose and geranium in a breathy, panting veil over the darkest body musk. This is absolutely glorious, one of the best Lab scents I've tried over the past two years - a soft, glowing honey-musk with a clean sharp spike of geranium. It has a good throw on me without being overpowering and makes me feel very warm and feminine and at ease with myself. Instant bottle order!

This dries down to an almost pure honeysuckle on me. Absolutely gorgeous - warm, summery and as others have said, clean. There's a purity about this scent that I love.

Freak Show is the only BPAL scent so far I've had a true allergic reaction to. I'm atopic, so that's pretty good going, really. Anyway, Freak Show caused a cluster of raised white lumps in the exact circle of skin on my wrist that I applied it to. Shame, as I actually was enjoying the scent. I have no idea which ingredient or combination of ingredients caused it, and I'm inclined to test it one more time before passing it on to see if it was just my body being weird that night. Blends with a lot of vanilla also give me sick headaches. Midway had me practically ready to vomit after a few hours.

In the vial: Bubblegum. The pink bubblegum in the blue and yellow wrapper that they used to sell at our corner shop in the 1970s, to be precise. Ooh, nostalgia. Wet: Ooh, pie. Freshly baked, just out-of-the-oven fruit pie. And flowers of some description. With a hint of powder. Dry down: H'ok, this is where it becomes interesting. The generic fruit pie has turned to berries tempered with a drop of something slightly warmer, spicier and resinous - the amber and carnations, I presume. It's bright and sweet without being tooth-achingly saccahrine, warm and resinous without being heavy or fierce. It's not Carnivale the HBO show, which I imagine as smelling rather bleak - dustbowl poverty overlaid with the scent of sequinned costumes drenched in cheap perfume and traces of old, exotic incense; but rather encapsulates the helter-skelter swirl of light and colour of the traditional fairground. Damn, I wish this was still available. I'd snap up a bottle of it, no question.

De Sade does exactly what is says on the tin. It's the smell of leather, all right, but not a civilised leather, like the scent of a saddle room or a new leather coat. This has a more brutal tinge to it, like something chewing on a pile of raw cowhides or sucking on a thick leather glove. It's raw, and while not overpowering, it's totally and utterly distracting because, well, it smells like sex, and when I say sex, I mean a good, old-fashioned seeing-to, and by an old-fashioned seeing-to, I mean a 'grab you by the hair and unashamedly bang you up against wall until you forget what your name is, where you live and who you're married to' type of affair. Ahem. It's enough to make a girl feel quite flustered, if you get my drift, and I'm quite sure you do. I keep looking around for this big, unsuitable and thoroughly sexy brute of a man and realising, oh, it's me, a simultaneously entertaining and frustrating, furniture-humping train of thought. Gosh. This scent is almost too much for me on me, though I think I'd find it thoroughly intoxicating on the right kind of man. Perhaps I'll try layering it with something less forthright and masculine. I like leather all right, but on me at this intensity, it's just making me twitchy.

Review x-posted from my journal: Catalogue Description:This is the captured scent of a cold, moonless night, lost deep within the darkest wood. Haunting and desolate, this scent evokes images of fairy tale tragedy and half-remembered nightmares. Thick, viscous pine with ambergris, black musk, juniper and cypress. In the vial: A blast of pine and cypress shot through with something sharper - the juniper, perhaps? Wet: Immediately less overwhelmingly piney on the skin. Dry down: Not desolate - nice. The cool breath of pine, come-hither sweetness of ambergris and the sharp hint of the juniper together produce a surprisingly gentle, subtle and frankly uplifting aroma that has me constantly sniffing my wrists. Verdict: A light yet complex scent redolent of sweetly-scented night air with the crush of pine needles and bloom of damp earth underfoot. This is not a scent that to my mind suggests foresty nightmares and desolation. If this scent was a fairy tale, it would be one where the forest is oddly enchanted and strange, fey creatures who lead you astray for kicks and giggles, rather than one strewn with things that'll eat your face and then gnaw on your entrails for dessert. Definitely rather more of a sweet, civilised and feminine scent than its description would suggest. I'll definitely be picking up a bottle of this when my imp runs out.