tziporra

Poppy smoke, velvet jasmine, sweet three-year aged patchouli, and black plum. Remember how Blood Countess was all opium smoke and plum and some florals? Yeah. This is like that. Smoky. Plummy. Florals to make it smell like perfume instead of a beverage. I was hoping for a bit more patchouli, since this could be a little dirtier and Id be a little happier. I dont like the scent of plums after theyve been on my skin 8 hours, they smell like crumbled dusty jolly ranchers. But its ok because I verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry much that smoky poppy top note and Ill just wash it or whatever at the four hour mark. Chosen by my friend and stolen by me because it smelled much too clean on her skin chemistry.

Salt-splashed silk, spiced cedar, hinoki wood, sea musk, a strand of kelp and a squeeze of lime. It starts out just as you are dreading it will, corn chips and dryer sheets. And its the DRYERSHEETS shrieky type scent that some aquatics are just determined to morph into. And then an hour later its all delightful warm salt soaked dried silk and you wonder why you were ever worried about the thing. My friend asked when I ordered it what silk smelled like and I said, I dont know except that it smells like silk. Which this does. Exactly and evocatively. I love it, and its even worth the pain of corn chips and dryer sheets to get there.

Rice milk, white ginger, oakmoss, ti leaf, and cardamom pod. My label says vivid enjoyment of the memory of rapture which is a different thing entirely and slightly disappointing considering the art. But no matter, on to the scent. This is very chai tea on my skin, heavy on the green juicy ginger and cardamom. But it doesnt feel terribly edible to me. More like this is a morning shower scented by someone inspired by their ginger heavy chai tea with rice milk. Its incredibly bright and energizing but there are no citrus notes so doesnt do that bitter pithy thing that bright energizing scents usually do on my skin. Back in the day I had a ginger-heavy tea scented body spray that I loved, and this is definitely the closest Ive come to matching it. Delighted to have a bottle.

White rose, orris root, and ambergris accord. There are very few roses that dont go sour rose potpourri on my skin, but it doesnt stop me from trying, because for whatever reason a good rose scent just smells S-E-X to me. And being that I am a passionate fan of the labs ambergris note (yes I went through an entire bottle of the SN in six weeks) this one seemed worth the risk. Yes indeed this is teh bomb. Giant damp rose petals sweetened with Orris and dirtied with ambergris. Very similar rose to Roses Pearls Diamonds, but with the salty naughty ambergris instead of coconut. Did. It.

This is a spectacular variation on the brown fuzzy theme. To me, it's cleaner than Tombstone, as if this brown cat is carefully groomed, but I definitely feel the comparison - if instead of sassafras you have just a powdery dusting of golden cardamom. I definitely get a menthol-y aspect, but maybe that is a thing the cedar is doing on my skin. If this theme appeals to you, and you use up the bottles of outlaw and unicorn and ram as quickly as you get them, this one will be extremely satisfying.

I have not had a good relationship with bpal tea. I have tried and tried and tried and the tea always went all strangely sour on me or was mixed with sugar which does horrific things on my skin. But here is a tea I can wear! And the drydown here is pretty much straight tea with slivers of musk keeping it from getting too sour. But first, the opening, it's a really spectacular bergamot top note rush, citrusy and heady. I loooooove this kind of bergamot opener, so this one had me at hello. I also get some iris at this stage, but it's not nearly as floral as I would have expected. Then Silver Dollar dries down to tea and musk and it behaves perfectly on my skin. I'm madly in love, and definitely keeping.

I blind bought three bottles, and Beneath the Kotatsu was the runaway favorite. Wet it's the warmest fuzziest floral (iris) vanilla cedar. It's perfumey, and beautifully so. As it dries down I get the vegetal-y aspect of the orange blossom and it smells delightfully like some orange blossom drawer liners my grandmother used to use in her house when I was kid. Very golden and sunny. The vanilla does a lovely job of sweetening and grounding the whole scent, keeping the flowers in check. The cedar in this is utterly gorgeous, doing everything a wood should do with the warming and dry edge. I can still smell it when I wake up in the morning, but mostly just the morning after of the orange blossom. Absolute love, and a big thanks to everyone in this thread for your great reviews that led me to purchase this one blind. Tzi

I bought this one because apricot and Aristocratic couple but this is all about the orange on me. It's potpourri orange on my skin too, which is making me sad. I get some honey and a little apricot when wet, but then it's orange orange orange. Im going to try it again but despite my absolute love of the artwork I think it might be a pass for me. Tzi

I've been blithely ordering from the box of chocolates for a few years without considering that these little treats are _supposed_ to be foodie (because I've picked out the ones that contain the fewest ingredients of actual food, I guess). This one scared me in the bottle (lab fresh, weekended inside waiting for me to return from a trip) because it's a caramel-y blast of the most foodie kind, and usually that note goes scary wrong on my skin. Besides, I thought sniffing the bottle again, this caramel thing is a nice _house_ scent maybe not a nice person scent. But I bravely slathered some on my free wrist and was surprised at how very quickly the caramel was tamed (dare I say overwhelmed?) by the extremely rich dark decidedly un-sweet whiskey. There is almost a chewy vetiver-esque edge to the booziness and it has a certain dirty edge to it that would make me a lot less likely to eat this chocolate caramel. Speaking of chocolate, it's there in its lovely gourmand way, supporting both caramel by grounding it and booze by (oddly) sweetening it. No cardamom detected after 12 hours of wear, but there are a lot of other powerful scents here, maybe I'll find it in time - or in the scent warmer, where I shall try it next. In summary, I will 100% try it again. The whiskey skews this one strongly masculine, which I really like. I will also try it in the scent warmer. Tzi

Why am I the only one who gets mint? A minty snowy blast out of the bottle the wet stage is by far my favorite. Then the "lead" sets in and it's very sweet (coconut-y) mentholly woods. The dry down is where we lose the mint (so sad to see you go emphemeral and beautiful top notes) and it's woody with the sandalwood and the rose-y impression I always get from dry patchoulis. The impression is very much heavy gray skies (but no ozone) with piles of snow. I like this and it's one of the reasons I can't hang out with people who "hate patchouli" -- I'm not crazy in love with every patch I meet but when I find one l like I'm not giving it up for anyone, not ever. Tzi edited: for too many verys

I am always excited to see "fougere" without "tea" or "lavender" and so I blind purchased. This opened up as a nice herbal honey (as opposed to the sticky dirty kind) supported by lilac at the edges and topped of with fizzy lime. It starts out soooooooooo beautiful I can't even. An interestingly it really sang to me like a musical composition at this point. As pointed out above even though it's a "fougere" it reads quite femme and while I know all manner of boys would be able to pull this off quite nicely, they should be ready for that. Unfortunately it dries down to straight honey. It's a nice honey, and I don't have a honey scent right now so it's still a definite keeper, but oooooohhhhhhh I really liked it wet.... Tzi

I bought this because I recently ran out of Hope and Fear Set Free and I was hoping this would be close. It's much better. The vanilla infused benzoin is a stronger balance against the piney frank here, so it doesn't run away with the show like in HAFSF. There are almost floral undertones to the scent here, and it's nice and sweet and golden. Just lovely, so happy with it. Tzi

I blind bought six Luper bottles, and they were largely winners (there is one I'm going to rest to see if it improves before ditching it) but Hidden Pearls is the best of the lot. So it's coconut and vanilla and orris and pear - I find it more similar to Black Pearl than Blood Pearl but either comparison works - but gah, it's just so much more. It's such a sweet heavenly soft cloud of graceful white scent. Of all my Shungas this one feels the most oriental to me, the tiny greenery found in the pear sets it off perfectly. Funny enough a dear friend of mine took me out to a tea shop last night and I enjoyed a tea named "pear la France" - it was a green tea infused with pear, flavored with vanilla and served with cream. If the drink had been coconut based instead of tea based it would be a dead ringer for Hidden Pearls. And the blissed out feeling I'm getting wearing it is just the same I experienced sipping sweet tea, listening to the new age spa music and the playing of the fountain. Tzi

Oh NOM, this is my kind of gourmand. Goes on ooey gooey sticky tobacco with dusty sticky chocolate and a smoky haze of vetiver. For me the smoke stays for the whole experience, doesn't get any less dirty or intense. I also find the vetiver veers into burnt rubber territory, but I don't care. It's still good. Scorched deliciousness. Tzi

So yeah. This smells like, um, standing on the porch.... in a cool spring rain, which is unoriginal but really that is mostly what comes to mind. I get a few whiffs of clean laundry coming through, and the scent reads _intensely_ feminine to me - my 6 year old wanted to try it and I got some dissonance with him wearing it since he usually prefers more unisex scents. I have not fallen in love with a BPAL aquatic since Ulalume and that one had beautiful rotting leaves to dirty it up, but this one is quite lovely. Very wearable, reads as straightforward "perfume", but utterly unlike anything in a department store right now. Unexpected and wonderful. Tzi