Frills

This is everything I hoped it would be. Perfect late-summer scent, with just a hint of the warm colors of fall. I could bathe in this scent. Snake Oil sometimes swallows up other scents on me when it's blended with something else but this? This is perfect.

First on, this smells like cream. Like a bowl of cream with a touch of vanilla in it. I've never smelled any perfume that smelled so spot-on creamy. I like it a lot, but I'm wondering where the Snake Oil is! After it's been on a little while, there's just a hint of Snake Oil's spices but it's still bowl of whipping cream waiting to be made into a dessert.

I bought mine in 2007 when it first came out, and it smelled so much like Snake Oil on me that I shrugged and set it aside and mostly forgot I even had it. I put it on last night after pruning my stash and HOLY HELL it is good. I tend to like fresh Snake Oil over aged but this? This has aged into something sweet and comforting and sexy and it lasts. Most older oils vanish pretty fast after being applied but this one goes all day and smells so warm and perfect. First applied it's spicy and I can really smell the teakwood and milk and spices. But after a couple of hours it's dark chocolate and the spices and incense from Snake Oil; a few more hours and it's vanilla and warm skin. When I first bought it, I didn't think it would become one of my top three favorites but I'm so glad I didn't sell it.

This is such a unique scent. In the bottle it's chocolate chip cookies, very similar to Chips Ahoy. Then I put it on and there's a little bit of engine grease, like I'm a kid again snacking on a crunchy chocolate chip cookie while my dad works on our car. It's my bedtime scent because it's so comforting.

Oh. Oh. I love this. It's bright, it's fresh, it's semi-masculine, and it has a cow on it! It's a really sexy cologne, like what you might wear when you're baling hay and still want to smell amazing. I can't even pick out specific notes (besides the hay absolute which is divine), it's so well blended. My new favorite.

The truth hurts — so why tell it? Muffle the blow with Alternative Facts. For example: FACT: Following White House advisor Kellyanne Conway’s January 22 appearance on “Meet The Press,” sales of George Orwell’s 1984 skyrocketed, making it the fifth-best selling book on Amazon.com. ALTERNATIVE FACT: In under a week, President Trump’s administration has already managed to improve literacy, reflecting the public’s renewed interest in privatized education, as well as its rejection of the mainstream media in favor of more “traditional” forms of information-gathering. See how easy that is? With the help of Alternative Facts, even the most unpalatable among us can preside over a gallery of glittering, candy-coated delusions — one in which reality itself conforms to our beliefs, sincerely-held or otherwise. If you truly want to obfuscate what you really smell like, this is the scent for you! Sugar-crusted vanilla, a firecracker-blast of cherry and sour lemon, a hint of scuttling spiders, encroaching fog, and trumpets of bombast, bluff, and bluster. Like its companion scent, Fake News, proceeds from Alternative Facts will benefit the ACLU. Trivia: I composed the scent concept and description for Alternative Facts while in line to view the Constitution at the National Archive. It was a fascinating experience: the line to view the documents in the Rotunda was filled with MAGA hats /and/ Pussy hats, and it really dawned on me in that moment that we're all looking at the same sacred American artifacts, but reading, interpreting, and responding to them in entirely - often diametrically opposed - ways. What I saw when I bore witness to the Bill of Rights isn't the same as what the guy next to me in the Trump scarf saw. The whole experience filled me with this strange frisson; it's hard to put into words. It was like witnessing a pantomime of the vast, vast differences in worldview in this country come to life. This one lives up to its name. It's sweet and lovely and then suddenly high-pitched and sharp in a way that sneaks up on you when you aren't paying attention. Sort of like listening to the Head Cheeto talk about his version of reality. I love this scent for what it is but it's so sharp I'm not sure I'll wear it very often. Maybe if it mellows once it's not fresh out of the box.

Oh. Just like that, a scent that I love as much as I loved Minotaur from eons ago. I didn't think that would ever happen. Wow. Wow. I'm in love with this concept and this scent. Okay, so: it very much reminds me of a wolf. The warmth of it, the great outdoors feel of it, takes me back to working with these incredible animals. There's something in this perfume that hits exactly the feel of being around a canine who is very, very much not like your dog. Notewise: I get musk and incense front and center, but every few whiffs I smell pine and a hint of tobacco, and it's all warmed up and rounded out by the vanilla. Now, I would never actually guess that there is vanilla in it; it's not prominent on me. But I've noticed this same "softening" in other blends with this vanilla. After it warms up on my skin it's lighter--the rose, I think. But man, this still reminds me of the feel of warm wolf fur. So gorgeous. I'm so glad I was able to snag a bottle.

This is a spot on banana cream scent. I actually tried this on shortly before I ate a slice of banana cream pie, and figured I was mistaking the perfume for the food. Nope! The oil is just that accurate. Bottle: Pie, delicious pie On: Warm pie! With a little bit of tang, like you get with homemade banana cream pies when you've dipped the bananas in lemon to keep them from browning. Over time: it becomes sweet cream instead of banana. Still delicious. Low throw, very comforting. Love it.

This is FANTASTIC! Sweet and dirt-y and there's a hint of something more, like you're smelling tarts at the end of the rabbit hole.

I put this on right off the porch instead of letting it settle like I usually do. In the bottle it's very frosty, very sandalwood-y. And it has tons of throw! You need maybe a little dot on your wrists. Fresh on, it smells pretty much like it did in the bottle...maybe a little bit soapy (which is my skin chemistry and sandalwood duking it out). I get a hint of it warming up, but no sign of vanilla yet. Lots of frost! Little bit of sandalwood peeking through my wonky skin chemistry. I'll have to let it settle and try it again. As it is right now, I like it, but I really really want it to be more vanilla and less frosty sandalwood. ETA: After about an hour it settles down and smells a lot like Midnight on the Midway. Which is one of my favorite scents ever. If you miss Midnight, snatch this one up before it's gone. (And give it plenty of time to mellow!) I knew I wouldn't regret getting a full bottle

I normally don't like the smell of melons, but this was a frimp and I love every Mad Tea Party scent I've tried, so... This is the freshest scent I've worn in a long, long time. It doesn't smell exactly melon-y or necessarily fruit-y. It's like what you would imagine water smelled like if you had only seen pictures of it. It's clean and crisp and a perfect summer or spring scent!

I love most of the lab's apple blends so this one was a must-have. The Hesperides was my favorite apple blend when it was still around, and Sjofn is really similar in the bottle and on the first application. It's much sweeter, though--like candied apples instead of one you pluck off a branch. When it dries the woodiness comes out, but the apples are still very strong. Almost too strong, thanks to how my skin amps apple like crazy. I'm going to let it age, because I think if the woods get bolder as the blend gets older, this will be a beautiful scent.

Orange blossom is my favorite scent, so I got this hoping it would be heavy on the orange blossom. Once it dries, it's apricot with a touch of honey and pink pepper, instead. I can't smell any orange blossom, and the white musk sort of comes and goes. It smells lovely! It's not what I was hoping for but I'm really glad I got a full bottle anyway. It's like a deeper version of Katharina, which is my favorite GC blend. Pandy is a summer scent where Katharina is for spring.

I used to have a 2005 bottle. I sold it because I first got it during a rough time in my life, and every time I put it on after that it put me right back in those darker moments. But that was eight years ago! I wanted to try Snow White and "train" my brain to associate it with better things. 2012 smells just like I remember. And at first that was a bad thing. It mellows much faster than 2005 did, and the "crisp" note isn't as distracting as I remember it being. I'm glad I bought a bottle again, this scent is too lovely to write off.

Katharina went on soft. I thought it disappeared, and then twenty minutes later a soft, beautiful scent, everywhere. I rarely go from imp to "must have a bottle" in one try, but this is an exception. I need a bottle.

This was one of my favorite scents. The first time I tried it I got apple and wood and it was gorgeous. My bottle smelled much sweeter and was heavier on the apple, and I didn't like it as well, but after some aging it has gone similar to the wood-apple scent I loved. I'm sad it's discontinued, GC discontinued bottles seem harder to track down than LE's.

I bought this when it first came out and loved it, though I remember it being heavy on florals. I tried it on today on a whim, and after aging for almost 7 years it's mostly apricot--but very clean apricot--with a little trickle of starfruit, and honey, and this beautiful orchid note. If I breathe it in and close my eyes I can imagine being in the park on a cool, early spring morning. I don't like aging my bottles much because they tend not to last on my skin long, and 13 is definitely softer than I remember. But it's beautiful and rounded out, and I'm so glad I still have it after all this time.

I'm looking for scents that are pretty dominantly black licorice-smelling. I have Pink Mood and love it, but it's aged and doesn't last very long and the cherry blossom is stronger than when I first got it. (And I know black licorice is not a very common favorite scent so if you have some that sound like they may work and you have them for sale, feel free to link me to your sales!)

This is a libertine's celebration of decadence, debauchery, and sexual freedom: orange blossom, ambergris, orris root, white rose, lemon balm, jonquil, carrot seed, and benzoin. I love this wet. It's light, complex, girly, something I could see myself wearing regularly. I forgot it has rose in it, and once it's dried on my skin that's all I smell. Augh skin chemistry, whyyy?

This scent is beautiful. It's Christmas in a perfume. I worried it'd smell too much like a candle at first but after it's warmed on my skin it smells like pumpkin pie and berries and just the faintest touch of Christmas tree. It's not really foody, though; it just smells warm and homey. Going to be wearing this on Christmas Eve, for sure.

This is mint, and a hint of woods. But if you let it dry and forget you've got it on your arm (as I did) you catch wafts of the real scent of snow--watery, crisp, fresh, so cold it can make your nose hurt. In a good way. And it's also got a touch of mint. Sort of like being outdoors, building a snowman, then going inside to have a candy cane. I think I like this one--I usually have a love-hate relationship with the snow blends.

I tried this fresh, so I'm sure it'll change a bit, but it's like a sweeter, Christmas version of Vixen. It reminds me of being in a snowy field on Christmas Day, smelling the clementines my grandmother always brings, and the faint smell of warm homes. It makes me happy just smelling it. Love this blend. So glad I went ahead and got a bottle.

I got this and The Apple of Sodom to try, because I was in an apple mood. This is gorgeous on my skin. Warm, almost magical, clean, beautiful. I had the imp a total of two days before I realized I needed a bottle.

Anise works really well on me. Instead of turning to liquorice it becomes a nice, spicy depth to other notes, and it's the same here. At first it's BLACK JELLY BEAN SCENT, but after it dries, it's mostly cherry blossom with anise as a background. Cherry blossom is a fairly sharp scent on its own, reminds me of soap, so I'm glad the anise is there to temper it (and after a few hours, the vanilla makes it a little sweeter). I hope the vanilla comes out a bit more as it ages, but I suspect it'll age beautifully. Love this scent, and I'm so glad it works on me!

This has been different every time I've applied it. The first time, it was all berry all the time with just a touch of warmth (probably from the candles). The second time, it smelled exactly like a Christmas store I've been to--so I'm guessing the spices include cinnamon. The third time, it was gorgeous. To die for. Exactly what the description sounds like minus the snow. Definitely keeping this one, although I may have to pick and choose where I wear it to carefully.