Casablanca

Nice. The Air and the Ether has a classic perfume quality, but I like it a bit more. Initially, I get an airy lavender, an ambergris-amber blend, and musk that makes me think of both white and skin musks. There's a little powdery texture to the scent, a white musk sort of powder, but nothing that takes over. The amber moves smoothly into ambergris, like a gradient. Ambergris can be iffy for me, but the amber seems to help. This is sweet, from amber or something else. Maybe both. When the oil has dried, the lavender lingers still, rather than vanishing quickly in volatility. The notes blend more and soften. They also lose some depth, and give me a stronger impression of classic perfume. I love the initial stage of the blend, but the stronger classic perfume impression after drydown doesn't resonate with me, so I might just enjoy the decant.

This smells a lot to me like the creamy mallow-sugar-lavender combination in De Vos' Unicorn, plus a little not-very-foody gingerbread. Didn't expect to smell mallow based on the above reviews, but it's definitely more sugary lavender than gingerbread. I'm glad I picked this up!

Old, sour, balsamic brown leather with hints of frankincense and hay. This one is just a bit of a crash and burn on my chemistry, I think.

A potent dry and pale sandalwood warmed with ambergris and made a bit antique with a little cognac. Ambergris can go salty on me, but this one doesn't. The mood of this is sophisticated and mature, but unfortunately it goes powdery on my skin in drydown.

An unexpected blend from the listed notes... A pale and gentle cognac musk lightly touched and sweetened with honey. There's a soft and clean perfumey quality to it; sometimes I think I catch a whiff of bergamot or petitgrain there. Behind that is a swirl of light balsamic woods, well-blended and mild. This is complex and does remind me of a pastoral landscape scene, an oil painting. It's not quite for me, but I'm really glad I got to try it.

Fuzzy-wuzzy dark and ambery musk! I soon get a lot of myrrh joining them. Yup. Fuzzy black musk (something like furry musk, vetiver, and lemon myrtle) with golden resins. It's not for me, but it's neat.

Bergamot honey and white sandalwood, with a hint of salt. I amp the salt as this dries, which seems common for me. In this case, I think I amp it too much.

I mostly get a vanilla mint from Fishtail that reminds me of how Alisz smelled to me before it settled -- like mostly sweet vanilla mint. There's also a bit of a dried brown quality that seems like a plant husk, and some cedar warmth. The cedar comes out much more in drydown, and a pleasant hint of soft patch appears. If this settles like Alisz did, the non-mint notes will come out more fully with time.

A fresh, fizzy, coolly forested gin and tonic. This is a high-end cocktail with some novel ingredients. The juniper reminds me of the one in The Crescent Moon, but the rest of the notes put quite a different spin on it. I'm enjoying this more than expected, considering I'd normally drink a G&T but not wear one. This freshness and forest pine add the right fun and novelty.

2017 Sweet, minty snow, with scant hints of the cologne-like dead leaves note. Mostly sweet, minty snow.

2018 Potent AF. I think Lambs-Wool may be the first perfume to last all night on my skin, persisting from evening to morning, with barely a dimming in its strength since it dried. It goes on me as an intense, apple-pulpy, spiced cider scent -- perfumey and boozy, rich and foody. This is a soft, cooked apple smell, rather than a fresh, crisp, just-bitten apple. It reminds me a little of the apple in the Dead Leaves, White Sage, and Apples atmo, to the point where I'm craving some white sage in this to ease its mighty sweetness and foodiness, like that one has. The blend becomes more boozy on me for a time as it dries, but then that part settles again. Otherwise it's not a morpher on me, just full of oomph and longevity.

This one is warming and surprisingly comforting to me on this day that's so bitey with the cold. It reminds a lot of Mexican hot cocoa, without crossing into being too foody. Freshly applied, I can smell the pistachio and hazelnut mingling with spiced cacao. I love hazel trees and hazelnut flavors and smells, but this might be my first pistachio scent (?). I love eating pistachios, though, and I'm enjoying its note. Dried, the nut scents fade, leaving a cozy and heartening spiced cacao. This is a dry cacao, which reads as less foody to me than the creamy milk chocolate sort, and I'm a fan. It combines beautifully with the red chili and clove. "Heartening" is my one-word description for this blend. It has been lifting my mood all morning, and I'm very pleased I picked it up.

😍 This smells like the pure lavender and clean, fresh white sage essential oils from my favorite soap made this year, but additionally sweetened with sugary, honey-warm vanilla. After Incolumitas dries, a mild patchouli comes in as a soft base and support, merely joining the above notes, not calling attention to itself. This blend is sweetly lovable. I was concerned with this one that once I tested it, I'd be sad not to be able to get bottle(s). Several of my favorite notes are in its list. That's come true, but I'll much enjoy the sample.

Very first impression: Blink. That's a thickly sweet musk. Brain tries to parse things: Cottony lavender musk with a bit of saltiness like ambergris, and a lot of sugary -- even gooey -- coconut-marshmallow sweetness. Drydown: Saltiness rising. Goodness, this one is a rocking ship, with all the salt and sweetness. Kitty ahoy? Dried: The storm passes, the salt spray settles, clouds part and reveal the moon. This has relaxed into simple, soft cotton musk, and it reminds me of Wynken, Blynken, and Nod. Puppet Kitty went some unexpected directions on my skin at first, but it quickly settled into a calmer, simpler, skin-soft scent.

The Old King is sacrificed, dismembered, and returned to the earth so the land may be renewed and nourished. The death knell of the Old Order so life may begin anew: juniper and yew berry, black pine, white sage, soil, and pyre smoke. Fresh on my wrists, the Eternal King is black pine, dark juniper, and woody yew berries swirling with a ghostly sage smoke. As the blend starts to dry, I also start to smell black, hard-packed soil. And then the yew berries mostly take over, upon drydown, as they did on me in that earlier moon, Bergelmir. Eternal King dries into yew berries and black earth. The Eternal King begins with the mood of a dark mystery. It's like a found-footage reel showing nothing but a shaking view of shadows and smoke in the woods at night, with some running and panting (and falling). It's not footage that answers any next-morning investigator questions about where all the screaming kids went and what's with the burnt effigy and large footprints. I wish I were drawn to the way yew berries smell on my skin. We don't seem to quite love each other, so I think the decant will be enough. But I'll hope for sage and smoke and conifers together again sometime.

First impression on skin: Soft grey and slightly creamy fur-musk among honeysuckle and dandelion. After a few minutes: Add in some blended grasses and herbs. I get sage on a meadow background. Settles into an herbal-green dandelion-honeysuckle musk. This is spring-like, but I think I'll need it in a year-round box, rather than the spring or autumn ones. Then I can enjoy it anytime. 🐇

Ghost-Faced Bat's first impression on me is a pretty, sugared vanilla coconut meat with a dollop of honey. It definitely gives a coconut meat impression, rather than just coconut, though there's nothing coconut-watery about it. I like this phase. In drydown, the honey grows a bit, but stays secondary. I start to smell benzoin and sweet condensed milk in the mix. After this dries, something smells a tad off on me, and I like the blend a bit less from that point. I think it might be a chemistry quirk with the condensed milk. This might settle down on its own, or I could add a little vanilla or honey scent to the blend later to help it along. Nice blend.

In the bottle: Movie theater butter-flavored oil. Wet on me: Movie theater butter-flavored oil and a little chalky-yellow buttermilk. Dry on me: Movie theater butter-flavored oil. Good cause. Wanted goat's milk from this, though.

Hm, neat! On the wand, this was all heavy, smoky birch tar. But on my skin, night jasmine and maple appear out of nowhere in the smoke, like a magic trick. Lots of smoky birch tar with well-blended jasmine, maple, and pine. Hints of patchouli and sage add touches of deep earth and cool herb. The jasmine is more calm than usual in this one. She is smudged on all sides with smoke and warmed with maple. I will need a bottle.

Like Poofie described, I get a creamy, sweet amber on my skin as the first thing. Alongside that I find hay, dried husks, and sunflowers. Mm. In drydown, I find a fresh white tea note that brings an airy and cool feeling over the husk and sunflower amber base. Once this has dried, I catch a mild cologne that I think VetchVesper mentions. Soon after that, the blend as a whole dims to a skin-soft level. Later still, the cologne impression fades and my wrist is just softly sweet and ambery. This was a certain bottle upgrade until I got to the cologne and quick fade-out of the perfume. Not really sure now, but will retest.

This one is nicely potent on my skin. Wet: A surprisingly perfume-musky vanilla mingling with dry incense and dead leaves. That's about the order of the notes in their strength on me. Drydown: Sometimes I think I get a little fruity, peach-like scent in the mix. Nothing pulpy, more like a shampoo scent. The dead leaves assert themselves a bit more. Dry: The vanilla has calmed significantly and I get more of the dry incense and dead leaves.

I went to Chaparral Elementary School, and still think of the plants as almost synonymous with southwest Calif landscape. I love seeing it as a listed note, and enjoy the desert-y plant scent I get from it. This blend goes on me very soft, but I get smoky sage, a sweetness, and chaparral, in about that order. That smoky sage... Mm. But the sage loses its smoke quickly. Then, in drydown, the sage mostly fades (weep), and I start to read the oakmoss in that sweetness. The dead leaves also appear. So, this was a sweet, smoky sage and chaparral blend when wet, and sweet oakmoss, dead leaves, and chaparral when dry. I like this blend, but it's short-lived and so skin-soft on me, I'm not sure about a bottle. There's time to retest. I want a long-lived smoky sage blend so, so much. ETA: I was just looking at chaparral stuff, curious because chaparral itself is a plant ecosystem rather than a single plant. I found a few sites mentioning that what's sold as "chaparral extract" is actually from creosote bush. Not sure if creosote is what note this is, but thought it interesting, so sharing.

Despite the bitter almond billing, this blend goes all sweet amaretto on me at first. There's also an effervescence that begins faint, and soon grows into strength. In drydown, cedar warms it up further. I get a little excited whenever I see CO2 in a notes listing, but I never find frankincense or most of the listed notes here. Almond-turned-amaretto is stomping everything else out. So, yeah. Cedary amaretto soda.

Yup. This is Ivy's world. Overgrown tendrils of clean, green ivy. Boughs of juniper and pine mingle in, and the three combine to remind me of that fresh, sticky green odor of trimming hedges. This goes a tiny bit sweet on me as it dries, but still green and clean. Sage is hiding, alas.

Sweet patchouli and dark teak on a stage of other woods. The patch is earthy enough to give the blend texture against the smoother woods. As this dries, mahogany nudges forward, just enough to be known, and later I find hints of copal, but mostly this relaxes into blended woods. This is woody, and its mood is more that of a large indoor hall than the wooded wilds.