modillian

Frau Holle when it was fresh was a fir scent mitigated by slushy/snow overtones, but after a couple years of aging it's morphed into a more purely fir scent which remains surprisingly nice.

I find Megaera (Orris, black amber, bergamot, plum and grapefruit) is an even BETTER version of Lucky You (Ruby red grapefruit, crushed green leaves, blue poppy, and star jasmine, lower notes of sandalwood, amber and musk), though it's a bit fruitier. Cheshire Cat (Grapefruit, red currant, dark musk, Roman chamomile, delphinium, and lavender) or Kitsune-Tsuki (Asian plum, orchid, daffodil, jasmine and white musk) may also fit the bill. And a request: Anything resembling Hugo Boss's Deep Red for Women? To me it smells almost chocolate-y with a some florals and a heady waft. The 13 series might be appropriate for what I'm looking for, but there are so many of those by now that wouldn't even know where to start. Scent description of Deep Red: Green and sensuous, with citrus, woods and spices. Rich fruity fragrance with powdery undertones. Contains Black Currant, Tangerine, Ginger Blossom, Freesia, Sandalwood, Cedarwood and Vanilla. I'm pretty sure it's the combination of the foodyness of the currant and vanilla that translates as "chocolate! " to my nose, with the tangerine imparting a fresh sensation and very little detectable wood notes. I've already tried Megaera, Cheshire Cat, and The Candy Butcher, which are good but the last two were too foody for me (I want to nom off my hand when I wear them!) So if y'all've got suggestions for anything else that's...mmm, chocolate-and-floral-seeming(even if chocolate isn’t a listed note, LOL), or currant-tea-floral that doesn't have too much musk in it, that would be helpful for me.

A sepulchral, desolate scent. Long-dead soldiers, oath-bound; the perfume of their armor, the chill wind that surges through their tower, white bone and blackened steel: white sandalwood, ambergris, wet ozone, galbanum and leather with ebony, teak, burnt grasses, English ivy and a hint of red wine. Smells pretty nifty first on. Something rich, woody, and green-spicy. Could be excellent for a man as well as a woman. I can't smell the notes individually, but the wine isn't detectable, let alone sour as I'd fear, the ambergris doesn't overpower everything else, and neither does the ozone. It's wonderfully well-balanced. The longer it wears on, the richer and headier the perfume gets. After a while the ozone gets a bit more distinction, but not annoying or sinus-irritating at all. Seriously, I would not have pegged myself as liking this as much as I do. Not like a cemetery at all, but beautifully alive and unfolding like a flower. After 4-5 hours it wears down to just the ebony, teak, and grasses, but before then it was so wonderful I'd recommend The Black Tower to just about anyone as an example of smooth, complex, heady, unisex scent. If you like this I'd recommend Kubla Khan and Thanatos too, maybe Tavern of Hell for something girlier with the same sophisticated, woody "feel". Amazing, just amazing. I don't know how often I'd actually wear a scent like this, it's not a very "me" personal scent, but it's be great in a burner or a room scent or to perfume laundry and clothes, etc. I am honestly so shocked by how much I like The Black Tower, since half the notes rarely work on me, but it works anyway!

*Note, patchouli generally does not work on me, and chocolate-ish things only work half the time. If you love patchouli then you might be wilder about wearing Tezcatlipoca than me. Omg. OMGZ?!?! I'm smelling...chocolate? And flowers? And wood?! And maybe a little musk? This is insaaaaaane and yet good. Aha, looking at the description, maybe not musk but leather, the oily kind. I am so shocked that I like this, I expected it to completely blow up in my face. The chocolate fades from topnote to midnote pretty quickly and the incense/patchouli scent is on top. Still, this is insanely good, and I can bear patchouli stank when it's mild like this. The flowers are detectable but also a midnote, something pungent like moonflower or jasmine or freesia. After an hour the woods and flowers balance themselves out, chocolate and leather as a minor back notes. There is surprisingly little throw as well. Someone compared this to Snake Oil, and I can see it since they're both in the foody/incensey category. I put SO on my other arm to compare. Tezcatlipoca is spicier and drier with that more BO stank of patchouli while SO (mine aged 1 year) is more roundly vanilla and sweet musk. It dries down to rather smelly patchouli so I'll need to take more time to consider whether to keep it, since Tezcatlipoca is so wonderful otherwise. This is maybe not a body scent for me but would be insanely wonderful as a room scent/clothes scent/in a locket.

Wet: Smells...antiseptic, with a touch of steel wash basin and medicinal soap. I'll wait it out. Dry:...still nothing but antiseptic with a vaguely citrus tinge. Reminds me of Black Opal with the mineraly-ness detectable under the cleaning fluid. I'm guessing this is copal? If it is, I'm not impressed, because it drowns out everything else, even the incense. I have no idea why this smells so odd on me. After a while some weak florals rise up and Xiuhtecuhtli makes a good imitation of Black Opal plus Antique Lace, but it's waaay too late to save this oil from the swap-bag.

This works perfectly on me, but somehow I don't like the combination of florals (which reads "blue" to me, and "blue" scents don't work on my skin, which is different than the salty and bitter oceanic or refreshing water notes, which read as "clear" to me.) Something about the jasmine here is different, much less grating and biting, and the latter of which I am learning is the way I prefer jasmine, funnily enough. I didn't know what olive and champaca blossoms smelled like, just their stem-y biproducts, but I do not like them here. :/ What a disappointment!

I like vanilla. I love orchids. Ginger gives me pause Bah Humbug! It's the freaking ginger, it smells like my grandmother's housecleaning fluid! I've tried a few ginger blends and ALL of them have flopped on me. I give up on ginger!

Wooo, grassy and musky! Reminds me a lot of Coyote with some Death Cap dirt and spice thrown in. Not my type of thing at all, too much of the sweetgrass in there.

In bottle: Insanely sweet. Wet on skin: Insane potpourri. Just insane. Supersweet fake fruits like in air fresheners, and then spiciness like cinnamon that's completely impersonal. Insane potpourri is all I can think. Aw man, I really wanted to like this one. Plum is so delicious on me in Megaera, and I like carnation single notes, but this just turned into the supersweet fake potpourri my father's mother likes to use. Also, it's making my wrist itch.

In bottle: smells acetonic, not good. Wet on skin: completely delicious. O.o Soft and resinous, with a very sweet note in the middle mixing with the lower resins. Ah, the supersweet note is the berries and the slight powderyness is the rose. The is beautiful, a powdery-soft perfume perfect for a girl or woman emulating a wintery puff of snow. Similar in theme to Snow Bunny. Unfortunately, the wood notes don't show up enough, and eventually the sweetness amped with the white amber reminds me too much of the sickening sweet pea note even if it doesn't quite achieve the Herculean nauseating quality. I won't be keeping it, but I can appreciate the artistry nonetheless.

Floral, somber, purple-y in the bottle. We on skin, still "purple" with quiet herbs in the background. Ah, and maybe a pinch of patchouli. The rose is quiet, only backing up the benzoin. Gentle, lolling, a round and complete scent. It's reminding me of Phantom Queen, but this isn't nearly as flat-out sexy. It's more...not comforting, but solid, sturdy. This is the candles lit when it's your bedtime but your parents are staying up later; the scent drift through your slightly ajar door along with the dim candlelight, their murmured voices. When you get up in the middle of the night for a glass of water, the moon greying the kitchen, you wet your hands in the sink and smell the lingering perfume. Here, the myrrh amps over time to softly melt into the rose and benzoin to be a perfectly calm and soothing scent. After a while the moss invokes a slight acetonish tinge (moss and I do not go together), which would be the only drawback to this lovely GC scent. Thanatos would be perfect as a bedtime scent for me, no astringent lavender that's supposed to be somnolent but ends up irritating. Thanatos would be an amazing room scent too.

Smells like licorice in the bottle! Smells like LEATHER WOAH BABY on the skin. Like, not finished leather, but the unfinished stuff on the inside of a glove or inside a coat or pocket, with the little nubs. Raw leather, the low softness and the higher tannin-y waft. No detectable licorice. Ten minutes later it's developing a kind of mealy...breadness? Cakeness? A grain-ish sweetness. Which must be the gaufrette. But so much leather, blargh! No licorice for me. :\ ETA: DOUBLE BLAAARGH, had to wash it off after ten minutes, too yucky.

In bottle: Oooooh, so different than R'lyeh! Spicy and aquatic, but not as dank with ambergris. Wet on skin: Ohhhhhhhhhhh! I like it! More powdery than R'lyeh, more floral. More of a waft too. This reminds me of my grandmother's fancy soap, but in a very good way. Something slightly nasal, like a lily going on, but not too much, just to cut the powderyness. More of an aqua-floral than a straight-up aquatic to my nose. Gets extremely wafty, inducing a mild headache. It's not exactly a "me" scent, may have to relegate it for dress-up or show-off purposes only. It works alright on me, but may go to the swaps simply because I can't imagine reaching for this as even a 10th or 15th choice when I want to wear perfume.

The oil is perfectly clear and runs like water. Smells like in this order: vanilla, sugar, mint, plastic from the shrink wrap. Good, interesting, but not something I'd wear all the time, since I am neither a candy-cane person nor a minty person. A good scent, though, and I'm sure I'll use up my tester. ...Then again, the longer I wear this the more I like it. It's very wearable. Refreshing, familiar...hmm. May need to invest in a full imp after all. 8D <---sign of the crazy bpal collector. It stays on as a soft skin scent for more than eighteen hours. However if I want others to smell this I'll need to reapply every five hours or so, and I really do want that. ETA: Must Find Bottle! I really like this one for the vanilla-y musk and the lightness of the mint, and the other ones seem too minty for me.

Mmmm, I still love Polyhymnia for woodiness. It reminds me of fancy old wood furniture with just a touch of lemon polish.

This is reminding me a lot of The Jersey Devil. Sweet, floral, green. It has the same "evergreen" note as The Jersey Devil. More perfumey though. *looks at notes* Ahahahahaha, it's PINE, very cool pine though, almost unrecognizable, like obsidienne said. Lots of herbs and flowers too. I'm not picking up any musk or flax though. These are "garden at dewy midnight" herbs and florals, though, not spice-cabinet smells. There's a heavy first blast of floral waft going on before it settles into softer florals, the mildest pine, and the delicious slushy note I've just begun to love. The staying power is formidable, about twenty hours for me. It sticks close to the skin after eight hours, but lingers and lingers and lingers after that. Amazing. Must get a bottle.

**Note: this is a frimp, and I mostly dislike rose. In the bottle: Blarg! Watery light pink flowers! The smell of an absolutely spineless person. Oh, roses. Well that makes sense. ROSE HATE, GRR. On skin: Pink roses and green shrubbery. Fresh and clean. A high sugary note emerging, too sweet like aspartame. Unfortunately, rose reminds me of nothing so much as expensive soap and my grandmother, most of the time, and Lucy's Kiss is proving the rule and not the exception. Drying: If by rose they mean pink rose and carnation plus watery notes, they're right. If by "Victorian spices" the lab means fructose and dusting powder that makes me cough, then they're right too. Yikes. This "works" on me but isn't my style at all. Dries down to a vague rose note.

In bottle: Ooooh, this is interesting. A buttery sweet smell, maybe honey? With some nose-tingling spices. My interest is piqued. Wet on skin: oh yum. More honeyed gentle spices, reminding me of the buttered pralines that went sadly wrong in Gluttony. There's something dark weighing this down and making it stable. A mead-y scent, maybe? But without the alcoholic notes. I haven't tried anything quite like it. Drying: Hmmm, interesting! Getting drier and clearer. This is remind me of buttered toast for some reason. Ooh yes, spices coming out, making it quite different. The dark spiced not (amber? But amber like I've never experienced it!) is coming to the forefront. *looks at notes* Oh yum, ambergris! Yes, the spiced ambergris is very light here, and the grey amber is indeed what I detected before. The vanilla and musk makes the honeyed note. I can't detect any lily or orris, and I don't know what emeli or sea moss smells like. The sea notes make it weird enough that it's unsettling as it wears on, but it's still ultrasmooth and nummy. After six hours I get some of the musk-worry with it being too sweet. This remains a light, pleasant, unobtrusive blend to wear when I want to feel "finished" in an outfit with perfume, but not to make people double-take with sniffing. It's almost a skin-scent. I can't believe a musk actuall works on me! I don't think I'll use more than an imp, but I remain impressed with the ingenuity here.

In bottle: Flowers? On skin: Flowers. Since I've just tried it, I know for sure there's nag champa note in it. It's sweeter and lighter than Midnight on the Midway, though, and no smoke. Vanilla is prominent. Drying: This gets very, very dirty more than MotM even. More of the incense than the vanilla now. It's okay, but a weaker version of MotM so I don't need to keep it.

In bottle: Woo, cherries! On Skin: Woo, fake cherries! Oh man, this is like that Strawberry Shortcake doll scent, where she smelled like fruit and powdery plastic. Drying: BLAAARGH. *nauseous* Hokay, washing off now. Note: I still dislike cherry scents, and most almond scents except for Hecate. Also, I took a chance on orange blossom here, but I can't tell if it went sour on me as it tends to or if it was the disgusting cherry all on its own.

Wet on skin: This is a frimp. I would never have ordered something like this for myself. That being said, this is gorgeous. It changes, gets headier and thicker, the florals growing, the light salty aquatics/"airy" ozone remaining in the back. Really, really gorgeous, and no vetiver or wine at all in the beginning. The scent layering here is incredible. Let's see what these mystery notes all are, shall we? nicotiana: tobacco plant. Really? Yes really. Wiki tells me nicotiana is also a member of the nightshade family. Niiice. Nicotiana=nicotine. Fancy that. bois de chandel: called dragon tree or candle tree in english....ah-ha. Some more fancying-up of terms here too. Wiki reveals: A bright red resin, dragon's blood, is produced from D. draco and, in ancient times, from D. cinnabari. Some species such as D. deremnsis, D. fragrans, D. godseffiana, D. marginata, and D. sanderiana are popular as houseplants. Rooted stem cuttings of D. sanderiana are widely marketed in the U.S.A. as "Lucky Bamboo", although only superficially resembling true bamboos. I've had Lucky Bamboo. I've also been peddled unrefined DRAGON'S BLOOD, my arch nemesis. I...can't tell if it's present in the scent though. Damn. elemi: Aromatic elemi oil is steam distilled from the resin. It is a fragrant resin with a sharp pine and lemon-like scent. One of the resin components is called amyrin. Elemi is chiefly used commercially in varnishes and lacquers, and certain printing inks. Elemi is used as a herbal medicine. I do detect something like this here. garambullo: The garambullo is a cactus that grows in arid and semiarid zones; it bears a purple fruit which contains pigments belonging to the betalain family. It also appears to contain some kind of acid used in scientific studies for food science. O.O pega pega: a species of bamboo. flame of the forest: also called parrot tree and Kinshuk. A deciduous tree with, surprise surprise, bright and startling red flowers. A floral note I suppose. Drying: Well! All that certainly explains the tropical juiciness of this blend. And oh, how it is juicy, and light and sweet. A few heady flowers and the sweet saps of these plants. Wonderful, exotic, refreshing. No wine and only the lightest, most pleasant vetiver, yes! The fresh dewy quality is similar to citris with the elemi, but more akin to the yuzu acting in Night-Gaunt or Aizen-Myoo. It's a totally different green scent than the fir-y Nocnitsa or ephervescent Hemlock, and it's one that I really enjoy.

In bottle: I received a half-imp as a frimp from a generous seller. Mmm yum, surprisingly astringent and yet delicious! Wet on skin: Yes, that musk-dragon's blood's "blood" note (yes, daemonorops, I recognize you sneaking into my bpal box!) is similar to the one in Valentine of Rome. It's not as metallic here. I like it. The sweet note of honey-current is on top. Dry on skin: I expected to totally dislike this. Why on earth would I like musk on top of dragon's blood(another musk! and a bloody one!) and too-sweet HONEY? I mean, currant and kush are always delicious, but the other ones are tooooo smelly, right? Wrong. This is freaking awesome. The smells melt and mute, growing more delicious by the hour. The first incitive bite is bloody musk, followed by a softer waft of amberhoney mimicing a floral. I think I'm liking oils that have a preliminary hard bite (acidic fruit, singed smoke, bitter metal) and then softer notes under it (orris, buttery resins, florals, currant, amber). I have so much perfume by now I don't know how I would fit this into my repetoir, but I think I'll try. I may have to hunt down a bottle of Anactoria, because it's so very awesome.

Odd, I thought I'd already reviewed this one! It's only strange because Midnight on the Midway has rocketed up into my top five BPALs ever. It starts off with a huge bang, the powerful jasmine-perfumy waft tussling with the, yes it actually smells like that, sugary-vanilla-incense, a very strong champaca. I love jasmine, I love incense, and putting the two together sends me into raptures. I already just liked MotM for the opening blast, but then it dries down to a middle sugary smokiness at three hours, and then to a faint vanilla smoke at eight hours. Incredible. (My top five also includes Polyhymnia, Love in the Asylum, and Anactoria, so my preference for throaty smokey florals is well-established. If you like the same, you'll love Midnight on the Midway.)

In the bottle, peach and something murky. On the skin, the peach hits high right above the florals, but the contrast with the base notes is killer. They match each other, the high and low, and the contrast is very cruel indeed. This is a very fresh blend, surprisingly. Jonquil is narcissus, kind of a breathy bite in the back of the throat, very distinctive. Galbanum is a musky resin. Vetiver is woody smokey basalmy stuff, which I can only detect a little. The amber throws a great deal, yessss. Holy crap that's a lot of narcissus. I like it, but it's strong here. This matches the concept well, but it's not my favorite floral/fruity/resin blend ever.

This is reedy, aquatic, and fresh with a little bit of spice in the back. The sandalwoods mingle well in the back, and olibanum is...frankincense, a resin. Huh, didn't see that one coming. Well, I vaguely recognize that smell now, from church, and it's definitely the dominant note in the blend. Strange. But beautiful. Definitely a keeper. Frankincense hitting high on top, middle iris and sandalwood, rounded out with soft spicey myrrh. Very distinctive, but for some reason the with Marquise de Merteuil on my other hand they're both pinging a similar fresh smell that renders them...pretty similar, actually. Good, but sadly it doesn't fit my personality at all. It's a pity I'm losing out on the most beautiful woman in the world.