ivyandpeony

So happy to have tracked this one down! At first there's nothing but sweet pear and apple, but as it dries down they back off a bit and a lovely soft muskiness develops. I'm not getting any clove at all. But I think I'd like it with or without the clove showing up at the party.

Bumping this because a member was looking for it.

You can sign in to your account on the Lab's web site and check your order status there. If something went wrong you won't have a pending order - or if it seems to have been pending too long, e-mail the Lab at customerservice@blackphoenixalchemylab.com.

From their site, it seems that they are resellers of a number of brands but they are not an official BPAL retailer. The Lab may sell older limited editions via Etsy, ebay or trunk shows, but none of their retailers do. Although I don't know anything about this particular shop, businesses like this one aren't necessarily bad - there are a number on ebay that sell decants of high-end perfumes and I've purchased scents from some of them over the years. Basically it's like you are buying from a forum member or ebayer who is reselling for profit. The Lab already got their money when the bottle was originally sold and their customer service can't help you if you aren't happy with your purchase, but you might be able to find a rare bottle that isn't available.

I think that alcohol can cause vasodilation (think of the stereotypical guy with the red face leaning over the bar) - of course, different degrees for different people, but it would make sense that drinking alcohol might increase your skin's sensitivity to certain things like cinnamon. I wore Jailbait once and got hot and sweaty and that's the only time that it ever made me break out.

I'm closing this thread because the Lab is no longer using CCNow as its credit card processor. Can I get an AMEN and a HALLELUJAH! Please feel free to PM me if you have any questions about this thread.

I loved this so much I split it from the original topic it was in I don't have a full list yet, but I would HAVE to put The Witch Queen in one of the witch-y villainess bottles, probably Malifecent (even though TWQ is technically a Gaiman character). I think it's my favorite of all the BPAL scents inspired by wicked ladies real or fictional. I really wish these bottles would become a reality - although that could easily mean that Disney would have some cheap, smelly eau de toilette to fill each one. I would prefer buying them to fill myself, even if that meant they were at a higher price point as "collectibles."

I think that birch can sometimes smell like camphor or wintergreen, too - and it can vary from batch to batch of the component. Back when the Lab did a Dracula series for Halloween (2006, I think?) there was a blend called The Carpathian Mountains. I sniffed someone else's bottle and loved it, but the bottle I got when I ordered turned out to be a bit too camphor-y for me. And Hamadryad was well known for batch variations (minty vs. non-minty, which I think could have been due to birch with and without a camphor-y component.)

It is that time of year again - possibly my favorite update! I haven't even begun to narrow my huge list down yet. I'm still at the "buy it now, or wait for reviews" stage of evaluating all my wants. I can attest that Sin in the Pumpkin Patch & Snakes in the Pumpkin Patch are on my must list. I tried both of them at DragonCon and was wishing I could take them both home that day. The pumpkin is rich and orange without any kind of vegetable quality and just deepens the spices in each blend. A World Where There Are Octobers was also there but I didn't skin test it. It seemed very woody and I liked it on bottle sniff, but in general woody scents need some sweet component(s) to work on me. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the must-haves and meh's as the Halloween season approaches!

Thanks so much for the suggestions! I'm happy to have tracked down decants of the other pumpkin patches I was interested in - Alice, Morocco & Dorian. I love Samhain as a room scent but it just doesn't work as a perfume for me. But what's funny is that my list of top 10 GCs would definitely include Snake Oil, Sin, Alice, & Morocco and possibly Dorian. I've been intrigued from the start by the idea of Alice in the Pumpkin Patch but I wondered if delicate Alice could stand up to the pumpkin & spices. I'm thinking that Snakes & Sin may smell a little more different from one another as they've aged a tiny bit, so I think I won't rush to divest myself of one or the other.

OK, Pumpkin Patch fans, I need some help. . . I bought Sin in the Pumpkin Patch and Snakes in the Pumpkin Patch. They smell really, really similar on the skin. I love Alice, Morocco and Dorian, but didn't buy those pumpkin versions. Tell me if I need to keep both of the ones that I have, if one can go, &/or if I need to add one of the ones I skipped! I'm completely befuddled.

Last year's pumpkin patch had a vanilla-pumpkin blend that smelled caramel-y to a lot of people (Pumpkin V from 2012). If you really want to avoid hunting down LEs, you might try layering Miskatonic U with Jack to see if it comes close.

Lemon-Scented Sticky Bat is, to me, just intense sugared lemon drops. (You can find it here - http://www.blackphoenixalchemylab.com/stickybat.html) I love Shanghai but the green tea note is very prominent to me. But then again, green tea smells sort of lemony to my nose. And Shanghai is GC so you can order an imp to try it out.

I know it varies for all of us, but for me the purest, simplest vanilla is Detestable Putrescence. You can find it here: http://www.blackphoenixalchemylab.com/gris.html

There's a thread right here about lemon scents - http://www.bpal.org/topic/20230-lemon-lemon-lemony-goodness I am sure you will find lots of ideas! (I'll merge this thread with that one after you've gotten some more responses.)

I love that softness you get from orange blossom & neroli as well. A few years back I read a book on perfumery and in a brief discussion of white florals, the author said that most of them contain a substance called indole that contributes to the deep, heady scent. Indole also naturally occurs in feces. It really clicked on a light bulb over my head. I love white florals, I really do, but sometimes it's like they're so good they're bad. Or vice-versa. My favorite orange blossom scent is Jezebel. I think the honey & orange blossom are a great combination. Now I have to go thru my imps and bottles and see what else I've been loving with these notes!

The first time I tried Jack, all I got was the buttered popcorn smell too. It was so buttery it made me ill. I stuck the imp away and forgot about it so much that I didn't even think to be cautious the first time I ordered Halloween pumpkin scents. I finally remembered to try Jack a couple of years later, and the butter had faded and it had aged into something I could actually wear. But of all the pumpkin scents I've tried since then, and I have many, only one has been a huge disappointment, and that was The Shattered Pumpkin, from tthe Sleepy Hollows in 2008. It was just a watery pumpkin guts scent and I was so glad I only ordered a decant. (Typically I go straight to bottle purchases for my Halloweenies.) That pumpkin note is the only thing that will keep me from eventually ordering Theme in Yellow, if it smells like raw pumpkin guts with a candle burning inside. I just don't care for that smell. . . . YES, that is exactly the smell I was thinking of when I was talking about how pumpkin can have a weird vegetable smell! If I want to smell that, I'll just carve a pumpkin. Or open a can. I don't want to wear it. I have tried most of the returning scents and have bottles of the ones that I love - enough bottles that I may not make an effort to hoard more, but I never say never Day of the Skulls and Dia de los Muertos are two of my "older" favorites, and I really loved Ghosts In Love and Le Revenant last year. And I have numerous years' incarnations of Samhain. Odd thing is I very, very rarely wear it. It gets very heavy and masculine as a perfume on me, but I love making room sprays with it or using it in an oil warmer. It really is the ultimate autumn scent. I bought Hell-Gate the first year it appeared - it took me a long time to decide whether I liked it or not. I love the clove, but the other notes end up making it very masculine on me (this is a recurring theme. My chemistry doesn't seem to possess much ability to feminize or sweeten a scent, so if I want those qualities I have to buy them up front!) I am pretty sure it's the black musk that's the ringleader. But it smells incredible on so many people. The really sweet, candy-based scents are often just way too sweet for me (I'm thinking Creepy, Sticky Pillowcase, Suck It, those types of scents). But Ooky is tempting me! It sounds like it might be brightened up with the spices and lemon zest.

Jack was one of the first imps I ordered yon many years ago. . . and wow, I hated it! The buttery note kills it for me (and has killed every scent since, where it's been included). But I've found many pumpkin scents I do love along the way. Pumpkin Queen, Pumpkin Latte, Pumpkin Cheesecake, quite a few of the pumpkin patch scents from its many iterations too. So I don't think the butteriness accompanies the pumpkin in many BPAL perfumes. I think Theme in Yellow sounds incredible - it's on my list!

I'm not sure if I'm going to just order it now or wait til reviews come in, but I am really intrigued by Autumn Fancies. Sounds like it might be a fantastic scent in this category!

Have you tried Eden? It's in the Wanderlust category. It's a cool coconut scent - very green and figgy as opposed to a creamy candied coconut. The green component reminds me of the bright figginess of The Apothecary, which would also be a great room scent.

That's the exact reaction I get from cinnamon & cassia. I've even reacted to the same two perfumes! I don't avoid those notes but I do use caution if I'm planning to test or wear a scent with one or both. Always wait as long as possible after showering, apply some unscented lotion to make a bit of a barrier and an odd one I've learned: don't wear those notes in warmer weather or when I'm doing something that might make me too warm. I had Jailbait on one day and got a call that my out-of-town guests were headed in a day early. In my cleaning and organizing frenzy I started getting red and itchy everywhere I'd dabbed Jailbait! Oh, and the same routine works for me too - wash it off and apply some hydrocortisone cream. Back to normal in a jiffy.

I've never tried Uninhibited, but I found a list of notes: Top notes: bergamot, orange and aldehydes. Heart: heliotrope, ylang-ylang, geranium, rose, jasmine and tobacco. Base: cedar, musk, sandalwood, vanilla and vetiver. I'll see if I can think of anything that sounds similar! And now I have Gypsies Tramps & Thieves stuck in my head too.

I'm going to lock this topic so we can keep the convo all in one spot. Thank you for posting the link, SadariEveningstar!

Bumping this because I got a PM asking about this, then somehow it disappeared before I could respond! I apologize to the sender! Funny thing is, after not wearing this in what seems like forever, I pulled it out last weekend and wore it Friday and Saturday. And that has inspired me to try again to see if I can find a good BPAL combo that replicates it! I only have this teeny roller bottle of UD Sin and I know it won't last forever.

That was one of the first scents to pop into my head, too! My two favorites that would fit this bill are Carfax Abbey and The Castle, both from the Dracula (Halloween) series from fall 2006. So they could be harder to find just because of the amount of time that's passed, but you can keep an eye out in Swaps and in Lab overstock sales on Etsy. (Both have aged beautifully, BTW, so that's always a plus.) The Castle - A distant whisper of pine, wet moss and dry leaves passing through vast halls and winding dungeons whose scent bears the memory of blood, faded splendor, imperial elegance and stunning violence. I actually find this much warmer than expected - I think there may be some amber & patchouli in there representing the "faded splendor" and "imperial elegance." It is one of the very few BPAL scents with blood in the description that either doesn't contain dragon's blood resin or contains so little that it doesn't get sharp on my skin, too. Carfax Abbey - The scent of abandoned places, of desolation and emptiness: heavy woods and thin dusty herbs touched by the wafting incense of a nearby chapel. This does have a dusty quality but the woods and resins are dominant. It truly does evoke an empty, desolate church.