ivyandpeony

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Another general thing I thought I should mention - I have noticed more posts lately where people are mentioning severe allergies to certain ingredients, the type that trigger much more dangerous reactions than a mild rash or burning sensation.If you have such an allergy, please do not rely on anecdotal advice from other forum members to protect yourself. The only way you can ascertain whether a blend actually contains an allergen is to ask the Lab directly, by e-mailing them at answers@blackphoenixalchemylab.com.

 

They aren't going to be able to send you a list of all the ingredients for every perfume they've ever sold, of course... You should be able to eliminate some blends by using the search engine on the Lab's website and submit a list to them of some oils you are interested in but suspect could contain the evil allergen. And keep in mind that like so many food products, the Lab's products are all made in the same environment and with the same equipment, so there's a chance that a trace allergen can be found in any product... just sayin'.

I'm quoting myself from some months back just to make a point - I think that if you truly have a life-threatening, potential- anaphlytic-shock-inducing allergy to an ingredient that may be present in one of these perfumes, you need to tread with extreme caution here. Some dermatitis is one thing, a hospital stay or death is another.

For starters, I feel pretty confident that the Lab would be unable to guarantee that cross contamination will never occur - they use the same finite amount of equipment to fill bottles (and imps) with everything from their catalog and LE offerings (I don't think anyone could expect a company to have a separate machine for each of 500+ perfumes). It's cleaned to eliminate the scent of the previous oil before they begin filling bottles with another one - but it's impossible to ensure that every molecule from a previous oil is removed. So while a scent formula may contain none of your known allergens, the pristine bottle of that scent that arrives from the Lab could potentially contain allergens nonetheless, just as foods with no nut ingredients can contain nut particles or residue due to shared factory equipment. I would think very long and hard about whether that risk is worth it to me. It's not your fault and it's not the Lab's fault, it's just the situation.

And although a list seems like a good idea, if it is a life and death question and not a "will I break out" question, I believe that I would want to hear from the Lab directly and not rely on what someone else tells me the Lab told them or what someone else says they can wear safely.

I will try to bring these issues to the attention of someone at the Lab and see if they have any comments - I'm not their lawyer or spokesperson, this isn't even my area of the forum from a mod standpoint - I just get the itchies a lot so I pop in this thread fairly regularly.

If you like any BPAL blends with cocoa or honey, you will flip for this candle. I got one a while back when Beautyhabit was offering a 25% off discount code and although it was still very pricey, I have had a few of the Burn Rare line candles over the past few years and they are incredible - not something that you are going to buy 5 of at a time and burn every day.

But light one and my entire downstairs (something like 1700 square feet) is scented within 20 minutes, and you get a total of something like 90 hours of burn time from one. Just having one sit on a side table is the equivalent of having a big bowl of potpourri in my family room, I can smell it from 12 feet away. (The wax in these is very soft due to the high percentage of fragrant oils, so when I have burned one to a point where I'm not comfortable lighting it one more time, I scrape out the remaining wax and put it in a tart burner).

The notes listed for the Rare Love fragrance are: bitter Mayan cacao absolute, aromatic Ceylon cinnamon bark, Madagascar vanilla bean, Tunisian amber resin, Reunion Isle ylang-ylang, red rose attar, sacred Asian lotus, jasmine sambac, Mysore sandalwood, Nigerian ginger root, Malabar Coast pink pepper and sensual musk. The closest thing I can compare the scent to is Boomslang layered with single note Honey. But the scent quality is SO BPAL-y.

My other favorite from this line is the Amber Resin candle: Golden Amber, Peruvian Balsam, Sumatra Benzoin Crystal, Florentine Orris, Somali Frankincense, Bourbon Isle Vanilla Absolute, Opopanax Resin, and Brazilian Tonka Bean. It reminds me a great deal of Jacob's Ladder, the awesome Yule LE from 2005 & 2006, with a hint of vanilla. ZOMG it is gorgeous.

(BURN also makes liquid soaps and lotions that are available at Beautyhabit - I haven't tried them yet but plan to when I have some spare cash one of these days!)

Gosh, I don't, portalkat, but I wouldn't fret about your timing as far as swaps go. You might have missed the Yules coming down from the site, but you're probably right on time for people to begin realizing they don't have to have that 5th bottle of the Snow Storm or The Shivering Boy that they grabbed

I think Victoria would be lovely on an 11 year old girl - my niece just turned 13 and I would have had no qualms about giving it to her or her stepsister (who is 6 months younger) within the past 2 years or so.

I think there are lots of Mad Tea Party recs in this thread as well as in the one for "very young children" and I definitely agree - there are tons of good ones in that category for young BPALers. There are some lovely light notes to help train sensitive noses, some sweet notes to appeal to kids (and lots of us never outgrow those), lots of citrus which I think is one of the most universally appealing families - and you have the added advantage of not having to explain what a Sacred Whore is.

The Unicorn, Alice, Tweedledum & Tweedledee and Queen of Hearts strike me as scents that would be especially nice on a young lady who doesn't need to explore the worlds of red musk and patchouli just yet.

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Right now I absolutely adore The Oval Portrait--it's sweet, slightly floral, creamy in feel, with that definite complexity of carnation in there! It reminds me, color-wise, of a blushing very pale pink--like a blossom that is so pale a pink it looks like it's just blushing. I just wish I could find a GC that was exactly like it

 

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Victoria (from the Stardust series) reminds me of The Oval Portrait a great deal - V. is a little rosier, TOP has that heady honeysuckle but their underlying feel is similar to me.

Morocco might be my favorite GC carnation scent - although Alice and Maiden are both very carnation-y on me and they're beloved as well. I love BPAL's carnation note(s).

I love Chinatown - to me it's mostly patchouli and florals with a little bit of fruitiness. I haven't consciously noticed a BPAL that resembles it, but I haven't been looking, so I will definitely put on my thinking cap for this challenge. I will have to try Midnight on the Midway again, soon. It's been ages! I remember trying it this summer as I was going through bottles to keep or swap and deciding it was a keeper. (This is a sign of having too many bottles, incidentally, but that's nothing new...)

I'm laughing at myself, I'm wearing Old Moon today and thought, "OMG, this is so good, I have to post about it in that Perfect Winter Scents thread!" Then realized that I had done that exactly a week ago... duh

I'm not sure if it's totally inappropriate to post this here, but the richest, most buttercream-y buttercream I've ever come across is at Heaven and Earth Essentials (the link is to the forum thread) - you can get a straight buttercream scent from them, or a lot of scents with a buttercream component. ...

Since Anna mentioned being unsure about whether it's appropriate to recommend non-BPAL perfumes in this section, I thought I'd clarify that for everyone - this is in no way an admonishment or an Anna-spanking, she's one of my favorites round these parts and she's always so helpful in her responses whether they're here in Recs, in Chatter, in FAQs, etc. *hugs Anna D.*

In general we discourage it, since this is a part of the BPAL-specific area of the forum (I posted about it here about a year ago) - the rationale being that if someone's looking for general scent recs that smell like X,Y, or Z we have Retail Therapy for that so we can reserve this section for BPAL discussion. If every thread was a free-for-all discussion of any and all perfumes that fit the original poster's likes/dislikes/requests, I don't think this subforum would be nearly as useful to BPAL fans who are using it for its intended purpose. The size that the forum has grown to also influenced that decision - now that we have nearly 10,000 members we naturally have many more threads being started, many more posts on a daily basis, and keeping things as organized as possible from the start is much easier than trying to sort things out by splitting threads, merging threads and such. You can read a little more about it in my post in the link above.

In this particular case, we all seemed to be reaching conclusion that Persephanise probably isn't going to find a bread or buttercream BPAL blend - so it made sense for Anna to suggest some favorites she's found elsewhere, and that's cool. If I was seeing posts in "The Best BPAL Vanilla" listing off all of someone's favorite etailer vanillas, that would be another thing; I also don't think it's necessary to steer folks to etailer dupes when they're asking about BPALs that are similar to a favorite perfume. In any case it isn't something that I am going to smite someone for - it really falls under the "good manners" banner to me. And I'm always available by PM if you want to talk about this or anything else going on in Recs.

Alright, enough forum stuff, let's get back to talking about perfume.

I picked up a bottle of Judith and Holofernes about two months ago at the Whole Foods in my area that is carrying the Salon exclusives. When I tried it at the store, I was a little overwhelmed by the patchouli, which seemed dominant and a little raw-edged. But I love the way that patchouli ages and the other notes in the blend are favorites of mine - so I thought I'd invest in a bottle and see how things progressed after it sat in the dark for a little while.

OH! I am so glad that I did! This is sublime. Sweet honey, heady magnolia, spiced up by the patchouli and carnation and held together by the sandalwood. The elements are very nicely balanced and this has the effect of an elegant perfume without seeming overly "perfumy," I think due in part to the way that the Lab's honey and carnation notes are so natural (they smell like honey and carnations, respectively, not honey-scented oil and carnation perfume) and to the patchouli-sandalwood base. This is one of my favorites of all the Salons I have tried.

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ETA: Might be worth a browsa through the Uber Foody Recs, too...

I'd definitely second tartchef's suggestion - the experts on the foodies have been in and out of that thread since its incarnation so you're likely to find some detailed discussion of many scents in there. If you want to search the thread for a term like cake or bread, go down to the bottom left of any given page and enter your term in the box below the last post, then click the Search Topic button beside it.

Of everything I have tried in the BPAL universe, I personally have never been struck by a dominant bready note nor a dominant buttercream note. This doesn't necessarily mean that the blends that you want don't exist, it just means you will have to try a lot of the cake, cookie, and sweet-creamy blends to find out if any of them are going to become what you want them to once they're on your skin. A lot of the foodier scents do have a bit of caramel in them and my chemistry amps caramel so much that I can't smell any of the other notes in the blend, so I don't consider myself the best guide to the foody blends. This caramel thing happened to me with Channikuyah - so there may be some good bakery notes in there that come out on your skin.

They are so hard to find that I almost hate to mention them, but the best and truest cake notes I've found in any BPAL blends are in Monster Bait: Closet and Monster Bait: Underbed. Midway has a bit of a cake-y element to it, but may be sweeter than the brioche that you're seeking.

Searching Reviews for mentions of the word "bread" in reviews, you will find these results, which can give you some ideas to add to your wishlist. (To replicate or to search for another term, put the term in the box on the search engine page, highlight the Reviews forum in the drop down menu, choose search title AND text, and display results as posts or topics, either can be helpful. These results are displayed as posts.)

Have fun searching and trying new scents - be sure to report back and let us know what you find.

(and on a moderator note, I may merge this thread into the big "foody" thread after you get some responses, just for the sake of forum tidiness.)

I took a chance on champaca, which can be the flower of doom for me when it shows up in what otherwise looks like a fabulous blend. There were so many notes that I drool for in Prospero, I had to roll the dice... I adore amber in any shape or form, plum is absolute heaven, and Beth's white musk makes me weep with happiness. So 3 outta 4, pretty good odds!

The plum in this one is absolutely gorgeous, rich and grape-y and winelike - if you even think you like plum, this one's a must try. And the amber is gorgeous and spicy. But dammit, the champaca did it to me again. It must have enjoyed ruining Khajuraho for me so much that it was determined to screw up Prospero too. Ah well, it was fun trying.

I absolutely adore BPAL's white rose note (I could be the only BPAL fan who has at least four bottles of Parlement of Foules, for an example). And that ivy note! It's not used enough in my opinion, and it's so gorgeous and authentic (my house is surrounded by ivy so I know and love that wet green smell).

But when I wear Madeline, my skin grabs the soil note and amps it to the exclusion of anything and everything else in this blend, which smells so marvelous in the bottle. This has happened to me many times before, with Zombi, the venerable King and Queen of Clubs, Penny Dreadful, The Premature Burial, Destroying Angel, Burial, The Death of the Grave Digger... such a long list. So I wasn't really surprised that this was the result I got - just a little sad!

I'm going to give her another try before I send her away forever - hope springs eternal when you love white rose. And I am sure that Madeline is absolutely lovely on that faction of people who smell great with a teeny sprinkle of dirt on their roses.

When my bottle of The Oval Portrait originally arrived from Dark Delicacies, I wasn't sure if I was going to like it (and that disappointed me a little bit - I had with delight when I saw the description for this one).

So today I was going through my bottles, culling a few, and tried it again to decide if it was going to stay or go. And within 30 seconds a resounding "YES!" was heard throughout the land.

There are many bottles that arrive from their travels, still fresh and new from the Lab, that really need to sit in a dark place for a few weeks or more and just calm down. The Oval Portrait was definitely one of them for me. Not a hint of the sharpness that I got when I first tried it - this is a sweet, rich vanilla with layers of flowers on top, most noticeably honeysuckle (which is a fantastic companion for vanilla! I love this combination.)

The Oval Portrait reminds me a bit of Victoria - on me, it's Victoria Leaves Wall and Visits New Orleans. She leaves her tea roses behind and wraps herself in honeysuckle and the result is just delightful. I love it.

theal8r, I was just popping in here to post a comment about an old favorite I rediscovered, and I realized it actually might be a good candidate for what you are looking for.

I have a bottle of Nemesis I bought almost 3 years ago and I hadn't pulled it out and worn it in what seems like months - it has really gotten gorgeous with a little age on it! I always liked it, and like so many BPAL blends it's richer and yummier now.

Nemesis has tons of fig but it's tempered with woody and spicy notes (the description says "cypress, ginger, fig, dried rose, red patchouli, tonka bean and cyclamen"). It's not as green or bright a fig as Strangler Fig, but it's lovely nonetheless.

It may not be that great a solution to my Dublin problem but Old Moon is such a gorgeous winter perfume... at least now that I have Old Moon to love, I can alternate it with Dublin and my Dublin will last longer. (And the longer it lasts, the better chance that the Lab will find a source for the stuff that they can't get right now that went into Dublin, or the artisan who supplied them and had to close shop will be opening again by the time I am using the last drop of my Dublin, right? Right? Please tell me it will happen! Hold me...)

... I was leaning toward Morgause, Nocturne or Marie but I'd love some suggestions!

Of those three, Marie is my favorite because the violet really stands out. I really can't smell it in Nocturne, I think the other florals in that one overwhelm the violet on me - Morgause is lovely but very complex and incense-y, so the violet is a team player but not dominant on me.

Veil has lots of violet on my skin (notes: white sandalwood, lilac, gardenia, violet, orris, lavender and ylang ylang) as does Le Serpent Qui Danse (violet with vanilla and gardenia, but on me the violet is in first place and gardenia's in third, which it doesn't often do).

Faith is a fantastic violet blend - sugared violets, smells just like it sounds and I love it. It's only available in a bottle set, Hope and Faith, The Siamese Twins (part of Carnaval Diabolique) and since you're on the fence about liking violet, I have a feeling you won't want to make an investment like that (unless you happen to adore rose - Hope is sugared rose). You may be able to find a decant from someone in swaps though. Violet lovers should all try that one, IMO! If you tried Pink Moon 07, which was sugared carnation, it's very similar but of course with violet instead of carnation.

AEris, can you wear rose? If you can I think you might like Psyche (Bulgar rose, Chinese white musk, lavender, orchid and frankincense). Pontarlier may also fit your tastes, it's green and herbal yet pretty and girly at the same time (ferns, lilac, blackcurrant, rose, lavender, sugar and absinthe).

Unfortunately, they are all about to sail away to Discon Island, but many of the Muses have a real floral-herbal feel, which is what I got from Sleepy Moon overall. (Although, as you know, Sleepy Moon and I didn't get along splendidly, and I sent my bottle away to live with... oh, it was you! )

If you want to get some general herbal recs, there is a thread here for your perusal - feel free to bump it with questions or comments, too.

Just a periodic bump to get some attention in case there are some folks out there who haven't read this thread...

Since we've had a lot of new members join over the holidays and therefore more "Help me, I'm new" threads (in addition to lots of "help me with a gift idea" threads) I'm trying to stay on top of archiving those when no one's posted for 30 days to keep the place as uncluttered as possible.

If you find your thread's been archived and you want follow-up recs, you have 2 choices: you can PM me and I can resurrect it, you post a reply at the end to update and continue discussion. Or you can start a new thread for yourself.

Just don't start a new thread for yourself if your first thread is still alive and well in Recommendations!

*This applies to the topics that are oriented very specifically to one person, you or your mom or your sister types of threads. The first post in this topic explains how Recs works, when you should be bumping old topics for discussion and when it's OK to go ahead and start new topics.

... I am experiencing very bad pms symptoms this month, (actually it's usually every month). Is there an oil that helps with pms symptoms? I usually experience the extreme grouchiness, depression up to 10 days before it starts. I have tried the search engine, but no actual topics came up, (maybe I'm doing it wrong?) so I apologize if this has been discussed already. Thanks in advance!!

I am sorry you are having such a bad time with PMS! I hope you find some good suggestions here for some soothing BPALs. My doctor advised me to be sure to get as much calcium as possible and to take omega-3 supplements and those seem to have made a difference for me. If it continues to be this bad, consider seeing your doctor to be sure you don't have an underlying condition like a thyroid imbalance or PCOS that could be making your PMS even worse.

As for effective searching, my usual suggestions are to limit your search to a single subforum by highlighting it in the drop down box at the bottom left of the search form, and try searching just for topics in your first go (there are radio buttons on the bottom left of the form). I did a search for "PMS" limited to Recommendations, searching titles and showing results as topics only, and found this thread right away. If you continue to have problems searching, you might want to check the Forum Questions section to see if other people are experiencing similar glitches, post questions there, or contact either a mod for the section where you're searching or an administrator.

Good luck!

I'm sure you haven't done anything that's harmed your baby - it's just that everything that goes on your skin does get absorbed to some degree, so The Lab has advised people who have e-mailed them about the subject to abstain from wearing perfume at all. I suspect that this is not because it is terribly dangerous, but because after consulting with their lawyers and analyzing the number of scents they sell, the number of people wearing them, the number of components going into those scents, the batch variations that can occur with natural oils, not to mention the varying amounts different people use and the zillion factors other outside their control, there is no way that they can guarantee safety to each and every person - therefore they must advise pregnant women not to wear it at all.

Those threads do contain information people have compiled about essential oils that should definitely be avoided, reports from several mommies who used BPAL, creative tips on using scent without applying it to your skin, and other helpful info.

Congratulations on your pregnancy and welcome back to the forum

There are a couple threads on pregnancy and BPAL, one in FAQs and one in recs that may have some tips for you - in particular, I believe that the lab doesn't recommend using perfumes during pregnancy at all. A scent locket or an oil burner to scent your room may give you the fix you need while making sure that you minimize the possibility of absorbing anything you & your baby don't need through your skin. (Of course, ultimately your doctor is the best source of information on what you should avoid and what is safe.)

Blood Phoenix has a very grape-like quality on me, especially when it's wet and in the first hour or so.

Wow, that's some sleuthing... I have had so many products I have loved the smell of over the years, and had no idea how to figure out what their fragrance was!

Sometimes you pick up an imp and try it and think to yourself, "this smells just like ____________!" although when you look at the notes, they don't seem to have any in common. So on the chance that someone thinks of a resemblance but doesn't make the Asian pear-papaya connection, it's good that you have the specific product name.

And because of that phenomenon (a BPAL scent smelling like something you've smelled before, even though they don't seem to have any notes in common), I'd definitely work my way through the recommendations in tropical scents and fruity BPAL blends. (I was sure that we also had a thread on pear blends, but I cannot find it!) Apple is similar to Asian pear in many ways, at least when I am comparing the two fruits to one another in the produce department, so that may be another category you want to explore. Given your apparent like of fruity scents so far, I think you will enjoy the research. Have fun!

You may want to skim the Recs thread on green scents for some general ideas, too.

 

Oh wow I didn't even see that and I did a search and everything. Thanks! Lemme know if you're going to merge threads.

Oh, no merge necessary (unless you want me to move the discussion there) You have a lot of wiggle room in this section - usually when there's a thread where someone's looking for recs for gifts and they've got some specifics, it just stays on its own, then I archive it after no one's posted in it for 30 days or so, to give the OP time to dabble, order, comment, etc. (For those who are curious about how I sort it all out, you can read this post - and if anyone's having trouble searching or finding their way around Recs, of course, drop me a line and I'll be glad to help.)

I get weird results myself at times using multiple search terms and I am not sure that wildcard searches work the way that they did before the last forum update, so it is possible that search gremlins kept you from finding that thread.

Hope you find some things that your sister likes! Although I like green scents in general, they're not my favorite category - but 51 is one of my top ten and I am really loving Pollution these days. Elsewhere in my collection, The Mock Turtle's Lessons, Pontarlier, Rosalind, and Tweedledum were all bottle worthy. All have a green element but they're all very different from one another, which is fun. And although I can't really wear Shoggoth, one sniff of it just screams bright green to me.

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Could anyone recommend a scent that's a warmer, spicier tea? I find tea a very comforting scent, but in the winter I want something spicy as well.

Have you had a chance to look through the thread about scents that resemble chai? If not, I feel sure you'll find a suggestion or two there. You can also dabble with some layering, like Kumiho with something spicy, say Bengal, to spice up a normally light and fresh tea scent.