Batty Cathedral

[zankoku_zen]

Leathery wings flapping through billows of incense smoke.

[ghoulnextdoor]

The leather in this blend is an airy, floral leather, conjuring visions of a little bat snoot dootling deep in trellis vining, moon-luminous night-blooming flowers. The incense is cool and crystalline, frost on stone, smoky winter mists high on a mountain while a witch sits in silence, tracing runes in the snow. Like a Wardruna video. With more bats and flowers and witches.

[elissamay]

This started off like an amped-up version of Cathedral, which is one of my very favorite BPALs ever. I didn't really get the leather at all, just pure, already perfect Cathedral. As it wears and warms up I start to get a whisper of leather, but it's fleeting. It's like the leather here adds a little soft suede to the resins and smoke of Cathedral, and the bat's wings waft it all around to somehow amplify the whole. I would probably love just about anything blended with Cathedral, so ymmv, but this is a lovely little variant.

Edited November 1, 2023 by elissamay

[forspecial_plate]

This was the Bat most likely to win for me, and I was right!  On me it is on the lighter side but it's a bit of a sexed-up Cathedral.  At first I didn't think it smelled like Cathedral at all, but today I compared them, one on each arm.  Cathedral has always been a little woody, and a little waxy to my nose, with the rich incense notes swirling in the background.  Well, Batty Cathedral is strange because I get very little leather, but I smell a weird (unexpected) fizzy note like champagne.  Maybe the leather is just playing tricks on me?  But it reminds me of the sweet fizzy note from Visiting the Temple from way back.  So maybe it's the incense I'm smelling?  

 

Whatever is going on here it is fabulous on me, it's like Cathedral has a chic cousin, with a gin and tonic in hand.  It's a lighter scent as I mentioned before and after a couple hours it's more of a skin scent on me, so I may have to upgrade my decant to a bottle.  Which maybe I should have done in the first place, lol. 

[Biocarbons]

Okay, so I get floral (the small, white kind) marzipan (almond + cherry paste) mixed with dry incense over dry blonde wood and a hint of brown suede.

 

Slightly foody and not at all what I was expecting.

[Little Bird]

I don't think that this smells anything like Cathedral, unless Cathedral has been massively reformulated away from my older bottles.  Batty Cathedral is intensely, oddly fizzy with a sharp citrus edge, and it smells just like bpal's champagne note, which I dislike, because it always has an edge to it that's sickly sweet and pukey smelling on my skin.  Then there's a note that smells like dust.  Tons of champagne sprayed over dusty floors.  I was really disappointed in this one because I get no Cathedral, no leather, and no incense.  I even let it rest for two months because it was so unexpected and confusing, but it has stayed the same.

[Ciariel]

I have not sniffed Cathedral, so I don't have a comparison point. I generally like incense and resins so I was looking forward to this, and was not expecting the blast of fizzy, sweet champagne. There's not much incense or leather here for me - if they're here, they are mere ghosts in the background. I thought maybe my decant was mislabeled but I see other reviewers have had a similar experience.

[Pris]

I also get the lemony-champagne notes. Citrus over something a little dank and creamy. It reminds me of First Class Upgrade, without the cottony background. It's nice, but not what I was expecting!