Dorian

[crain]

Inspired by and created for my beloved Tedwin: my eternal, beautiful, wicked Dorian Gray. Refined, elegant, and lovely, with a noble bearing and seemingly gentle air. This blend is an artful deception: a sweet gilded blossom lying over a twisted and corrupted core. A Victorian fougere with three pale musks and dark, sugared vanilla tea.

 

 

This scent is so wonderful and is one of my all-time favorites. Admittedly, I don't wear it that often because I fear over-using it and not reacting to it the way I do now.

 

In the imp, I smell lavender, lemon and milky tea.

 

On my wrist, I get no lavender, and instead a beautifully blended strong sugary, vanilla tea with cream. It smells almost spicy and rich and creamy. I love it!

[alliekat13]

To me, this is a sweet, sexy clean scent. At first, it's all about the lemon tea, warm and sweet. After a while, the lemon calms down a little, and the sugary vanilla and musks come out to play. There is a hint of something a bit murky and masculine underneath it all, reminding me of crisp greenery and lavender-- that must be the fougere. After a couple of hours it has faded into a sweet slightly plasticky vanilla musk scent, I find it delicious and addicting. The problem is that I have to reapply this frequently, slathering it on, but the scent it great. It's sexy, femenine yet I can totally see a man wearing this...I will definetely buy another bottle of Dorian.

[goth_huntress]

This is my favorite vanilla scent, although I would have liked to smell more of the tea. I do like it a lot though.

[lightgatherer]

Vanilla and something else kind of watery - perhaps the tea? This is an incredibly light fragrance, not so much as it has a light throw (I would call it a medium throw) as the blend just smells light. It's definitely a lovely blend, and I can see why it's so popular, but it's just too light for my preferences.

[astarinel]

To sum up: I love love love Dorian. Love. If I were a different person than I am, this would be written with many capital letters and exclamation points, I assure you.

 

In the imp I mostly get sweet vanilla, which is a nice start.

 

It is somehow both light and rich. It is very sweet, on me. I am definitely getting the tea, so my first impressions are of sweet, creamy vanilla tea. However, there is something musky and floral and deep underneath it, which gives the scent a much deeper and more complex feel.

 

I started out thinking, oh, how delicate and sweet... which quickly turned into huh, this is actually kind of dark and sexy.

 

This turned out to not be much of a morpher on me, and had pretty good staying power and decent throw. However, it was one of those weird ones where it started strong, then I couldn't really smell it anymore, then periodically I would get whiffs of something good and think, "what is that delicious smell? oh right, it's me!"

 

My boyfriend, who is generally uninterested but a rather good sport about my perpetual "smell me! SMELL ME NOW!" liked this one so much that he offered to buy me a bottle immediately, and spent the rest of the evening snuggling my neck.

[lyricalwaters]

Bottle: Lemon... but sweet lemon, almost like sweet tea, actually. Except the tea isn't all that strong, it's like putting your nose into a glass of sweet tea right where the lemon is floating at the top.

 

Wet: Very, very musky. But a little sweet. Not getting any tea at all, though.

 

Dry: I think my skin just doesn't hold tea scents unless they're REALLY strong, which makes me sad. But still, whatever this turns into, it smells really good (just not like tea). It's strange in that after a couple of hours I can't pick out any of the specific notes at all, it's just a general nice smell. It almost seems floral to me, which I can only assume is the musk sweetened by vanilla. It's not what I expected, but it's such a pleasant scent that I'm planning to get more.

[Schnax]

This does smell like a sweet creamy vanilla tea to me. There's something lurking underneath that I can't quite put my finger on. This lasts about 4 hours and stays true to the initial scent.

 

Hubby insists that it makes me smell like pie. Fortunately he likes pie.

[asciident]

Wet: Vanilla and honey.

 

First on: Vanilla tea with lemon and honey, warm but crisp.

 

Dry: Sugary without being cloying; warm sweet tea with fresh lemons in it. The musk develops as a sort of undertone to the tea and sweet notes, without managing to overpower anything. Unexpected and beautiful.

[dragonrain]

Sweet tea with lemon. I adore this.

[acaciasears]

A friend of mine gave me an empty bottle of Dorian a while ago; it had a couple drops in the bottom so I could test it, which I did, and I knew immediately that I had to get a bottle.

 

It seems to me from personal experience and reading the reviews that Dorian is extremely variable. The empty bottle I had (which was, admittedly, well-aged) was a sweet, musky, honey-vanilla tea with a splash of cream. The bottle I just got is almost all lemon & musk in the throw, which is medium-to-light, and fades out to the sweet & musky tea that inspired me to buy it. I won't say I'm disappointed, because it's still nice, it's just a lot more masculine than I had hoped, and is lacking in strength. I am confident that this will change once the bottle ages a bit, and if not, it's a nice variation from my usual foodies & will smell quite nice on my boy.

 

In Bottle: Lemon and musk with a hint of sweetness. Mostly, it's tart & musky.

On Skin: Very tart (I don't want to say sour, because it doesn't smell spoiled - it's definitely more tart than sour) and strongly musk. It's pretty faint, so I need to use a lot.

Drydown: THAT's what I wanted; honey-vanilla tea with a little bit of musk. The parts I don't like as much are the first to fade out and the parts I crave are the ones left behind. It fades pretty quickly, which is a shame, but I prefer that to a scent that is so strong I have to wash my wrists off in order to breathe again.

 

I will use this bottle, but I hope that the next time I order it, it's got more of the sweets and less of the tarts & musks.

Edited May 12, 2007 by Cacie

[Mimicake]

Yummy yummy yummy. A strong (yet somehow soft) vanilla tea, that smells gentle and elegant. The lemon couldn't be detected on my skin sadly, but Dorian is one of my new loves regardless. I will be certainly hoping for a big bottle of this one. Thanks again to Spacekitty for the frimp in order to try it.

[Gwydion]

It smells like cotton candy over flowers and musk on first alication, but fades to something utterly delicious. It blends beautifully with jolly Roger to make something debauched and insanely sexy.

[arcticwolf]

Sweet vanilla tea, with lemon, and just the faintest hint of musk underneath. It stay true on me from wet all the way to sniffing my arm the next day. It's light, but still has some throw to it. I love this. Big bottle for sure.

 

I never used to like vanilla, in fact, I used to hate vanilla, but Beth has changed my mind with this, and with Dana O'Shee.

[Jenesis]

Bottle: Light cologne.

 

Wet: Sweet vanilla with a slight "kick" from the citrus. Amazingly, the lemon hasn't amped to washing-up-liquid proportions yet!

 

Drydown: Sweet vanilla tea, just like the description.

 

Dry: There's sometime else in here that I don't recognise (probably the fougere, I haven't a clue what that is!). It's a sweet, bright, vanilla tea with the remnants of a slice of lemon in it, and this other, slightly musky scent underneath it. I love white musk so this is lurvely!

 

Verdict: Mr Darcy holding a cup of sweet vanilla tea out of which he has just fished a slice of lemon.

 

Rating: 4.5/5

[erraticprophet]

I've been dying to try this scent out. I love tea scents and I love light musks. My only worry, a very minor one, was that I tend to amp sweet notes. I didn't want to smell too candy-like.

 

Initial Impression: sweet tea and vanilla with a hint of musk.

 

On Wet: more musky now, less tea, very sweet. Almost like cotton candy.

 

On Dry: I'm pleased! This one stays pretty well balanced. The musk is there, as well as the sweet, cotton candy smell, but the tea, sadly has faded.

 

Final Impression: Very yummy! Everyone who smells me tends to go "Mmm!"

 

Rating (on a scale of 1 to 5): Definitely a 5. I need a big ol' bottle of this stuff!

[aiko]

In the imp: Sweet, like cotton candy?? vanilla

 

On skin wet and dry: It remains sugary sweet with a hint of vanilla. I don't get any tea or musk

 

Conclusion: I was looking forward to testing Dorian, unfortunately, it doesn't work for me. It is too sweet. At least now I know that my skin amps sugar.

[laliloo]

Dorian is gorgeous. It is lovely, subtle and sweet when I put it on. Vanilla tea, but not at all sickly. I don't get a lemon scent from this at all! I didn't think I liked the smell of vanilla until I smelt this oil - if vanilla could always smell like this, then I'm a convert.

 

It lasts about 3 hours and then I have to reapply as I end up craving this scent - my wrists seem to float towards my nose all day long when I have Dorian on! I have already ordered a 5 ml of this. This is described as one of the more 'masculine' scents, but it's very feminine on me - I can't actually imagine a man wearing it, as it's so sweet and feminine, without being floral.

[funkmoppet]

Oh, so lovely!

 

The faint touch of lemon is only really present when wet. Given that lemon can amp up on my skin, this is a welcome surprise.

 

On the skin it's vanilla tea, drying down softly with just a hint of musk. It's not too sweet, and is possibly THE loveliest vanilla I've come accross. I was expecting more of the tea, and for the blend to be a little more unisex, but I'm completely taken by this.

 

Dorian.

[willowtreeling]

a lovely wonderful gorgeous one. lemony milky sugary black tea...mmmmm....with a tiny bit of powdered donuts. this does not morph much on me and I loooove it.

 

I am going to have to buy a bottle of this, but must be good....and wait until summer is over and I get monthly paychecks again.

[Nessa]

I really like this scent.

 

In the bottle, it's very strong, a citrus-y floral, with the floral definitely being lavendaresque.. a bit of a perfume-y memory of my grandmother's house. I really don't pick up any vanilla, and just barely pick up any tea. It's definitely musky, and quite masculine scented to me. On my skin though, it really changes completely.

 

On the skin, the vanilla comes forward, and it becomes a much more creamy, milk tea with a dash of lemon scent. The musks and lavender are still there but not as strong as they are in the bottle

 

After a long dry down, the sweetness stays behind and the sharpness leaves, ending up with a sort of powdery vanilla smell.

 

Very delicous either way. Goes on very strong but dampens down quickly. I can see it being masculine, worn by a fella', but it works fine on a girl too. I wear it pretty frequently. It's staying power is medium. It seems to fade to a weak scent fairly quickly (within 3-4 hours), but it still smells good, just more soft and sweet and less musky-tang. Like a sachet in a drawer.

 

One thing of note though, when I first put on Dorian, it makes my nose VERY sneezy and sniffly. I have a slight allergy to it. There's a fine line between just enough and too much, and if I cross that line I'll be sneezy for a good half an hour. I don't really mind because I am quite used to being allergic to sweet smelling things and I've learned to deal... but if you're wearing a lot of Dorian and someone is very sneezy.. well, it might be you.

Edited July 2, 2007 by Nessa

[The Perfumed Ferret]

Sigh...oh Dorian! I wanted you to love me but I knew wasn't meant to be so....

 

In the imp, on, and dry down were the same for this one.

 

 

Cream, sugar, vanilla. Three notes I can't stand. I was really hoping the tea would pull through, but it didn't.

[underline2]

Dorian

 

In the imp:

Dark, sweet vanilla tea with the slightest bit of lemon. It's definitely intriguing and sexy.

 

On:

Something powdery happens to it, as if milk were suddenly added to the tea. It's not nearly as sensual as it is in the imp.

 

After a bit:

The powdery smell goes mostly away, but it's taken the dark notes with it too. If we look at Andrabell's infamous first post as the epitome of Dorian awesomeness, then I only get to the sitting room with the tea and perhaps a mild innuendo or two before that posh and oh-so sexy Victorian gentleman has me escorted out while he retires to his bedroom where some other lucky tart is waiting for him. Hmph.

 

 

ETA: Okay, I spoke too soon. The throw is great and the darkness is coming back. My beloved Victorian gentleman has merely been teasing me! Perhaps he has been bored with the pattern of tea-then-ravishing and needed some more intrigue this time. Whatever the reason, Dorian and I are working out our differences and are very happy with the outcome.

Edited July 9, 2007 by Underline2

[modernsaints]

In the imp, this is a sharp, very herbal tea, with no sweetness it all.

 

On my skin it goes through this brief, GLORIOUS phase of pure vanilla sugar - I cannot get enough - and then, what? What is this? Oh. It's... tea.

 

I mean, don't get me wrong, it's a lovely delicious lemon tea with a hint of sugar and vanilla, but I'm just so heartbroken! I want the vanilla sugar back. Boooo. As is, this is... nice, but I'm not sure I'd really ever reach for it. I'll stick it in the imp box & see how it goes.

 

ETA: I lied, it goes back round to vanilla sugar. AWESOME

Edited July 18, 2007 by modernsaints

[yellowbean]

For the first two seconds, Dorian is pure Pine Sol on me, but the sugar and vanilla kick in underneath it almost immediately. It eventually becomes a warm, sweet lemon, without any of the acidity I usually associate with citrus. The musks don't really appear in scent form, but just act as a smoothing agent. I can't detect any cologne, and there's only tea if I strain my imagination. This is lovely.

[Nia]

I'm unlucky with tea blends. they either disappear completely, or the tea note is undetectable. It doesn't matter if the tea is green, white or black. This case is no exception: it smells as if someone had added vanilla to Baoban Sith. Even though the elusive tea note is frustrating, I like this unexpected combination (lemons and vanilla, mmmmm), which is not overwhelmed by the musk at all. Yum.