Maiden

[magdalene]

A gentle vision of purity, goodness and virtue: white tea, carnation and Damask Rose.

in the bottle: roses and carnations, with sugared cups of tea.

wet on skin: this is me, at 16. Trying ever-so-hard to be grown up and jaded. I was dating the boy that all of my friends had crushes on and I was in love, real love, for the first time in my life. Every time he looked at me and smiled, I was over the moon. On my 17th birthday, he gave me a bouquet of roses and carnations. I still have them somewhere, pressed between the pages of an Anne Sexton book of poetry. He broke my heart shortly afterward, in the worst way possible.

dry: the carnations take to their bed, in favour of the roses taking center stage. This has a powerful throw and the floral isn't bothering me, like most florals do. Probably because it's roses and roses are one of the only florals I can tolerate. This is a gorgeous scent, I'm just not sure if it's something I'd wear. Between the memories it evokes and just the not-me of being floral. I haven't decided if it should be relagated to the swap box yet, though.

[valentina]

In the imp: Roses, tea, spice of carnations. Lovely, very girly.

 

Initial application: White tea scent predominates. This smells a lot like a white tea-scented candle that I got a couple of years ago and just loved. There are lemony undertones with a final whiff of rose.

 

Dry-down: The tea notes faded out and the roses took over, very extensively. I am a bit bummed, as I adored that tea fragrance.

 

3-4 hours later: The rose has calmed down and while it's still predominating, I'm also getting the spice of the carnations and a little waft of white tea.

 

This is a very pretty, very femme scent. It is almost a 180 degree change from my usual dark, incense-based favorites, but it does work on me, albiet not as a signature scent. However, it is lovely and it's a scent that I might really enjoy using in a scent locket.

 

valentina

[Northernminx]

Love and worship and adoration... fresh and clean and springy. This was floral without being too floral, innocent without being naive, and fresh as a spring day. This never went powdery on me, just a soft overlay of roses and a touch of carnation spice, and a little bit of white tea. Gorgeous. Love this. Going to BATHE in it now...

[slugbait]

This smells like green tea right out of the imp; a bit tart while wet. Drying down, carnation adds a tiny bit of spiciness while the rose softens it out. This almost smells citrusy. Very delicate, feminine and yet tangy. It gently wafts off skin when I move around. I like this a lot.

 

While this doesn’t have a whole lot of throw, it does smell rather lovely and defiantly merits frequent application. A keeper for sure.

[13bodies]

Wet, this smells of carnation. A single, fresh, white carnation.

 

Dry, no more carnation. Now it's a light, fresh rose scent.

 

I never got any of the white tea, and while this is a nice, light scent it was completely gone in 3 hours. It's nice but not a big bottle scent.

[ocicat]

Just received this from Magdalene

 

In the bottle it's roses. ROSES. Reminds me of the Body Shop Tea Rose oil my mom used to wear.

 

Wet, on me: Still roses, but there's spice now. My skin likes to amp spice. I wonder if that's the carnation (?)

 

Drydown: Rose is *very* faint now, and the spice is holding strong.

 

Very pretty

[soleluna]

Pretty, sweet,soft, innocent.

For days when you wanna feel carefree and cheerful

[herongale]

preconceived notion: THIS IS MY SIGNATURE SCENT. Seriously... I love it to some highly desperate degree.

 

in the bottle: almost a purely transparent-coloured oil. This a rose, but such a rose that it really is distinct from any other rose I've tried. It's the full deal: a red, red rose in bloom, along with the heart and the stem and the leaves. This is the rose petal that is good enough to eat: fresh and living and with a hint of sugared waters. Perhaps it is the carnation, but there is an underlying spiciness, but it is very subtle. There might even be a hint of cherry here... it's just that red.

 

wet: a green, almost candyish scent, replaced almost immediately with an exact replica of the incense used at St. Mary's church downtown (in Detroit) during the Latin mass. This reminds me so much of when I went to mass weekly... this is not at all a smoky scent; instead, it's that transient, almost evanescent twinkle of incense that comes briefly to the nose when you sit in the back of the church, and the priest is waving his silver incense-thingie around up front. It's also the residual scent when you go up for communion and take a sip of the red wine. And yet... despite this almost achingly holy scent, it is also a profoundly outdoors scent. That impression of living green roses never fades. I don't get the tea, I don't get the carnation, but whatever they are doing here is perfect and fitting.

 

drydown: the most changeable, complex scent I've tried. Like Athens, this lingers on something fierce, but it seems to morph into something different every fifteen minutes. The scent of incense, the scent of rose... that stays as an undernote. But sometimes it smells like honey, sometimes it smells like crushed velvet, sometimes it smells like a small European bakery, sometimes it smells like turned-over dirt of the Netherlands on a wet spring day, sometimes it smells like a garden of rare flowers, possibly from the land of Lothlorien. Absolutely gorgeous in all of its incarnations; this is the scent of a young, immortal goddess.

 

verdict: perfect. perfect for me. I always want to own this.

 

post-conceived notion: I have a sneaking suspicion that I am nostalgic for high liturgy.

[Little Bird]

This is the first BPAL blend with carnation in it that I've tried where I can actually pick out the carnation. Spicy white carnations. This makes me think of Valentine's Day... you know, where schools always have those 'send a carnation to your crush for $1' deals.

 

First on I can smell the rose for a minute or so, but then it disappears and I'm left with a pure carnation smell. I can even smell a bit of green, like the stems. I'm not getting any tea at all.

 

I like this a lot. Like most white florals, it's giving me a headache... but I can't stop sniffing it. If I could wear florals, I would bathe in Maiden.

[LyndaM]

I love Maiden, but after reading through the other reviews, I'm confused. Y'all get rose out of Maiden? On me, it's single note carnation. Maybe I'm just amping that note. Must obtain another imp for comparison! I'll edit when I puzzle it out...

[atthis_uk]

Vial: crisp, greeny-white, definitely carnation

Wet: white, but spicy

Drydown: Lovely spicy carnation, slight almost citrusy note that might be the tea. Hint of rose develops after a while, but not too strong. I really like this!

[Voleuse]

On first application, all I get is carnation, but in a few moments, the rose comes in. The white tea is faint at first, but over time it gets stronger, and it keeps the florals from becoming overpowering.

 

It is a very maidenly perfume, I think--airy and a little bit sweet. It stays the same, as far as I can discern, for a few hours, and then disappears entirely.

 

A nice scent, but not for me, I think.

[iriedanym]

I got this as a frimp today, and I am shocked no one suggested this to me sooner. The strongest note is the white tea, which has a very clean scent. I haven't picked out the carnation note yet, but the rose is there when the oil dries. This is a very nostalgic scent, and I'm really loving it.

[perclexed]

I think the carnation really didn't work with my skin. It turned really harsh, and monster headache inducing on me. That said, it's lovely in the bottle and it would be interesting to use as a candle dressing, especially around Imbolc.

 

I liked Maiden. It really did not like me.

[harmonyfb]

In the bottle: Sweet carnation, with a bit of rose.

 

Wet: The rose pops out for a minute, and then disappears.

 

Dry: Ugh. This smells like an overly-spicy 'kiddy perfume' that you get at the dollar store. Scrubbing my wrist three times takes it down to a faint carnation smell that's pleasant.

 

Definitely not for me.

[maewitch]

I love the strong white tea note best, though it dissipates fairly quickly. Nevertheless, it does manage to temper the strength of the rose and the carnation, which alone would be too powdery and spicy. This smells more like what those florals fade down to after a few hours, which I generally like far more than the opening bit.

 

Light, feminine, gently floral and a little faded, like antique linens. Nice.

[puck_nc]

Origin: Swapped for an imp on the forums.

 

In the Bottle: Lemon tea, then the floral notes rise.

 

Wet: I'm getting strong rose and carnation, with a hint of the tea. This is good; in other blends with tea it turned into Lemon Pledge on me.

 

Drydown: Very light and pretty, though the tea distracts me a bit for some reason.

 

Verdict: Hmm...it's all right, but I have many scents I like better. I think this one will become a lotion for a friend's Christmas present.

Edited November 16, 2005 by puck_nc

[carolinachiquita]

I still have this thing in my head that tells me that I don't like rose blends, it wont go away. This is another blend with rose in that is just divine, It is a spicy rose with the tea wafting past every now and then. I think this is a very clean and soft fragrance, its very feminine on me!

[Musamea]

In the bottle: tightly closed rosebuds and freshly cut stems – the scent of a floral shop or a rose bouquet distilled into a bottle

Wet: Wow, I never knew carnations had much of a scent, much less one this beautiful! The carnation in this blend gives the scent a beautiful green-white spice, which balances perfectly with the sweetness of the rose and the white tea (which my skin tends to amp up more and more as time passes)

Dry: The spice of the carnation fades back a bit, but still remains the topnote over a gorgeous blend of rose and tea. Maiden does seem to fade fast on my skin (especially on my wrists, which try to turn any rose into powder), but I've taken to applying right before dressing, so that some of the oil stays on my clothes – it has great throw that way.

Overall: This is a lovely, complex scent that's fresh and feminine, with a bit of flirty spice thrown into the mix. I could live with smelling like this every day!

[AlaskaSnows]

Wet: Rose and the slightest bit of sweet tea, so totally a dewy fresh flower, FRESH the operative word here.

 

Dry: Same. Very fresh, womanly and enticing.

[BlackDahlia]

In the imp ~ Carnation and tea. Very pretty, light scent.

 

Wet~ Carnation and milky tea with a hint of rose in the background. A really lovely balance.

 

On the drydown ~ the spiciness of the carnation really shows and it smells like carnations really do, which I have never had in a perfume, before. I really, really like that I can smell true carnation. WOW. The tea still holds it's own ~ sandwiched nicely between the carnation and the rose, which just peeks in.

 

Very nice.

Really a masterful blending.

I really like this fragrance as an everyday scent.

Glorious.

[cuervosueno]

Interesting, as always, how different people's skins amp up different notes. I decided to try this--despite my loathing of rose perfume--because I love me some carnation and tea, and I was hopeful the rose wouldn't be noticeable.

 

Perhaps the reason I don't like rose is because my skin loves it so much it blasts it out there to the detriment of anything else in the blend? could be, because that's what happened here.

 

In the imp, this is mostly white tea with a floral note I can't quite name. but literally, as soon as it hits my skin its all rose!

 

I have to admit I don't dislike this, though. Its a true rose, like walking into the florist like someone else already said. soft, dewy rose, one of those old-fashioned ones that get very full and blowsy and have a divine scent. (I like rose fine in flowers, just not in perfume).

 

So far, though, all I get is rose. There's a slight astringency in it which I suspect is the tea, but no, sigh, carnation at all.

 

Oh well--I've newly discovered Hod, so that can do it for my carnation fix, and in the meantime, at least I have experience once rose scent I don't dislike.

[LittleGreyKitten]

I love tea scents, and roses, so I had high hopes for Maiden. Sadly on me the carnation is the strongest smell. I can't even detect the tea. I don't hate the carnation, I just wish it was less intense. Alltogether it is an agreeable smell but I'm not bowled over. It seems to gently fade on me, with no huge changes. It also disappears rather quickly. I will probably use it some while I have the imp of it, but it will definitely not be a re-order. I'd give it a 3 to 3.5 out of 5.

Edited January 23, 2006 by Shollin

[blueroses]

In the imp: Rose. That's all I get, so I'm expecting the worst. I'm not into straight-up florals.

 

Wet: Um. I get a nice light rose and something lemony. This must be the tea, I guess. Sometimes this note smells lemony, and sometimes just green, like sweet grass. I only get a little carnation.

 

Dry: Much the same. Less carnation, more tea, and the delightful rose. This is a nice greenish-white scent.

 

I love it. Probably going to get a bottle.

[Alchemy21599]

I love tea scents, so I had to try Maiden.

 

In the vial: tea and white floral. Very pretty.

 

Wet: Holy roses! I expected this to be a tea scent rather than a rose scent.

 

Dry: The roses take over everthing. I love to grow roses and smell them, but I don't want to wear them on my skin.