Asphodel

[wickedgoddess]

The grey and ghostly flower that fills the fields of Hades.

Wet - a rather generic white floral.

Dry - this stays pretty much the same from wet to dry, and lasts quite a long time. It's pleasant enough, but not really me.

On the wickedgoddess scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being best, this rates a 2.

[Ancientgirl]

I ordered this to round out an imp pack, and because I read somewhere that the Asphodel was an alternate birth flower for me.

This is a very fresh and clean floral on me. The "ghostly" aspect comes out in its diffuse nature. I applied it only to my wrist, but all day I felt like the scent surrounded me, in a light and fragrant cloud. I agree that this is somehow familiar. It's very pretty, and I think it will be a good scent for summer or working out, any time I don't want a scent that is too overwhelming or heady.

Ancientgirl

[urraca]

On me, this smells virtually like single note black narcissus, the same note that is in Darkness and Hades (so, given the descriiption of Asphodel, my identification makes sense. I get a little of smething sweeter, like freesia or even the hyacinth that someone else mentioned, around the edges. I like it, but it is a little overpowering. Apply sparingly.

[Sistinas]

a review of Asphodel

 

Vial ~ the description fits this scent perfectly. As I sniff it I am given

images of grey flowers (as if they really exist).

 

Wet ~ It is still the light floral scent that I discovered in vial. I just

hope that this will be a long lasting scent.

 

Drying ~ the fragrance is wafting from my wrist, I am amazed at how light

and delicate a scent can have such power. Usually light scented fragrances

are soaked up by my skin and have absolutely no lasting power.

 

Dry ~ It is still a soft fragrant floral and the scent has not died down

much, it is so pretty and makes me feel very feminine.

 

Fade ~ A half hour later and it is still going strong, I am quite impressed.

I am very much in love with this scent and definitely need a bigger bottle

of it. It makes for a wonderful soft daytime scent.

 

Final thoughts ~ This is suppose to be a grey, ghostly flower and I can

imagine there being a field of these that the ghosts of Hades gather. It

is a truly beautiful light floral scent. On a scale of 1 to 5, I give this

a 5.

[gingersnapp]

This is a soft, powdery floral that actually grows in intensity as it dries. I get a very distinct "Secret Anti-Persperant" vibe off of it, but it's not really offensive or anything. Just reminds me of my powder fresh deoderant a little too much.

[Rosabella]

OH! Absolute Spring in a bottle!!! This is beautiful on me. Wisteria and the fresh green of flower stems and new grass, a cool tender Spring breeze, with maybe a touch of hyacinth? white lilac? freesia? in there too. Not grey, but pale lavendar flowers come to mind. For a high light floral, this has great throw and amazing staying power - usually these kinds of crystalline scents disappear within seconds of touching my skin, despite my love for them. I don't get any powder or deodorant notes from it at all, it's just gorgeous!

[Mnemosyne]

I too "know" this scent. I'm not sure I can exactly place the flower, but I get a very strong impression of being in church when I smell it. I'm guessing that means it must be lillies that I'm smelling. Lillies that are so heavily laden with pollen that I can almost feel their powder on my fingers. After half an hour or so, I do start to get the violets that other people are mentioning.

 

Really everything about this scent evokes disconcertingly overwhelming scent memories for me. This is wonderful if you like florals, but I'm more of a foody-scent type of girl.

[LiberAmoris]

From Asphodel, I get lilies and daffodils. It's perfect for the flower of Elysium and Persephone's favorite flower. When I wear it, I think of Homer's description of the afterlife and of ghostly, pallid meadows swaying with thousands of haunting, soporific lilies. It's beautifully done.

[gangstaknitta]

In bottle: a soft spicy floral; comforting and cozy

 

Wet: it smells like fresh rose leaves...and one petal. very fresh with just a hint of floral sweetness.

 

Dry: this is gorgeous. a sweet floral note comes out. it smells like rose but it doens't go powdery on me like rose normally does. when I run out of moon rose, I'm using Ashpodel as a replacement.

[Shollin]

First sniff: The ghost of a flower beside a clear pool. It’s far more aquatic than floral, to my nose, and very pretty. Softly blue-grey.

 

Wearing: The moment it hits my skin, I get the same “I know this flower!” reaction I’ve read in so many other reviews. And like everyone else, I can’t figure out what it is… but it’s wonderful. It’s a little like daffodil, it’s a little like tulip, it’s a little like a rose… but the real scent is a fabulous combination of all the best parts of flowers, a nonsoapy lily, a nonpowdery violet, a noncloying jasmine. It’s like a Platonic ideal of Flower.

[SeaMonkey]

In the vial this is rather sharp. Sharper than I thought it was going to be.

 

On my wrist, it keeps changing. It smells very familiar at first, but then it smells like pickles. Then it smells familiar again. Then it smells like bandaids. Then it smells familiar again. Then it smells very medicinal.

 

Now its back to smelling familiar.

 

Now I'm getting the same thing Gingersnapp got. Secret Deoderant.

 

I think this is going to the swap pile

[Laurel the Woodfairy]

Daffodils! That would be my best guess. Asphodel is a green floral that has a very clean, fresh quality--like one of the first flowers to appear around the time of Ostara. It's really pretty, but I think Eos already fills my "pale spring floral" needs, so I may swap.

[olympia301]

 

Most of the time I am indifferent to florals, but Asphodel is so well done and so tantalizingly familiar that I have to say it's sitting in my new top 10. It is beautiful and sophisticated, strong but not overpowering, persistent as the scent of flowers on the breeze, but not jammed in the drawing room.

 

Ok, so what does it smell like Ms. Golden Nose? Uhhh, hard to say. I liken it to lilac and lemon. The lilac is certainly not cloying. There could be some honeysuckle in here but that's debatable. Daffodil may be in here as well. Beth didn't give us any clues in the description. This one is worth the trouble to buy a bottle, and if you are pining away in the middle of winter for spring and its flowers, Asphodel is the ticket for you!

 

The icon is indeed an asphodel. The font I used was Asphodel, too. This particular flower was photographed on the island of Malta. The real flower isn't black, it's white but I took a bit of artistic license here. C'mon, it's supposed to be a flower from Hell...use your imagination.

Edited December 27, 2005 by olympia301

[angharad]

And this is why I don't like straight florals. Asphodel makes my nose crinkle up and my stomach hurt. It brings to mind images of generic grey flowers, death, and mourning. If not for how the smell affects me, this would be perfect for a funeral...but the scent, to me, is a rather unpleasant, overpowering flower with nothing else to balance it out. I can't bring myself to wear it for more than a few minutes.

[harmonyfb]

In the vial: Spring flowers.

 

Wet: Smells like daffodils, pleasant if a bit strong.

 

Drydown: Oh, hell. Jasmine. We meet again, my enemy. So long to any other floral note, because...

 

Dry: JASMINE!! ::Jasmine proceeds to shake her ass in my face, step all over my feet and spill her drink on my carpet::

 

::sigh::

[kitkat]

First sniff: A pleasant floral, light and very springlike.

 

Wet: Purple! I don't get the jasmine that others have sensed, but the lilac/lavender is coming through very strongly for me.

 

Drydown: Yeesh! Why does my skin amp up florals like this?? It's pretty in the imp, but my body chemistry warps it into something very strong and very artificial within minutes. I smell like those nastly little mesh bags of potpourri my great aunt always kept in her linen closet.

[coulrophobe]

In the imp: Clean, white floral. Not soapy, just... clean.

 

On: Ditto. It's making me think of lily of the valley and bluebells; maybe a little lilac or wisteria?

 

The color associations - definitely white, against dark earth and foliage. I find this one clean, calming, a little bit wistful; it's a quiet kind of scent on my skin, though not at all faint. It's pretty. Probably not knocking my socks off enough for a big bottle, but maybe if I need a good sleep/relaxation scent or linen spray.

[QueenFae]

A very light, silvery, creeping, night time flower scent. Very pale, eerie, ghostly and whispy. (Have I used enough adjectives yet? ) It's somewhere between lilies and gardenias for me, definitely white flowers. I think it's quite lovely and demure, but florals never last very long on me, and this one didn't either. All the same, hauntingly beautiful.

[Nox Eterna]

From the vial, to wet on, to dry on my skin this never changes.

It seems to have strong throw, and be very sweet on me.

On my skin it smells exactly like an Easter Lily.

OK, but not really me.Glad I got to try it.

[desu]

In the bottle: Thin, ghostly florals.

 

On my skin: A faint scent that reminds me of hyacinth, perhaps a bit of lily lurking in the background. Not really me, but it would make a nice room scent for when I'd like a subtle floral.

[Abbie]

In the bottle: See, I'd always heard "asphodel" was just Greek for "Daffodil". But this ain't daffodil. It's hyacinth or lilac: I can never remember which is which smell-wise. It's quite nice... a lovely rainy-day-at-the-botanical-gardens, although I think it might be a little heavy for day wear. Very simple.

 

First on: Man, this is lovely... very fresh and floral. I don't know if it's really something I want to smell like personally, but it's SO GOOD.

 

Dry: This doesn't change hardly at all... it always remains very subtle, and is lasting a fairly long time (~5 hours)

 

Overall: Not my usual thing but definitely a winner.

[WidgetAlley]

A frimp from the Lab, and my first foray into the Rappacini's Garden category. I've always been madly besotted with plant smells, whether herbs or trees (or, more recently, flowers), so I have high hopes for these scents as a group.

 

In the Imp: A clean, white floral. This smells a lot like Has No Hanna, to me, without the touch of cooking spice that seems to accompany all the voodoo blends. I also don't think it's muguet (Lily of the Valley), but something else very similar... another type of lily, maybe. Daffodils? Hyacinth? Maybe just a touch of jasmine in there somewhere... It's a little too "thin" for wisteria. Anyway, I like it. Don't love it-- it seems a little generic so far-- but a solid like. Let's see how this hellflower blossoms.

 

Wet: Whoa. I think my skin just ate it. It's certainly very faint on my wrists... but very pleasant, too. It's a little softer than Has No Hanna, not as bold, and a little more sugary, too. I can definitely see where the idea of transparency comes in to play; this is very light, but the longer it stays on, the more I get a sense of its presence, like a shower of white petals all around me. This isn't terribly daring, but it's high-quality: think freesia shampoos and floral shower gels done right for once. Asphodel is just a touch soapy on me, but in a sweetly feminine way rather than an obnoxious one.

 

Dry: Only the other day, I was lamenting the fact that I want to wear Has No Hanna for its scent far more often than I need its voodoo properties, but I didn't want to waste the psychological effects. Enter Asphodel, the solution to my dilemma! This is an absolutely lovely white floral, beautiful and classic in a femme way, strong enough to be present but light enough to be a "Oh God, where's that smell coming from? *look around for honeysuckle bush*" rather than a, "I can really smell your perfume!" Of the two, I think I prefer Has No Hanna slightly (although that could be just because I know it a bit better), but the two are quite similar and fit neatly into the same scent niche. (Upon doing a side-by-side in-the-Imp comparison, I noted that Has No Hanna is a touch more golden and honey-ish, where Asphodel is a little cleaner and almost ozone-y in its breeziness.)

 

That's entirely personal preference, however. Asphodel shouldn't be taken for granted; it's a gorgeous blend of white florals, like having early flowers twined in my hair, or holding a maidenly spring bouquet, and it strikes the perfect balance between delicacy and stage presence. I'm not sure I'd buy a 5mL, but the fact I'm keeping the Imp is a testament to Beth's genius... before the Lab, I would have said that florals were my least favourite perfume category in the world.

 

Shows what I know.

[fiddlehead]

I have no idea which flowers I'm smelling in Asphodel. But the first burst of them on my skin made me smile. A beautiful, moist smelling Spring bouquet of...I have no idea. Clean, transparent, lovely. I had a brief mental image of a patch of wildflowers.

 

I *think* there might be violet hiding in this, because the drydown is very different than the early stage and has that slightly blue and powdery feel that violets give me.

 

A nice change of pace from Jasmine and Rose heavy blends!

Edited February 4, 2006 by fiddlehead

[smallvoice]

It smells like walking into a flower shop. It's all freshly cut and green and lovely, but a little too much. I'm so glad somebody said it above, because it wouldn't have clicked into place, but it does smell remarkably like Secret anti-perspirant. I'm really glad I got to try this, but I don't think she's a keeper..

 

ETA: A really good spring scent, for anybody who likes florals- despite how it may sound, the florals aren't overpowering, they're just really complex.

Edited February 17, 2006 by cordia

[VenusFlyTrap]

Lovely, lovely floral!

 

I can't really put my finger on it but it smells like lilac and hyacinth to me.

 

Gorgeous spring time scent.

 

A winner and definite keeper in my book!