Jacob's Ladder

[ABrokenAngel]

The meeting of Heaven and Earth: golden amber, galbanum, benzoin, ambrette, rockrose, costus and tonka.

In the Bottle: Oh dear perfume goddess! That is amazing!! I had thought Stardust was going to be the only one I swooned over however Jacob's Ladder is a deffinate yum! If not on me then the hubby WILL be wearing this regardless of if he likes it or not! I'll hold him down and shower him in it if I have to. I don't even need to put this on my flesh to know I'm getting a 5ml or two.

Wet: Oh god this is rich, warm, brooding and utterly masculine. Deffinately purchasing a 5ml for the hubby. I dislike it on me although it works well with my chemistry because it's a bit too masculine on me, however....the hubby is going ot be in for T-R-O-U-B-L-E when he puts this on.

Drydown: Wow....warm, comforting, mature. This is just a fantastic scent however I doubt the hubby will cherish it as much as I do so I believe it'll only be 1 bottle. Edited December 31, 2005 by Shollin

[Aredhel]

Rating (on skin): 4/5

Summarised in a word or two: Classy!

 

In the bottle: A bright, sunny amber powder. This has promise!

 

On skin, wet: This has a definite high-class perfume aspect to it. Soft and lightly spicy, and still very bright. It's only slightly powdery.

 

On skin, dry: This definitely strikes me as high-end and classy -- as olympia301 said, it's a "big perfume house"-esque blend. I can't pick out any note(s) beyond amber.

 

Conclusion: The more I wear this, the more I've come to notice the warm, very lightly spiced amber, rather than the ritzy, classy high-end perfume aspect. I'm definitely learning to love it.

Edited January 1, 2006 by Aredhel

[Fefferbella]

Damn this is sexy...

 

Sweet tonka and amber are the most powerful notes in this blend. Very masculine... I love this on my fiance. On me it fades quickly, but on him, it lasts for hours!

 

[foxroses]

i wasnt sure what i was smelling in the bottle, but on my skin? OMG YUMMMM. sweet sweet sweet amber.. its not ambery like the lion, its wet and SWEET and feminine and GORGEOUS. i don't really know what any of the other notes are other than amber and tonka, but whatever they are, they are making this amber just.. wow. it smells like golden sunlight and gold and dancing and mmmm sweet. i can't even begin to say.. i MUST get a bottle of this!! i sense my first ever lab order coming on.?

YUM!!!

[stardust]

This is the most amazing, luminous amber I've ever smelled. Gorgeous is really the only word for it. It's strong, but seems to stick close to my skin. Sweet, well-rounded, with a tiny bit of darkness in the dry-down.

 

I have tons of amber scents, and when I first read reviews of this one, I thought, well, I can trade this one since I already have so many amber scents. But this one is better than all of them, and this may be my first two-bottle purchase.

[Victory]

I'm not sure what it is about Jacob's Ladder, but it smells "church-y" to me. I wore it to the Christmas Eve service at church because I figured it might be a better choice than O, and it was perfect. I'm not sure this is something I'd wear often, because I don't necessarily want to smell like the inside of a church, but it does make me think of religion.

[moon_lemming]

I came THIS CLOSE to buying a bottle without a preview sniff, because the Yule decant circle I'm in hasn't gotten here yet, and I would hate to miss out on something as glorious as everyone is finding Jacob's Ladder.

 

Luckily, someone on the alchemylab community sold me an imp, so I got to try it out and remember how much most florals hate me. It turned to detergent in minutes; luckily, it completely disappeared in about an hour. I think I'll stick with The Haunted Palace for my floral fix.

[BostonChris]

This is much lighter than I expected.. Especially given the description and the inspiriation for this one.

 

There's an initial powdery phase on me that mellows somewhat as the Amber warms up to my skin. There's a hint of spice and a very very soft floral note. It's masculine, but refined, gentle.

 

When my roomate sniffed my wrist, her eyes sparkled and she was like "Got a date?" So Im assuming this is the type of scent I could wear out for a low key night, cocktails and long conversation, followed by snuggling.. leading us to our own dreams of where Heaven meets the Earth.

 

Itll take a few more wears for me to love this scent, but its definately a hit.. and goes in the "for certain occasions" pile.

[alicia_stardust]

In the bottle: light but warm amber, and sweetness. Not sweetness like a candy sugar, more like a brown sugar type of smell...without being foody. I'm not sure if that makes sense or not.

 

Wearing: Wow, oh wow. Must buy bottle before it goes away!! It's beautiful. A warm light amber with resinous tones and swirling gold colors. My review truly can't do it justice.

 

5 out of 5 stars!

 

Buying bottle(s)!!

[girlmadasbirds]

hmm.. this is very very men's cologne-ish on me. spicy amber cologne. it's nice, just not for me.

[Miss Lynx]

I was dying to try this one, out of all the Yule scents, and finally got my chance at the recent Meet'n'Sniff in Toronto. And sad to say, I was underwhelmed. I probably won't be buying a bottle after all, though I might try and score an imp from somewhere.

 

It's not that it was a bad scent. It was just... really light, and soft, and gentle. I'd expected more depth and complexity, from the list of notes. It'd be OK as a subtle skin-scent for everyday wear, but it didn't wow me. My thought on first sniffing it was along the lines of "Oh... Is that it?" It also faded away really quickly, as those supersoft scents tend to do on me.

 

Looking at the other reviews, I didn't get anything masculine from it at all, or spicy either. It was just a very, very soft amberish scent that barely whispered its presence. What there was of it was nice enough... There just wasn't very much to it.

 

Oh well.

 

Grade: B

[urraca]

Over the winter break, I found myself in an airport duty free that was advertising the Prada fragrance. Its notes sounded like BPAL creation so I tried it on. It smelled like amber and chemicals.

Jacob's Ladder is what it should have smelled like. I agree with everything Olympia said about it in her review, especially that it smells like a big fragrance house perfume. When I read the description of JL, I focussed on the amber and tonka. On me, those notes provide backup to the more obvious incense notes of galbanum and rockrose, while the costus and ambrette lends a musky background. Heat magnifies it tenfold. It does have a masculine quality, especially at first, but I don't usually like masculine fragrances on me and I love this. What a triumph.

[LittleGreyKitten]

In the bottle I loved this. Soft, golden, everything good about amber backed with an amazing spicy, incensy dark background note.

 

Wet on my wrist I loved it. Smelled like it did in the bottle.

 

Then it dried. Everything smoky and spicy went bye-bye and I was left with just blah too sweet. Wahh! I'll have to try it again though- I've found sometimes BPAL scents smell different to me at different times, especially if I try them at work. That may have something to do with the fact that I often have something on from the morning and then wash my wrists before applying whatever goody I got in the mail to try.

 

A fellow employee even remarked that he didn't care for the perfume- he just wrinkled his nose and said "too sweet!" He thought he was smelling the antique perfume bottle I was holding, but I'm pretty sure it was actually Jacob's Ladder he got a whiff of.

 

Anyway. If it keeps getting the good bits of the scent eaten by my chemistry I will be completely bummed, since I absolutely loved the smell wet.

[Sheila]

This is soft, golden, glowing, and absolutely wonderful.

On me, this is primarily an amber scent. There's a slight sweetness (which I'm guessing is the tonka and benzoin) at drydown as well.

It's like a skin scent--not harsh or overwhelming, but definitely sexy.

My husband really likes this one, too.

A must-try for amber lovers.

[The_Merf]

In the bottle: This is light and warm. Oh, amber, you do such wonderful things! I'm very excited about this, given the positive reviews and the fact that I am always on the lookout for lighter oils that don't simply disappear on my skin.

 

Wet: I can't distinguish much besides the amber, but this is so classy and elegant.

 

Drydown and wear: This is a lovely scent, and as I said, it is classy, but it doesn't have a lot of staying power on me. I fear I will have to slather (and silly me, I have only one bottle), so I will have to save this for special times. It is, however, absolutely gorgeous and ethereal, and I'm so glad that I have the one bottle.

[yellowrose]

Words cannot express how much I'd been looking forward to and coveting the ambery goodness promised by Jacob's Ladder.

 

Thanks to some cruel twist of fate, I suffered an extreme allergic reaction to some component in Jacob's Ladder. What it was I couldn't say. I've never had problems with amber and benzoin. Tonka, too. For all I know ... well, I don't know. The scent had strong staying power that even two vigorous scrubbings could not dilute. The overwhelming scent was, oddly, lemony. Not a trace of amber.

 

Utterly crushed.

 

 

edited to correct spelling

Edited January 26, 2006 by yellowrose

[Northernminx]

Soft, somewhat earthy, a nice golden soft amber and a warm touch of vanilla and tonka. It's very warm, slightly sweet, more golden than "hot" and very pretty. This was soothing and relaxing but not really anything that stuck around on my skin. It faded quickly so off it goes.

[Reinaluna]

Jacob's Ladder: This one smells just like that Opium perfume to me. It does not really morph on me at all. I hope to find it another good home.

[Thaleia]

I'd heard a lot of good things about Jacob and his Ladder, so I decided to give him a go. I also really like Macha's artwork on the label.

 

When I open the bottle, I can't smell anything. At all. (It may not help that I've got The Bow and Crown of Conquest on my hand right now.) I tried smelling it earlier as well, and didn't get anything. Sniffed the cap - not much of anything, just a faint fragrance that's not even strong enough for me to place. Sniffed the bottle - a sort of faint incensey something, but not much of anything. How strange.

 

When I put it on, though, hello incense. Hello vanilla, hello amber, and hello costus, which is a ginger variant, it turns out. Jacob's Ladder really golden-light and comforting and warm, perfect for a winter evening like this one when it feels like it's ten degrees out and all you want to do is lie under a huge blanket and keep your feet warm.

 

There's a sort of sweetness that's not vanilla that I'm smelling now. Rockrose! I guess that's a rose variant, which means that my skin will pick it up like crazy, and it does. I'm not sure what to expect from benzoin, only that I know it's used in Lush's Snowcake soap, so it's got to smell something like that. I'm getting vanilla, tonka, and resins on the drydown, with a hint of (rock)rose. Yum! Meeting of Heaven and Earth, indeed. I give Jacob and his Ladder a 4.

[ladynoah74]

I confess, I bought this perfume simply because the story of Jacob's ladder is where I got my son's name. How could I pass up trying a perfume that had my own Angel's name on the bottle? I'm so, so glad I decided to be a sentimental mom.

 

In the Bottle: Weird. Smelled almost like warmed baby lotion.

 

Wet: Alll amber. Warm, spicy, but so gentle that I thought my skin was going to eat it before I even got to enjoy it.

 

Dry: It came back to give such a strong, beautiful smell! This reminds me of visiting family, of sitting in a window and just basking in the sun. It's comfort in a bottle and I'm going to have to scour the Forums for more! A definite bottle to hoard.

[PrettyPenny]

From the moment I first got a whiff of this in the bottle, it has been my absolute favorite BPAL scent. It's a very sexy yet ladylike amber scent, and it has this really rich perfumey fragrance to it as well. I can't quite place what it is that makes this so unique, but I love love love it.

[grrrlennyl]

at first: something almost sour and a bit sweet.

on: still something sour, but nice.

1 hour later: warm amber and tonka, but with something dark underneath.

2 hours later: i don't really like the smell of this. i'm not sure what it is.

3 hours later: pretty much gone.

overall: this isn't a scent for me.

[Kiera]

In the bottle: Nice, warm, sweet, and musky. Very pretty and pleasant.

 

On me: Smells like a masculine version of O. I tried it twice, and its not for me. I think it will smell nice on my boyfriend though.

 

Throw: Lasts all day long.

[malanna]

Jacob's Ladder smelled like floral water, the kind with red rose that you buy to spritz on your bed sheets and ends up smelling like potpourri. Fortunately, the incense and amber that was in the background pushed the floral water aside (even though it took them two hours). As a scent, Jacob's Ladder evolves by becoming lighter on the amber and having the incense (especially the benzoin) become more prominent. The drydown smells like powdered incense, somewhat similar to Midnight Mass, but not as sweet or woodsy (by woodsy, I mean that Midnight Mass smelled like glossy pews).

Edited February 10, 2006 by malanna

[rhubarbbear]

this one amazed and saddned me. the review were everything i was looking for in a midwinter perfume. the reality was horrible- strong, headachey, cheap male cologne.

 

skin chemistry...