Opium Poppy

[purplemoonshoes]

Opium teaches only one thing, which is that aside from physical suffering, there is nothing real. A bitter, soft, fragile flower.

In the bottle: Sweet and spicy. Very rich. Yum.
Wet: A peppery spice (that's what it smells like to me) dominates, mellowed by a floral; tickles your nose a little
Drydown: The floral notes bloom, but they're not sweet little things- this is a strong powdery flower, with a little green thrown in. The peppery note still adds some zing.
Later: This has throw and lasting power- it's been a couple of hours and it's still there, but my skin tends not to absorb the spicy ones as quickly. The floral gets stronger and the spice fades though.

[filigree_shadow]

Whenever I see "opium poppy" or "poppy" in a list of the notes in the scent description, I usually think that I'll probably like the blend. On its own, though? Not so much, it turns out.

 

I like the stinging perfumey quality that this has -- it's almost metallic. I personally love that sort of scent, and I can usually count on opium poppy to deliver. It's present here, and that's the good part.

 

The bad part is that this is not quite Eau d' Band-Aid on me, but almost. The thought jumped into my head as I was sniffing, and now every time I sniff this I think of adhesive bandages.

 

Maybe I'll come back to this another time, and hopefully by then I will have forgotten about that awful association.

[CrazyPretzel]

Sniffing this girl straight from the imp, I was reminded of a time years ago when my fiancee used to work as a ghost story-teller/tour guide in St Augustine -- wandering around the creepier bits of a very old town at night, in a semi-tropical climate with lush flowers and trees. That sort of dark floral. Very evocative.

 

Once applied, on the drydown (first 15-20 minutes) this starts to give off a very sharp, nearly poisonous soap-like odor, which will probably make my boyfriend complain though I don't mind it myself.

 

Once that phase passes, this turns into a mind-blowingly wonderful dark, creamy, mysterious floral. I had no idea what poppies smelled like before trying this, but if this is the Lab's poppy note I will *definitely* be looking for more blends with poppy in them.

 

I am so getting a bottle of this.

 

[Meg]

In the bottle: Perfumy resin.

 

Wet: dry... sneeziness? it doesn't smell of much, but it tickles my nose. It comes out as dry opium, in the end.

 

Drydown: Dry opium, to me it's warm and smoky, exactly like poppy seeds. There's something perfumy around it, too, resinous, sneeze-inducing.

 

Overall: Resins and smoke, mostly, this is an incensy blend and one that I don't really "get". To me it's perfumy, elegant and dark, but not at all my type of blend. Oh well.

[LadyCrow]

Okay, this is one floral that's found a happy home with me.

 

Smokeflower! Flowersmoke? Flokesmower. Smowfloker. Flokersmow. Sssssmoke. And flowers. Prickly a bit, like a real poppy. Georgia O'Keeffe, you could just fall in, man. A leeetle soapy in the drydown, don't worry though, it gets you over. Magnificent sillage, really maximum throw. You don't want to be doing this on the down-low in the restroom at work. No. Chasing the dragon -- like, Dragon's Reverie, this is reminiscent of the sweet-smoky nature of that. The floral is sufficient to get the user through the normal routines society provides, while the smoke satisfies the need, or causes you to dream of emperors and lost cities until some git from Porlock knocks at the door.

[puck_nc]

Origin: Frimp from the Lab

 

Initial Thoughts: I've liked a dash of opium in other blends.

 

In the Bottle: Um, yeah. That smells like a box of Band-Aids.

 

Wet: OK, now it's heavily resinous Band-Aids.

 

Drydown: The resins lighten a bit, the poppy sweetens up, but my overwhelming impression is still opening the door to the bathroom closet and inhaling the Band-Aids and various creams and lotions.

 

Verdict: This one does not like my skin. Pass.

[jasmine]

Opium Poppy is a lush, shadowy smell. Something smells a bit medicinal in the blend. When I was growing up, there was a white-flowered bush outside my house that smelled quite similar to a medicine I once took for pneumonia, and this has a similar lush-but-medicinal quality.

 

It’s ebbing slowly toward a shadowy white aura. I remember this from BPAL’s Languor, though Opium Poppy isn’t having the same psychosomatic pull of exhaustion upon me that Languor did.

 

Inevitably, Opium Poppy just lacks allure for me. It’s all shadows and no flash... all dreams, and no substance.

[bryghtrose]

This smelled burnt, like sesame seeds thrown in the bottom of a wok, or bacon left on the frying pan for too long. And as much as I love the smell of bacon, I don't want to wear it as a perfume. There was something off about this scent.

[DifferentDances]

Imp: Very pretty floral perfume in the vaguest sense.

Wet on skin: Ew. Something's rotting on my wrist. It's sharp and acrid in the middle of the perfume.

Dry down: Much better. Powdery floral, which I assume to be poppy.

Dry: Really, really powdery floral. Not my thing; I think that's just a personal taste issue though rather than evil skin chemistry.

 

My rating: 3/5. It's not a bad scent, it's just not one that I like enough to keep.

[Miseraya]

In the imp: I get a band aid vibe from this, but more than that it reminds me of heavy 70-80's style cologne. There is no way this will work on me.

 

On the wrist: Getting opium, definitely. This on me is just overwhelming resin/incense type stuff.

 

Dry: Goes powdery rather quickly and stays that way.

 

Overall: I should have known better, resin/incense smells just never work on me. Off to the swaps.

[Brianne]

In the vial:

opium

 

On me:

Someone compared this to bandaids - I agree with that lol. Something about opium smells like bandaids on me, and it just comes off as sort of funky and odd on my skin. The only exception to that is with Red Lantern. This is a really heady floral with a strange note in it.

 

Final note:

My chemistry just doesn't get along with opium, so if you have the same problem you are probably not going to like it in this one either lol.

[zankoku_zen]

In the imp: Shadowy

 

On Skin: Smells kinda like bandaids. Whuh?

 

On Drydown: Bandaids/pith of the grapefruit.

 

Verdict: Uh... my skin chemistry totally did not cooperate on this one. Either the opium or the poppy or whatever else is in this blend is not my friend.

[aquazoo]

Starts bright & clean. Intoxicating. I’m out of my element in describing this type of scent - pleasant, not spicy or floral, and yet strong. Keep.

[lady_pandora]

I wanted to like this; I have some poppy incense around the house and I love it. Poppy is such a decadent, evocative scent to me.

 

Unfortunately, on my skin, Opium Poppy turns to hair spray. The only thing it evokes is a memory of being thirteen in the early nineties and having my bangs poofed up into a hair-wall over my forehead. :D

Edited October 18, 2007 by lady_pandora

[steffanina]

Opium Poppy-

 

In Bottle: A heavy heavy cloying floral. No musk but still heavy and cloying.

 

Wet: Very floral, very sweet. And cloying.

 

Dry: Floral. I think there's a little jasmine in here, which doesn't like me very much. It has that plastic-powder-diaper thing going on.

 

Overall: Not for me.

[delicate_fangs]

Hm. In the bottle, it's fascinating. Floral sharp somethingness, but not the florals I usually dislike. I like the opium-ness.

 

On me, though, it's hypnotic band-aids. Huh.

 

Still, they're hypnotic.

 

Must ponder this for a while. We shall see.

[Miss Lynx]

I got this as a frimp in a swap, and tried it even though florals are usually not good on me, because I've had a couple of scents with poppy in them that didn't seem to amp too terribly, so that gave me grounds to think that poppy might be a relatively non-evil flower.

 

And indeed, this scent is fairly subtle and soft, even on my floral-amping skin. Mind you, I didn't put on very much of it, but still -- a little usually goes a very long way with me and any kind of floral. It's delicate and pretty, a little ethereal (slightly reminds me of Ouija). And there is a faint trace of something not-sweet underlying it, a little touch of some kind of bitter herb, maybe, just enough to give it a faint sense of bittersweetness and make you think that yes, this just might be based on something narcotic and/or poisonous.

 

Really, as floral scents go, this is a pretty good one. I'm still not really a floral-scent type of person, but if I were I would really love this. Even as it is, I'm tempted to keep it in case I'm ever the mood for florals without the musk and incense notes that are usually required to balance them for me..

 

Grade: B

[TrailerTrashPrincess]

impsniff: old-school band-aids (yeah, i don't get it either)

on skin: band-aids AND mercurichrome -- was i bad? did i get a booboo?

 

to note: this is not what real opium smells like (the kind you smoke, not the kind you spray) but it may be what the flower smells like. having never seen one... i dunno.

[Laurel the Woodfairy]

Every single time I hear the name of this blend, my brain does its Wicked Witch impression: "Poppies; poppies will make them sleep...sleeeeeeep" Other than idle Oz-related curiousity, I wanted to try this blend because I'm crazy for 'Mum Moon and wanted to try a GC opium-den scent; the Poppy is not all that much like 'Mum Moon, but the exotic, dreamy feeling is there. It also reminds me vaguely of YSL Opium but is a much more delicate member of the Oriental-scent family. Opium poppy was incensey/smoky/spicy on me at first, just as I hoped. Then it veered dangerously into burned Bandaid territory. WTF *is* that note, anyway? However, it recovered itself and became lovely once more on the drydown. My boy said it smelled like "church incense, but in a good way." I agree; a bit like Cathedral without the woody/resin notes. Soft, floating, and seductive--well, except for that weird middle stage. Very much an air elemental scent to me.

[parrot_suspect]

I don't normally wear florals; I prefer darker, more resinous blends. Opium Poppy turns out to be a nice blend of both. It's actually quite soft, a bit powdery. It reminds me a bit of the soft, spicy scent of carnations. As it dries down, it doesn't morph but it becomes richer and a bit darker. There's something languid, dreamy and almost "blurry" about this fragrance. As soft and sweet as it is, it doesn't smell innocent. I'm hooked, and will probably buy a bottle.

[eternalargus]

In Bottle: o00o, I'm already liking this. Usually opium perfumes end up smelling like my grandmothers entire ancient perfume collection all rolled together on me, but this smells nice and resinous and smoky.

 

On Skin: I'm one of the lucky ones who didn't get the bandage note. My skin instead decides to amp up the resin note and now I feel all dreamy.

 

Dry Down: Sex in a temple, that's the best way I can describe it. This one likes me.

 

Thoughts: Definitely a keeper.

[cranberry]

I’ve loved many oils with opium as a component, and poppies are one of my favorite flowers, so I’m glad to be finally reviewing this oil.

 

This is just lovely – smoky, rather bitter, resinous, only slightly sweet. As it wears it becomes more a floriental type-scent. Slightly spicy, slightly floral, resinous, smoky, sweet. Heady and gorgeous. I’m seriously considering getting a bottle of this.

[hkhm]

imp: um... bandaids? like bandaids with smoke and metal.

 

wet: this smells very perfumey along with smelling very acrid. there is still that unusual bandaid scent.

 

dry: still bandaids and perfume, though less smoky.

[cassandrakfreaq]

this has no real morph for me it smells like a mix between cinnamon and medicinal hospital supplies......totally not what i was expecting lol.

[angharad]

A bit smoky, sharp, bitter...slightly papery, slightly peppery as well...and somewhere underneath all those impressions is a flower. Not for me.