TKO

[LadyLuckless]

“Many things -- such as loving, going to sleep, or behaving unaffectedly -- are done worst when we try hardest to do them.”

Ohhhh MYYYYY! This is crazy gorgeous! A delicious lavender milkshake of cozy fluffiness. It's like they took LUSH's Twilight scent (my favorite lavender) and blended it with the sugary vanilla from Love's Philosophy (my favorite vanilla) to make the perfect relaxation scent. It doesn't knock me out, but it definitely chills me out and makes me feel really mellow and happy. As an added bonus it's the best scent to have rub off on my baby since it smells like cuddles. TKO has leaped gracefully to the top of my BPAL loves and I just plain refuse to ever be without it!

[Balame]

I'm not in love with this, but I think that's only because I'm not the biggest lavender fan (for a perfume - I like the herb in itself). This is soft lavender with a backdrop of vanilla and something airy but sweet. Almost like a minty sugar? The mint/eucalyptus/whatever it is stays calm and isn't overwhelming, just refreshing. I can see how this would be soothing to most. Ironically, lavender verges on being envigorating to me. I'd rather cuddle up with mallow, cream, tonka, vanilla... but definitely give this a shot if you need a sleep aid.

[whitsunweddings]

In the imp: We have this biscuit in NZ called Gingernuts - our most popular, apparently - and this smells just like them, mixed with lavender.

Wet: Yup. Ginger-caramellised-sugary-biscuity lavender. Glorious.

Dry: The combination of spice and sweetness makes this like a bubblegummy Eclipse with the barest hint of lavender. Wonderful! I need a bottle.

[mymymai]

ITI: Vanilla, spun sugar, nutmeg, and either dried lavender or eucalyptus. It's soothing and enticing thanks to the vanilla.

 

Wet: Vanilla-spun sugar underneath eucalyptus, fresh lavender, and faint lemon, I think.

 

Dry: As it starts to dry, it takes on a slightly medicinal quality. However, it still maintains a lovely softness from the vanilla and sugar. I can see why this would help someone fall asleep.

[yakiguri]

I absolutely love the scent of lavender and regularly wear a lavender vanilla lotion to bed, so why it took me so long to get a bottle of this I have no idea. TKO starts off a bit medicinal and herbal but quickly settles down into a soft, creamed lavender. Whoever said it was like lavender marshmallows is spot on. I'm quite a light sleeper and since using this I have been able to not only fall asleep quicker but also sleep more deeply, so TKO gets plenty of gold stars for that. I can see myself going through bottles of this quickly and will need to pick up the TKO massage oil from the Trading Post.

 

(Psst...hey Puddin, could you please make a TKO atmo? )

[ToThineOwnSelfBeTrue]

In a month I have purchased 3 of TKO, I LOVE this more than anything I have ever smelled before. I added some to Almomd oil and also created a bath bomb and it transfers perfectly. I hope this never goes away.....ever.

I get very stressed out a work and when I'm about to I sit and breath this deeply and my associates thank BPAL for it...lol and so do I.

 

I don't know if it's just me, but the staying power isn't great on me. Regardless this is one item that everyone should have.

[SophieCedar]

Amazing! Lavender, marshmallow, and possibly myrtle? I love this blend. On 1st sniff I turned to dh and said "ooohh thiissss smellssss gooouuudddd." with this goofy lackadaisical grin on my face at which he replies, amused, "whhhaatt did you just say? *grin*"

[Atrous]

TKO smells like a cloud made up of sugary vanilla and lavender. That's the dominant scent anyway.

Underneath I'm getting a camphor/eucalyptus/lemon thing going on that smells like Cajeput to me.

I also think there is Cajeput in TKO because the blend irritates my skin a little (skin gets warm and slightly itchy) on the dry down just like Cajeput does.

Despite the slight irritation, I do love this blend because it smells terrific and I've fallen straight to sleep each night I put it on.

[Ffenics]

Origin — cheap ebay bottle of unknown age. I have General Anxiety Disorder which sometimes makes sleeping sometimes makes sleeping not-happening so I wanted to try it.

 

In the bottle: Lavender! And something like marshmallows coated in crunchy confectionary sugar.

 

Wet; Lavender dominant, the marshmallows and something herbal are hanging out in the background

 

Dry: Pillowy marshmallow clouds with a light lavender overlay to stop it from veering into "sickly", heavennnnnnnn!

 

We Welshies (because we have the best language ) use the word "cwtch", which I don't think has a direct english translation so the closest I can come is "snuggle", but cwtch is even more snuggly. You can cwtch a person, or cwtch up under a blanket, etc, and it is just the bestest most comforting thing. TKO is a cwtch in a bottle!

 

I don't know if it was just the psychological effect of knowing I was dousing myself in something to make myself drift off, but I did find breathing it in I felt calm and naturally sleepy, and I was asleep within minutes (I used it when my anxiety disorder was pinging a panic loop in my brain so it had some tough conditions to work with). I tend to get nightmares & broken sleep (again because my brain is wonky!) but the nights I use TKO I tend to get a nice, deep sleep and I wake up naturally and refreshed in the morning.

 

So I'm not sure *why* it works but I'll take it above the fug induced by benzos and sleeping tablets any day - plus it smells amazing, once whilst I was about to doze off my wrist was grabbed and sniffed at by my boyfriend who found the scent and effects equally appealing, trying to use me as a scent sachet for him to get some sleep!

 

(Edited as I don't spell so gewd)

Edited March 19, 2014 by Ffenics

[Erinofhere]

I was sent a sniffie with just enough for a few skin tests. TKO is now on my list of simply have to have purchases.

 

Its heavy lavender on me with a lovely cloudy vanilla and a bit or an herbal whisp floating around the scent. Also there is a noticible root beer, Sassifrace, Sasparilla (?) note hanging around too.

 

I dont feel like this made me sleepy at all but it was a wonderful scent and I really need to own it. Also....we need a TKO Hair Gloss. This would smell perfect as a hair gloss don't ya think?

[macabre_fae]

I was pretty excited to try this, unfortunately this smells like lavender tortilla chips on my skin and makes me feel really nauseous. I have never had this issue with any other oils. I immediately had to go and scrub it off because it's just unbearable on me.

 

The lavender is very heavy in this blend. I usually have no problem tolerating lavender and I enjoy it but this is way too strong for my taste. The vanilla/marshmallowy note ends up smelling like stale tortilla chips, which I know sounds weird... maybe it's just my skin. Looks like this guy is going into the swap pile, sorry TKO.

Edited February 24, 2015 by macabre_fae

[Sarah Morehouse]

TKO does not smell good on me, but it smells FANTASTIC on my pillow case. It's a very smooth but potent lavender, a ton of sugared vanilla, a touch of either mint or eucalyptus (present more in the sensation of The Cool Side Of The Pillow than the actual scent) and... do I detect a whiff of cardamom? I think I do!

 

To say TKO is relaxing is like saying that the Cretaceous Extinction Event was a rough patch for the dinosaurs. TKO is like being painlessly bludgeoned to unconsciousness by an angel wielding a marshmallow.

 

I have used half a bottle in a couple months. Oh dear.

Edited March 3, 2015 by manycolored

[greeneyedgirl]

Decided the perfect time to test this was before bedtime. I got this decant in a spray so the throw is pretty far, which I like. It does remind me of Twilight bath bomb from Lush. The lavender is beautiful, soft and soothing. It also works up some nostalgia in me...something about it reminds me of the incense I used to burn in my college apartment. Lavender is my favorite floral and TKO did not disappoint.

[TorchedEarth]

This is lovely. It's kind of a cross between my beloved Nocturnus and Go To Sleep Darlings. The sweet vanilla sugar is stronger (& the same as in gtsd) than in Nocturnus & TKO is a little less herbal.

 

I have come to love all of the labs sleep blends.

[lady_pandora]

TKO goes on as lavender mixed with something sludgy-sweet; this must be the marshmallow thing everybody's talking about. The combo smells kind of weird, and it's really strong (I'd wondered if it would be a bit like Stygian Nougat, but TKO has like 10x the throw of Stygian Nougat), and yet really comforting. The first night I wore it to sleep, it didn't really work--maybe my mind was churning too much, or maybe I just needed to get used to it. So the next night I used Ebon Night instead, which is another story, but then the next night, I gave TKO another shot. That time, I slept great, waking up with vague memories of dreams.

 

The smell in the morning is a bit cloying to me; the lavender is mostly gone and it's just sweet and sweet and more sweet. But hey, for a sleep blend, who cares what it smells like in the morning! Especially since, unlike the Midnight Mass I also sometimes sleep in, it actually washes off in the shower and doesn't hang around the rest of the day! (Edited to add: And now, on third wear, the marshmallow scent is really identifiable as marshmallow in the morning, and smells better than it did last time. Maybe my nose was just off before. IDK.)

 

I think this will be a good sleep blend for relatively ordinary nights, when I don't need the added magical punch of Ebon Night or the meaningful dreams of (the even-weirder-smelling) March 2015 13 and don't want to smell like Midnight Mass for the next 18 hours. I wouldn't choose it as a regular perfume, but for sleep it works just fine.

Edited August 21, 2015 by lady_pandora

[whoahorsey]

Wet: It smelled like lemon pledge and diaper rash ointment when I put it on. I instantly marked it down in the "tried and hated" category on my spreadsheet and was prepared to trade it immediately, but...

 

Dry: Even though I HATED it when I first applied it, I didn't wash it off, and I'm so happy I didn't, because thirty minutes after application, it had mellowed into the most scrumptious vanilla buttercream. So good! I haven't loved a vanilla blend this much since Underpants! I smell almost no lavender, it's all vanilla on me in the drydown, and I couldn't be happier.

 

Happy I gave it a chance after an initial unfavorable impression!

[LizziesLuck]

I have been dying to try this! I have the massage oil from the Post, and I find it has almost no scent, still leaving me wondering what TKO really smells like on me. I received a frimp decant of this in a forum purchase, and I am so grateful for it!

 

 

Wet: Oiy. What IS that? It's not lavender, and it sure isn't vanilla. This is the scent in the massage oil that I thought was the "rice bran" oil. It smells oily and...weird. It's getting better as it dries though, sweeter and less odd.

It goes through an interesting "burnt pancake" phase.

 

Dry: I have no clue. I am not getting the "lavender marshmallows" that everyone else talks about. I'm not getting any lavender, really. Or vanilla. Or anything I can identify. It's a bit sweet, a bit herbal. Fairly pleasant. That's seriously the best I can do. I find this too confusing to want to wear to bed, I would be constantly sniffing myself, trying to figure out what the heck I'm smelling....

[Candice Chen]

A perfect balance between astringent, sharp, medicinal lavender, bright chamomile, and the most gorgeous sweet, clean vanilla sugar. Argh - how do they create this soft sugariness?! It smells like someone dripped a few drops of high-grade French Lavender oil onto a white sugar cube and held it over heat. As the sugar heats up (but not to the point of burning yet), a lavender cotton candyish sweetness comes out.

 

I am not a fan of lavender by any means - besides not liking the harsh, medicinal smell in and of itself, I associate it with unimaginative men's fragrances and cliche aromatherapy blends. TKO does start off with a sharp, strong lavender for the first 5-10 mins, but it's juxtaposed against that hypnotic, "lying on a pile of sugar" sweetness, which makes the astringent lavender bearable for me. The further someone is, and the longer it dries down on the skin, the softer the lavender and the more toasty and caramelized the sugar gets. The lavender also gets softer with age, and the sugariness more apparent.

 

It's not perfume-y; neither is it too much like an "aromatherapy oil" to wear out. I have done it and had someone remark that "something smells beautiful here" without knowing whether it was an ambient scent or a fragrance.

 

For me, it's not a sleep-inducing blend as much as it's a soothing scent. Which I guess winds me down and prepares me for sleep. I'm usually the sort that will lie in bed with my mind racing for an hour, not at all helped by the fact that the husband starts snoring 10 seconds after his head hits the pillow. I've been sleeping better than him recently. Maybe he needs some TKO.

It's not perfume-y; neither is it too much like an "aromatherapy oil" to wear out. I have done it and had someone remark that "something smells beautiful here" without knowing whether it was an ambient scent or a fragrance.

Edited July 4, 2016 by Nightphlox

[fundercat55]

I have been eyeing this scent for years, but it was always getting bumped from my cart by LE purchases. Well, now I have a 10 month old and after a nearly a year of chronic sleep deprivation, I was desperate for anything that might lend a hand to improving my quality of sleep, even if I'm still not able to increase the number of hours of sleep I get. This seemed like a good bet.

In the bottle and first applied, it's a blast of straight lavender. Which, I like lavender, but I was hoping for something a little more.

As it dries, ahhhhhh! There's the something a little more I was looking for. Beautiful, light sweetness. I literally cannot stop huffing my wrists.

Completely dry- It smells familiar. It took me a while to place it, but it's Necco wafers! If there was a lavender flavored Necco wafer, this would be what it smelled like. Light, airy, lavender sugar all wrapped up in a wax paper tube. This also has great staying power. I apply it at night before bed and can still smell a light whiff on my wrists when I get up in the morning.

I'm pleased I finally took the plunge and got this one, and I think it's a scent that's going to age beautifully, so I can't wait to smell what it does as it gets older. Overall, a very sweet, happy, mellowing scent that I want to make sure I always have in my scent arsenal.

[JTobias]

I cannot rave enough about this scent; it will forever be a top five for me. I suffer from Bipolar I (diagnosed at age 32) and have problems managing stress, anxiety, mania, and sleep. TKO is my "everything will be ok, so breathe now" scent; lavendar, vanilla, sugar, and magic, that's all I know. This scent does more for me than any type of meds from the doc.

[AnArtfuldodger]

Like falling asleep on a lavender marshmallow.

[KatyC]

This one was a real roller-coaster for me. I love all things lavender and I regularly use relaxation/sleep aromatherapy stuff, so I blind-bottled, fully expected this to be right up my strasse.

 

In the bottle: Slightly sweet, quite chemically, somewhat lavender/lilac-ish. Not exactly what I'd expected from the reviews here but I applied it before bed in the hopes it would change on my skin.

 

The first couple hours on my skin: The floral I could smell in the bottle pretty much disappeared, and the chemical note really came to the forefront, along with a herbal/medicinal element. I walked past my husband and he commented that I smelled like insect repellant, and I couldn't disagree. It wasn't absolutely vile but it wasn't particularly pleasant and I was tempted to wash it off before falling asleep, but I decided to persevere.

 

Middle of the night (approx 4-5 hours after application): I woke up in the night and finally found myself enveloped in the floral marshmallow I'd read about! I couldn't say for sure it was lavender, but it was very pretty and sweet, perfect for sleep. I lay awake for a while smelling myelf, like the little weirdo I am.

 

So - on my skin the final result is 100% gorgeous, but one has to suffer a little to get there. I'm going to give it another go in case it settles down (I tried it 3 days after its arrival in the post) but with Lullaby and Anaesthesia waiting in the wings I'd be surprised if this ends up being my BPAL bedtime scent.

[VetchVesper]

Soooo... A cautionary tale -. I made the mistake of putting TKO on after drinking too much and then went to bed. I woke up with a hangover, and it took me a long while before I could stand to smell this again.

 

Even without that experiencethough, I prefer Anesthesia or Baku for sleep blends. They are similar, but more purely herbal. There's a foody thing going on in TKO that clashes with a strong menthol note on me that's too strange to wear as a perfume. It's kinda like sugar cookies dipped in Mentholatum. That said, it does help relax me and my husband loves it. In fact, he stole my bottle. O_O

[Nilbog]

This was my first full size BPAL purchase. I love lavender and I felt pretty safe without sampling a decant.

 

In the Bottle this is an intoxicating blend of Lavender. Sharper when wet, yet the creamy vanilla note is still very noticeable.

 

On my skin it is just as delicious. The vanilla/tonka note is amplified. It also picks up a bit of spiciness that makes the lavender insanely good. That must be the other note people were speculating was eucalyptus. I can't identify it.

 

I genuinely can't believe how much this perfume exceeded my expectations. I did not purchase it to assist with sleep, simply as a daily perfume. Yet, I still find myself applying it at night just because it calms me and makes me feel like I'm laying on a lavender sugared cloud. My husband has insomnia and when I get back to Japan I can't wait to make TKO his best friend.

 

My one qualm would be that the throw is just average. I want to only smell this from now on.

Edited September 11, 2017 by Nilbog

[tinyvulture]

I've long been a fan of the Somnium category, and lavender blends in general, for bedtime. And yet I never laid my hands on a bottle of TKO until now! It's the queen of all the lavenders, isn't it? Just herbaceous, healing lavender, and smooth, not too sweet, vanilla. TKO is more medicinal-smelling than sweet, overall. Just taking a couple sniffs of it really chills me out. Five stars.