Carfax Abbey

[couscous]

At Purfleet, on a byroad, I came across just such a place as seemed to be required, and where was displayed a dilapidated notice that the place was for sale. It was surrounded by a high wall, of ancient structure, built of heavy stones, and has not been repaired for a large number of years. The closed gates are of heavy old oak and iron, all eaten with rust.

The estate is called Carfax, no doubt a corruption of the old Quatre Face, as the house is four sided, agreeing with the cardinal points of the compass. It contains in all some twenty acres, quite surrounded by the solid stone wall above mentioned. There are many trees on it, which make it in places gloomy, and there is a deep, dark-looking pond or small lake, evidently fed by some springs, as the water is clear and flows away in a fair-sized stream. The house is very large and of all periods back, I should say, to mediaeval times, for one part is of stone immensely thick, with only a few windows high up and heavily barred with iron. It looks like part of a keep, and is close to an old chapel or church. I could not enter it, as I had not the key of the door leading to it from the house, but I have taken with my Kodak views of it from various points. The house had been added to, but in a very straggling way, and I can only guess at the amount of ground it covers, which must be very great. There are but few houses close at hand, one being a very large house only recently added to and formed into a private lunatic asylum. It is not, however, visible from the grounds.

The scent of abandoned places, of desolation and emptiness: heavy woods and thin dusty herbs touched by the wafting incense of a nearby chapel.

If I had sniffed this knowing it was part of Order of the Dragon, but not knowing which one it was, I would have bet a significant percentage of my paycheck that this one was The Castle. It has only been on my skin a short while, but I'm already amazed by how accurately this captures my mythical idea of abandoned elegance. Beth tapped into some collective tool box here, for sure.

Carfax Abbey is bone suckingly dry, austere, and very dusty. It is NOT, as many would imagine, our token resin-y incense-y blend. In fact, it doesn't have even the slightest resemblance to the church as most of us know it. Sorry, Midnight Mass fans, this is not our halloween stand-in.

Instead, I smell... faded iris, a bit of sassafras (or is it a droplet of amber?), perhaps some dusted lilac, the driest white sandalwood, some cedar? The resemblance to dragon's bone is definitely noted, for it is the only other scent I can think of that feels this somber, this studious.

There are some dried, faded flowers and herbs in this, for certain, but they don't smell at all like potpourri. They smell much more expensive, much more like the impressions of a bouquet on a back stairwell, in the direct line of the only light source. Floral haters- do NOT be afraid. The floral notes I'm smelling are so light as to be ghosts of their former selves- no accident on Beth's part, I'm sure

The throw is minimal, and it only morphs slightly for me into something mildly sweeter- but never, ever anything cheerful or alive. I absolutely love it.

[portalkat]

I absolutely agree with Couscous in that I would have thought that this was the Castle if I didn't know better.

 

This is the scent of an abandoned, vast, ancient structure. It is cold and unwelcoming and the wafting incense is dry and spare, the resins having been sucked out by the emptiness of the place. The woods in this blend remind me of Dragon's bone, either the white sandalwood or the blondewood, I'm not sure. I can smell the floral in the background, but it is very faint and wafts in and out of the incense. This is so different from the other incense blends like Cathedral, Midnight Mass or Aureus. Carfax Abbey is a chill wind blowing through and I am loving it.

[TrailerTrashPrincess]

i tested this early this morning at work, without access to the official description..

 

my notes are:

initial sniff, pencil shavings, Zombi without the roses, and the ground in the deepest, darkest part of the forest where light doesn't penetrate

and a bouquet of flowers hung up to dry years ago.

 

so... yeah. not girly or floral in the least. not traditionally incensey or resiny. not quite as deliciously obtuse as the premature burial... but oh so yummy it it's own morbid way.

[ceej]

All wood here, no resin that my untrained nose can detect. Dry woods, very like Dragon's Bone as another reviewer said, only minus the rounded fruitiness of the dragon's blood. There's cedar in this as well (at least I think that's what's making me sneeze a bit). Desolation, dust, dry abandonment.

 

A scent I will use to get myself into a particular headspace for writing, I think.

[tinyvulture]

I’ve always hoped the lab would come out with a ‘haunted house’ scent, and I think this might be it. If you are familiar with Dark Candles’ haunted house scent, this is kind of similar, to my nose anyway. Woods, resins, something musty and earthy. It really captures the dry, peculiar scent of an abandoned old space. Picture pushing open the creaking door and stepping into pitch black. Did you just hear something scurrying across the floor? Where is that breeze coming from? What this scent makes me think of, more than any other BPAL scent, is total darkness… not knowing what’s two feet in front of you…feeling your way along, wondering if the warped wooden floors will give way at any moment…pushing cobwebs out of your face…is that a ghost…or just some ancient furniture covered with dusty cloths…who knows? OK, I’ll stop now. I love this scent so much.

[wolfie13]

Sigh. I SO wish this had turned out on me as it has on others. Who wouldn't want to answer "Carfax Abbey" when asked what scent you are wearing??

 

However, here we go. First off, it's a lot lighter overall on me than I would have imagined. Yes, it's very nice in a "dry, dusty woods" way initially. I must say that I don't get much "incense" at all from this at this point or any other.

 

But while this doesn't go floral on me, it does get very green! Shockingly so! I must be amping the heck out of whatever the "thin dusty herbs" are. And in fact they are not thin and dusty at all, initially, but quite grassy! The later drydown provides a more dusty green. But still the overwhelming note!

 

I imagine that this will be a lot more like others have mentioned for most folks - but I figure in case anybody else shares my odd chemistry, you will know you are not alone!

[theseagrows]

this is a very dry, woody scent with a touch of herbs to it, and maybe some frankincense as i get a slight pencil lead scent, which is usually what frankincense does on me. i think i smell some musks or amber too perhaps. i think the woods are a bit too much for me. on my skin they almost smell foody but not sweet-foody, and i don't really want to smell like that. lovers of herbal-woody scents may love this though.

[ND¢]

Imp: something gritty under a heavy incense that carries a lighter note. (How descriptive of me.)

 

Skin: Starts out as a high, sort of sour (cedar?) note with a somewhat heavy incense. The cedar mellows, though it's still quite strong, and doesn't take on the pickling-spice scent I sometimes get from cedar, so I am assuming I'm smelling more than cedar and just can't discern. It's a rounder, fuller wood scent. If I think of it, the wood smell becomes fragrant, creaking floors, or a massive stand of old cedars, some broken on the ground. It and the incense are what I smell most strongly. I don't get even the faint floral some people describe. The herbs may be what seems to be 'complicating' the cedar.

[sarada]

Whoops, I forgot to review this one when I got my package on Monday and went on a mad sniffing spree. Fortunately I've had a chance to test it at great length in the intervening days!

 

Being a fan of "heavy woods" I had my money on something kind of dark and smooth but this is a powdery, dry wood. At first the blend as a whole smells like Yggdrasil but a little more incense dust, a little more piney herbs. It's the box of old incense that is in my closer, or a breath of air through a dry, pine-needle carpeted forest.

 

Somewhere between The Rat King and Yggdrasil, but with a bit more green, dusty herbs. I like it best in its early stages, though it fades quickly. Unlike The Castle, which grew stronger as I wore it, this started to fade into the ambient smell of the woods that I was walking through when I first tested it.

 

It's definitely in the family of scents that I like but I will probably have to wear it in a locket to keep it strong and fresh. I see the pale straight trees in Yggdrasil shadowing an abandoned wooden building overgrowing with ivy and greenery, and motes of dust suspended in a pale shaft of light.

[Court Analyst/Strategist]

I was surprised when I originally tried this blend that it was Carfax Abbey. It's very different than I had expected, and sadly, even when I first sniffed the bottle I could hazard a guess that the scent just wasn't destined to work on me....

 

Carfax Abbey:

 

Thick, sharp dust and the scent of bitter, crumbling herbs. Cedar is present as well. There is a hint of a floral to be glimpsed (possibly lilac) when Carfax Abbey is first applied, but the note fades quickly into oblivion after application. The herbs are not distinguishable but just a sort of generic dried leaf smell upon drydown, so I know my skin chemistry's just not agreeing with this one already. The cedar softens along with the herbs and dust within a short period of wear, but as no other notes appear to balance their strength, the scent still results in being left sort of lopsided. Very dry and heavy. I don't get any incense or resins at all, simply a curtain of dusty herbal notes that stick around strong. However, despite not truly enjoying the scent as a perfume, oddly enough I can imagine an old, empty hallway permeated with the smell. The dust and musty herbs are very genuine, clinging and pervasive.

 

Overall Rating: Moderate to Strong scent broadcasting power, 4/10 on account of lack of wearability. Carfax Abbey shares commonalities with how The Rat King developed on my skin chemistry; Cedar, a type of clingy, wafting dust musk and bitter herbal qualities with no notes coming to temper them into a balanced scent. Disappointing, because I thought with herbs and incense in the description, what's not to love? But something in this blend kind of warps once on my skin. Alas, off to swaps or sale with the bottle.

 

Court

Edited October 7, 2006 by Court Analyst/Strategist

[themerrybaker]

I'm happy that the cedar-type oil in Carfax stays under control and that it is possible to wear this without feeling like a hamster. Wearing it? -a very very interesting scent. This one needs a bit of thought as to how often it would get into rotation.

 

But the dry woods would be absolutely fantastic in an oil burner. How wonderful to feel like I was living in an old vampire-ridden abbey!

[fairy]

I didn't have high expectations for this one working on me...just ordered it to help me reach my "must have all the LE's" goal....and so that my Kindly Moon wasn't lonely.

 

See what happens when you think you wont like something...you wind up LOVING it!!!!

 

This one is gorgeous! I can't stop sniffing my arm. I couldn't even begin to pull notes out of it because it is so well blended everything seems to fit. This isn't overly "guy smell" or "girl smell"...it's perfectly neutral.

 

I don't get the cedar that other people talk about. Although "old library hallway" sort of works. It smells like knowledge and very ancient....ancestor spirits floating around a large round library room in a mansion...the kind that is five stories high that you need a ladder to reach the books way up high.

 

Actually, I just re-read Beth's description and it's perfect! Abandoned and vast and ethereal and empty and smoky and all-knowing. Like the person who is wearing it has a secret. It's not in your face, has the perfect amount of throw and is sweet enough to make it pass for perfume but not overly sweet to where a guy couldn't or wouldnt want to wear it. This is a keeper for sure and a possible second bottle order. Gorgeous

Edited October 7, 2006 by maddi

[buzz23666]

wow - this one really confuses my nose.

 

wet - for some reason my skin makes this a combo of a bone dry, deader than dead wood and a rain-drenched one with a sharp incense bite.

 

dry - it feels almost like a cypress - or sharp like a pine needle without the pine. It is definitely a "skeletal" scent. With a haunting of incense that isn't ecclesiastical.

 

I really cannot make up my mind on this one. It is compelling and spooky at the same time.

 

It is also very, very strong on me.

 

Hhhhhhhmmmmmmmmm...

[sookster]

straight sniff from bottle is dry, dusty & woody; brittle...with a pepper quality...

that must be the herbs...

 

once applied this is vaguely reminiscent of rat king...definite dustiness going

on...and ultra dry...this invokes a feeling of despair and longing...this may be

just about the perfect scent for curling up by the fire and reading a good book

in the middle of winter when i have just about enough of the crazy white stuff

flying around

 

dries down quickly and is quite short lived with my chemistry but i think that is

perfectly acceptable for a scent of this caliber...

[oakmoss]

I tried this without going back to read the description and see what notes were in it, so without any preconceptions, my nose first detected a foresty smell in the bottle, rather like Yggdrasil, one of my favorites, with a sandalwood undertone making it slightly spicy. On my skin, the forest scent disappeared -- coming out of the forest and through the door into the abbey itself -- leaving an evocative incense blend with very faint notes of stone and damp. If you love Penitence (and Midnight Mass, and The Pit and the Pendulum) as much as I do, you'll love Carfax Abbey.

[Phaedra777]

Oh, I wanted this to work so badly. It sounded so good. But what I get is a very, very perfumey blend that makes me sort of headachey. It smells very like some well-known cologne, but I'm not able to put my finger on it at the moment.

 

On the other hand, my mother loved it. So I gave it to her.

[SultryWolf]

Bottle: Aquatic sharpness over earthy moss.

On: Really smells like damp mossy bricks, with a bit of pine or cedar. I love.

 

Side note: Hubby can't get past the name because it makes him think of carfax.com, a website where one can check the collision history of a used vehicle.

Don't worry, he's read Dracula - it's just that the durned television commercial for carfax.com is on twenty times a day!

[hologhost]

I smell...green. Not herbs so much, as the smell of plants. A yard or a garden, There are whisps of smoke and slight florals. Sunrise at the church. These's a very faint incense smell. Very nice. I'm not sure it's something I'd wear, but I like the picture it creates.

[gingersnapp]

This is woods and stone, covered in a damp, green moss. I don't get the incense so much, but it definitely has a Midnight Mass quality to it... if the church had been abandoned for hundreds of years and the plant life that surrounded it swallowed it whole.

[Rheliwen]

I took a big chance with this one and have been worried about it ever since I ordered. But I love it!

 

Wet this really reminded me of a more smooth Ides of March. It was very green pine and green herbs. I was so excited at this stage!

 

Once dry it becomes Midnight Mass incense meets a very subtle Ides of March meets cedar.

 

Incense and geenery and cold stone bricks in the countryside. I adore this so much! At first I was afraid this might be too cologne-y or masculine but it isn't in he slightest.

Edited October 26, 2006 by Rheliwen

[blackfelicula]

In the bottle: I smell fragrant woods with a sharp, medicinal quality. There's a smooth undertone. For now the smell is almost too sharp for me.

 

Wet: It mellows on contact with my skin. It becomes a smooth, luxurious combination of woods and mosses, sweet and rich.

 

Drying down: Mmm. Lovely round scent, wooden and aged. This is more than just the typical wood fragrances.

 

Dry: This is light, not much throw, but it is such a lovely scent. I am glad to have it around me.

 

Later: Mmm. I loved wearing this gentle wood blend. This is going on my wishlist.

[juniperus]

Bottle: incense and floral, but a drier floral

Wet: I can get the woods form this, now. very dry, dusty and dusky.

Dry: old wood and that odd floral incense in the background...like the church it's wafting from has flowers at the altar on a holiday

Later: evocative, dreary. the floral has passed and it is, indeed, old wood and incense.

[maijasu]

I didn't think I'd like this at all, but I got a full set of decants and am in the process of testing all of them--and I've decided that this is one of my favorites!

 

It is a soft, dry, dusty wood and incense smell on me. It behaves really well on my skin, not becoming too strong, masculine, or off-smelling as cedary notes tend to do sometimes.

 

I may need a bottle, and may also need to test it on the husband and see if he needs one too. Great job, Beth!

[Little Bird]

I expected this to be mostly dry woods and incense from the description, but it has more of a wet and mossy quality in the bottle, and a hint of something that reminds me of soil (sort of that papery soil note that I also get in Destroying Angel).

 

On me... dry/thin soil, a sudden blooming of pine notes, and a waft of cedar and incense. In the drydown, the dusty cedar dominates and the fresh pine notes disappear. There are hints of sweet incense in the background that get stronger with time. This reminds me more of The Pit & The Pendulum as far as incense blends go.

 

Carfax Abbey is another interesting, unique incense blend. Unfortunately, I think it's too much of a dry and dusty scent for me to get away with wearing it.

[euterpe414]

As previously mentioned, Carfax Abbey is very much related to the Pit and the Pendulum, which is fantastic for me since that is one of my LE top 10! However, this is a lot of more dusty and woody, not strictly monastic incense smell. This does remind me of a dark abbey with many secrets, a very "old" scent, if that makes sense (old, not musty, mind you!).

 

I do like this very much, although I won't need more than one bottle since I tend to hoard different incense blends of this sort. Lovely!