Tamamo-no-Mae

[rayvn1]

Tamamo-no-Mae’s scent is soft skin musk, brushed by white tea leaf, rice flower, black locust flower, white sandalwood kodo smoke, dry ginger, benzoin gum, and Amacha.

Interesting! A slight level of skin musk with a very dry, slightly bitter citrus scent. Glad I was able to try a sniffie, but not something I need to track down.

[Ohmaude]

What? I haven't reviewed this yet?

 

T.N.M. is rice candy, ginger and soft florals. It is a perfect late spring scent. Soft, airy and cheering. Incredibly beautiful.

[Suu4LC]

Lovely in the bottle-a dry, gingery, woodsy, fruity musk. I love the rice flower note and tea note. Every time I take a deep sniff I like it more and more.

 

Hmm...interesting on my skin...a little hard to describe-more woody and citrus-y...but I think my skin is morphing this in a bad way...it almost smells...bubblegummy. O_o Which doesn't make a LICK of sense...it fluctuates between being that weird bubblegummy scent, and like those Botan rice candies with the edible paper.

 

Damn, my chemistry is just really wrecking this...thankfully, on full drydown, it becomes lovely again, a sort of dry brown ginger skin musk with a hint of something creamy and fruity. Very beautiful.

 

So I am torn...that wet on my skin scent is pretty wonky...but I love the bottle scent and the drydown scent. So I think I shall hold onto it and test it again later...it definitely has promise!

Edited September 15, 2009 by Suu4LC

[Dominique]

I've found that some perfumes are immediately noticeable - the sniffie equivalent of a punch to the nose. Tamamo-no-Mae is not one of these scents, and in a way, that makes her so much sexier. It's possible to imagine someone actually smelling like this, though a fortunate coincidence of shampoo, detergent and body chemistry. Wet, the tea leaf and ginger are predominate, like a much, much gentler version of Kumiho. On my skin, the ginger isn't quite so noticeable. It's still a green-stroked, vaguely citrus scent, but a good deal more complex. The bottom note is floral, probably the rice and black locust flowers.

 

As it dries down, the florals come out to play, though the green hints never really go away. The skin musk manages to be both subtle and constantly present, adding a suggestive hint to an already lovely scent.

 

I got my hands on a 5 ml bottle and I'll be trolling Ebay, looking for more. I like Tamamon-no-mae.

Edited September 29, 2009 by Dominique

[biocarolyn]

I have discovered that although red musk hates me, skin musk & I are friends. Actually, perhaps more than friends. I've loved it in the Illustrated Woman, in Giant Vulva, and now as an undercurrent in Tamamo-No-Mae.

 

There is something citrus about this blend(which is good, because I like citrus)- like the sweetest ruby red grapefruit you could imagine. I know there are no citrus notes listed...Its such a strange combination of sharp and soft- maybe that is her intellect, her sparkling wit (like in the legend). Anyway, unfortunately, I have no idea what the rest of the notes in this blend (OK, except for white tea, which I can't smell in it) smell like, but I love what I smell.

 

Top 3. And I just smelled it for the first time today. Damnit- doomed to seek out more, probably at ridiculous prices LOL. See? This is why I was staying away from the LEs...

[Veronica]

Mmm this is a really soft gentle floral/musk blend. Very pretty and warm! I loooooove this, it makes me feel sexy and sophisticated.

 

EDIT: I swapped for a bottle of this based on my experience with a decant, but somehow I am just not feeling it quite as much as I was. In my memory, this is very creamy and a skin musk. From my experience with the bottle, on drydown this has a white floral base (the locust?), almost lemony (the ginger), tinged by a rice scent and a barely discernable musk background. The sharpness of the floral and ginger do fade, and it becomes creamier over time. After a few minutes, it is mostly creamy musk with a floral note that just seems slightly off. Just not quite what I remembered, pretty but unremarkable This bottle is already pretty aged at this point, so I'm not sure if it will get any creamier, but I might hang onto it to see, because the memory I have of Tamamo no Mae in my head is just that good.-9500111056515042537983

Edited February 12, 2015 by delighted

[devilot]

Tamamo-No-Mae

In the Bottle: Fruity, definitely that Asian vibe already.

 

Wet: Yup, still fruity as well as that tea and rice flower feel.

 

Drydown: Something shifts and it's almost dusty now. And yes, a bit sour, but still that fruity, tea, rice flower thing.

 

Verdict: This is a gorgeous blend, but ultimately, my nose no longer cares for these sorts of scents. That's also why I sold my Hanami months and months ago. I feel like these blends just get a tad sharp w/ my skin chemistry.

[loubric]

The only note that worried me a little was the musk, which tends to over power everything on my skin. But I still had to try this…

 

Whew thank-goodness the musk decided to take a backseat today. This is a very spicy clean and green scent (if that makes sense). Tea always works wonderfully on my skin and this is no exception.

 

Hints of sweetness peak through making this a lovely summer scent.

 

Beautiful!

[Schmoozy]

 

 

Skin musk and sandalwood combines with ginger and white tea. Slightly spicy, and kind of astringent, Tamamo-no-Mae is a close to skin scent with gingery sandalwood. It's clear, bright and very peppy. My only regret is not reviewing this when I bought it from the lab, because it has definitely become more sharper.

[HerbGirl]

I finally managed to find a bottle! I am so in love with the Asian themed oils right now... I think it's because it feels like Spring here in the Pac NW and I'm craving them! This is similar to Hungry Ghost Moon, but it's lighter and missing the Grapefruit note that I love HGM for. What a beautiful oil this is - I'm so happy I can finally wear it!

[saralaughs]

The florals in this are gorgeous and really scream spring and the smoke and benzoin really do give it a mysterious quality that is lovely and a bit powdery but the tea leaf and ginger combine in this to make it really astringent on my skin. Not quite what I was looking for in this blend.

[Vega]

Sniffed: Light skin musk, slightly milky/creamy, with touches of clear florals and zestiness.

 

On skin: Tamamo-no-Mae is recognizably one of BPAL's Asian-themed blends, but still holds its own distinctive character. The skin musk and benzoin form a gentle, sweet and creamy base, layered over with the airy clarity of florals and teas, with ginger lending a gentle, zesty bite. The blend deepens and becomes creamier as the florals and ginger fade over time. This is ultimately a discreet, skin-hugging, floral-creamy scent. Colour impression is a pale skin tone, gently flushed.

 

Verdict: I'm discovering that while I like BPAL's Asian blends, they are simply too light and discreet to hold my attention for long. Tamamo-no-Mae is very pretty and a beautiful specimen of an Asian-themed blend, but it ultimately isn't distinctive enough and it won't be staying.

[windbourne]

So, I have to admit that I've had this one for quite a while, both a decant and a bottle, but have never reviewed it for some reason. Crazypants. Anyway.

 

There are stark differences between the decant and the bottles, most notably that the decant is much softer and creamier, with a much more prominent rice flower note. The bottles are sharper and more ginger-white tea, especially initially. In both there is a gentle vanilla-like base, and a nearly citrussy …I hesitate to call it a bite, but definitely a nibble. The skin musk is pretty amazing, slightly sweet and …well, skin musk-y. I am hard-pressed to describe it as anything other than a sweet skin scent.

 

It fades over several hours, sweetening up as it goes, and wears like a dream. It's worth mentioning that rice flower has been one of my "MUST FIND MORE THINGS" notes since I tried the Castitas bath oil (rice flower, vanilla, cream) and thought it was one of the most gorgeous things -ever-. This is the only perfume I remember trying that has that note in any kind of prominence, and it seems to show up pretty rarely.

 

I do like the decant a little more than the bottles, and I'm tempted to carefully leave the cap off one of the bottles for a while to see if I can artificially age it a little? But that's a scary prospect. :x

 

Wear length is decent on me, throw is moderate (though it can -really- kick up if it's warm out!), and I'm pleased to have as much as I do.

[amyw]

This is not my usual sort of scent at all, but ages ago someone sent me a decant with a swap. I hadn't even looked at the notes when I tried it and I thought it was gorgeous. Then I looked at the notes and knew I never would have gone out of my way to try it, as I'm a resin/vanilla/heavier musk type and not at all a florals type.

 

On my skin, I can detect the skin musk, the ginger, the florals, and a tiny bit of the sandalwood. Maybe a bit of the tea too, but not much. It's a clean, light, very very pretty scent, and everything I can smell is very well balanced. Nothing predominates. I can see the comparisons to Hungry Ghost Moon, and to me this is a bit like HGM but without the smoky vanilla. I'm not a fan of smoky vanilla anyway, so I wasn't a huge fan of HGM. This stuff, though, is fantastic on me.

[Viridian]

I finally tracked down a bottle of this after coveting it for years based on the description and reviews. In the bottle this smells like a very cool, green, slightly fruity scent. On me, however, it becomes a very floral musk. I lose almost all of the refreshing springy qualities it has while wet, except the peachy scent.

 

I'm not sure how I feel about it yet - it was a stronger scent than I was looking for the first time I wore it, but when I re-tried it on one wrist today I'm thinking it's incredibly pretty. I wish more of the tea and ginger were evident, but maybe in a scent locket I'd get more of my preferred notes.

[Jangzonrice]

Wet it smells lightly gingery with a tea and powder note. Dry you can smell the skin musk and tea more strongly with the ginger fading and only a slight powderiness remaining. It is a rather ethereal scent with light throw and slight staying power. I'm happy that I have it, but I must use a fixative for it to stay longer than a couple of hours.

[Balame]

People have compared this to Hungry Ghost Moon multiple times, which excited me because I really like that blend. However, my experience was not similar at all.

 

When wet Tamamo-no-Mae is lovely. It's like a creamy, breezy mix of fruity florals and soft rice candy. Not my usual thing but very good. Then as soon as it starts to dry it turns into a super powdery floral that verges on being astringent. Powder + astringent = stuffy nose for me, so it was a big letdown.

 

HGM is much softer and dreamy compared to this, not to mention it lacks the floral component I dislike here. Tamamo could definitely have been a winner if it stayed truer to its initial application, but sadly that was not the case for me.

[Aviatrix]

This is very sweet on me, almost as if there was honey in it somewhere. It could be the creamy florals, perhaps? Or the Amacha?

I am also getting a nice sting of ginger from it, and a little bit of the tea leaf.

 

It is quite pleasant and makes me smell almost like sweet rice cakes; there is a definite Asian vibe in this.

 

Unfortunately it isn't very strong on my skin, but it lasts a decent number of hours.

[LizziesLuck]

I'm on the hunt for soft, subtle skin scents currently, so this sounded like it might fit the bill.

 

 

Wet: Light, sweet. A bit spicy from the ginger, which I love. Oh this is really pretty. It's very fresh and clean smelling, without smelling of soap.

 

Dry: Doesn't morph, just gets a bit sweeter, but not sickeningly so - just perfect. It's so light and clean and pretty. Perfect for what I wanted it for! If you like scents with a huge presence and throw, this is likely not it, but if you're looking for a light skin scent that makes you feel pretty and feminine without being noticeable by anyone around you, this is perfect!

[puellacaerulea]

Grabbed a secondhand bottle of this for the skin musk, tea, and rice flower notes. This starts off as a pretty, subtle skin musk, light and clean. As it develops on my skin, however, it starts to get fruity and almost candy-sweet -- a little too cloying for my taste. If you're okay with a bit of fruitiness, though, this does have a light, ethereal quality to it that makes it worth checking out.