Allison Gross

[carbide]

Witch-herbs, crushed golden flowers, and a man-made-dragon’s surly musk lightened by the scent of the blossoms and unearthly incense that clings to the Faerie Queen’s hair. Dragon’s blood musk, ambergris, sunflower, chrysanthemum, muguet, and rue, with gingered lily, moonflower, bluebell, peony, nightwort, and white rose.

I think I'm deliberately forgetting what Allison Gross does on my skin, because this is my third time testing it.

Wet in the imp, it's a rotting green, like soggy lettuce but more bitter. This last about ten minutes on my skin before turning to a slightly powdery, still green floral mix, with lily as the only single component I can pick out. It's kind of like hotel soap, and it's bringing on a sneezy headache. I'm not sure I've smelled dragon's blood musk, but nothing in the dragon's blood/musk venn diagram appears at all here.

Sneezily, I'll be passing on the decant to someone who enjoys it more. Edited April 7, 2008 by carbide

[djsiberia]

i sniffed this in the imp, and decided i couldn't try it out on the skin.

 

i didn't smell any dragon's blood and mostly it was herbal and ambergris. no florals just herbal ambergris.

[zankoku_zen]

For some reason this is very very faint on my skin. Smelled pleasant enough on wet, but definitely like a floral/herbal amber. And now that it's been dry and about an hour in, I can barely smell it.

 

Ah well.

[lilirose]

I bought this intending to gift it on to someone I'll be meeting who would find the name quite significant, but after smelling it in the bottle I decided it might not be the best introduction to BPAL for a newbie, so I'm keeping it.

 

In the bottle: bitter and very grassy green. It smells exactly like the colour on the label.

 

On skin, wet: Still bitter and green, but in a nice way. It reminds me of picking dandelions as a kid and accidentally getting some of the white dandelion sap/milk on my lips.

 

Dry: Wow. Oh wow. This is so beautiful, a huge bouquet of fresh flowers in a warm, sunny room. I love it. My belief in the power of morphing is renewed- I never would have dreamed it would turn so amazing on skin when I smelled it out of the bottle. What a wonderful surprise!

 

I actually feel bad for the reviewers who say they didn't try it on after sniffing it, and I also feel bad for the person I bought it for (who, also, undoubtedly wouldn't have tried it after smelling it in the bottle).

[juniperus]

bottle: like...everything, man. it's so complex, I can't pick much out on its own -- but all together is smells like the syrup to make old fashioned home-made root beer.

wet: much the same, but slightly sweeter and floral (but the floral is just a hint

dry: sharper, but not a green sharpness. it's deepening a fair pace.

later: a gorgeous floral - gentle and not 'flowery' at all. hints of spice, and the musk and ambergris way in the background really lend themselves to the warm, subtle, salty musk of skin (er, post-tryst). love, love, love!

[filigree_shadow]

Is there spikenard in this? Is that one of the "witch-herbs"? Because that's what it smells like to me. I can smell a wee bit of florals, but there's an acrid bitter leafy herby scent over the top, and it reminds me a whole lot of spikenard. (I really, really dislike spikenard, in case you can't tell, lol.)

 

Nope, this one just isn't gonna work for me. And oh yay, I sloshed some oil on my fingers while I was opening the vial. Awesome. Now I have to go wash my hands.

[Iceblink]

I smell green florals in this. Nothing that I can pick out in particular--it's just fresh, flowery, and springlike. It's *nice* but nothing I'd ever seek out to wear.

[Celestyna]

In the bottle it was almost all freshly cut *cough* grass.

 

Every minute on my skin the florals came to the top and the grass slunk into the shadows.

I think with a bit of more light citrus or less florals, this scent would have worked wonders for me.

I looove the blade of grass.

[donnatron]

Bottle: A layer of grassy, slightly bitter herbs and sweet dragon's blood. Very similar to the blood musk note in High Priest Not to Be Described.

 

Wet: Still a two piece scent. The greens warm up on my skin and some of the florals start to unfold, particularly the muguet. I get a sense of the gingered lily and the bluebell as well. It's floral but not in a traditionally floral way. Under the herbal layer I can smell the dragon's blood musk warming to my skin. It's an amped down, savoury dragon's blood. Very warm and sensual.

 

Dry: Allison Gross takes awhile to calm down but when she does she is beautiful. The dragon's blood musk adds this amazing feral skin musk note to a sultry crushed herbal/floral scent. It's sweet, skin close and very pretty. The herbal scent actually feels very at home on my skin which is not a quality I associate with a lot of the greener scents. It smells like crushed greenery and herbs over my dragon's blood perfume.

 

Throw: Close to the skin.

 

Overall: If you want a more herbal/floral Red Moon 07 Allison Gross is your bet. If you want a feminine High Priest Not to be Described, Allison Gross is also your best bet. I would put her in a spectrum with those two scents but she is definitely an experience all her own. A beautiful, interesting, sensual scent perfect for the transition into spring.

[Coldfire]

 

 

 

 

Bottle: astringent herbs. Sharp

Wet on Me: still astringent herbs and sharp with a faint spiciness and whispers of green

Drying Down: less astringent, less sharp still faint green and spiciness/dragon’s blood and now incense joins the circle.

Dry: the sharp has all mellowed…everything blended nicely, a little of this and a little of that and all playing together in harmony on the playground of musk. So glad I got this!

 

[odalisque]

A generous forumite frimped me with this, and it's a real treat.

 

Firstly, I'm shocked that the dragon's blood doesn't dominate this, in fact I can't detect it at all. I think dragon's blood musk must be a slightly fruity musk. Wet, the sunflower is distinct and the rose peeks out. The muguet is strong at first giving this a perfumy feel and throwing a lot. There is a very green scent, but green as in believably vegetal and slightly dry as opposed to the dryer-sheet odor other green scents have on me.

 

The ambergris is slightly salty and moist and there is a breath of something with a faintly herbal tang; it reminds me of thyme but a little spicier. I think it's the chysanthemum and/or the rue. I can smell the ginger in the gingered lily, too (and the lily itself is incredibly well-behaved).

 

It's a very sophisticated scent, not an ethereal witch, not a sexy temptress witch, not a young maiden witch but a witch of years who knows what she's about. Compelling, as another reviewer said. It is by far the perfumiest and most floral scent I've actually wanted to wear, but I do want to wear it. It's beautifully complex and so well balanced. Just stunning.

[Venneh]

Got this as a decant in a recent swap. In the decant, this is all sharp florals and herbs. Interested to see what it'll do on my skin. Once on, it's that sharper floral/herbs at first, but seems to mellow out into a more perfume-y smell. We'll see what this does.

 

What it does is go to an herbal-cologne sort of smell, vaguely reminiscent of Pa-Pow, and then goes to nothing. Well, that decides it. Swaps/sales.

Edited December 23, 2009 by Venneh

[Sistinas]

 

In the bottle: floral and dragon's blood is the initial scent, giving off an incense impression. It is a little heady.

 

Wet on the wrist: I get the same impression as I smelled in the bottle, but I do get a small undertone of green. The florals blend really well together, giving off a light scent, the dragon's blood seems to be disappearing in the blend.

 

Dry: No dragon's blood whatsoever now. Allison is all floral combination that still has it's slight headiness to it.

 

Final thoughts: I cannot pick out anyone particular flower, none seem to stand out on it's own. I would not describe this as a light floral or so heavy it knocks you off your feet. The final scent is a sweet incense. I don't get the astringent, herbal smell that is mentioned in other reviews, but I vaguely recall this having that smell when I first got the bottle when it first came out. I would have to say it has aged quite well.

[windbourne]

Sooo. This one starts out a kind of Dial-soap-like herbal, and that lasts a violently short ten seconds or so and then it dissolves into its components.

 

From the top of my nose: Sunflower, VERY strong; ginger lily (I got a bottle of a single note of this from another etailer not long ago, so it -really- sticks out to me.), moderate; chrysanthemum, moderate; muguet, strong; and then a melange of mostly white and yellow flowers. The ambergris is there, but mostly as a quiet, dark underpinning to the scent, which is …ambery in color, but not amber-as-a-scent-note at all.

 

It has certain similarities to Encroaching Madness, but never takes a turn to musty-land as that one did when I tested it.

 

As it dries, it goes a bit incense and herbs and then the ambergris comes out, and, as it almost always does on my skin, rather takes over the drydown. There's a sweetness that mellows it, probably the dragon's blood pretending that it's actually there, and just a tiny bit of white rose peeping in about the sides, but mostly ambergris.

 

I'm pretty okay with this perfume, but I don't know that I totally love it. It doesn't have a great set of notes for my skin, and I have other ambergris scents I like more. I think that, if I hadn't experienced that drydown with other scents that I enjoyed more overall, I might have liked it. However, the drifting white-and-yellow blossoms aspect combined with the sharp herbal KABOOM it starts out with leaves me feeling pretty neutral about the whole experience.

 

Throw isn't huge, wearlength isn't long, but not short either. Maybe three hours to complete dissipation? Near the end it turns a bit bathroom-cleanerrific. Hm. :/ Might be do-not-want; will test again later to see if results are the same.

 

p.s. You know what's stronger than this and completely blew it off my wrist? Minotaur.

[JazzieCazzie]

Received this in a swap and was intrigued by the "Clairol Herbal Essence" original comps, since that is one of my "holy grail" scents.

 

IN THE IMP: Very green and herbal but not getting CHE. More like Karme to me, though there are apparently no veggies listed among the notes! Then the floral component wafts up to my nose to chase the veggies ... and something slightly alcoholic like wine! Already very complex and I haven't even applied it yet!

 

Applied to wrist and into crook of arm.

 

WET: Herbal, astringent and still heavy on the vegetables. Still astringent (that is not a bad thing for me). It's very light, for all of the notes listed, and fresh as well yet at the same time it's quite sophisticated and smells like a high-end perfume. It makes me keep sniffing a lot.

 

DRYDOWN: The drydown scent stays very true to the wet scent, which was true to the imp sniff. The throw from my wrist disappears within an hour. The crook of my arm just smells very very clean. I don't get Clairol Herbal Essence but I do get some sort of herbal shampoo.

 

OVERALL: I like this a lot. I don't love love love it, would not make it a signature scent, but I think it would be a great scent to put on in the heat of summer, which is just arriving here now, for it's fresh green feel and lovely light drydown.

 

On a scale of 1-5, a 3.7.

[Sidhechaos]

 

Allison Gross

Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab (BPAL)

A Little Lunacy (Limited Edition)

Status: Limited

 

Witch-herbs, crushed golden flowers, and a man-made-dragon's surly musk lightened by the scent of the blossoms and unearthly incense that clings to the Faerie Queen's hair. Dragon's blood musk, ambergris, sunflower, chrysanthemum, muguet, and rue, with gingered lily, moonflower, bluebell, peony, nightwort, and white rose.

 

in the bottle, a strong green scent with a pale floral undertone.

 

on skin wet, same as in imp

 

on drydown faint musk peeks through,sunflower and chrysthanemum are what florals I can pick out amidst the strong green note.Over time other florals weave in but none are strong enough to really assert themself definitively as to what they are, so this remains a green predominajt floral blend, very crisp.

[Lucchesa]

In the imp, the sharp note other reviewers have mentioned in Allison Gross smelled sour to me, as if she had put all her herbs and flowers into a cauldron to ferment. The sourness didn't last on my skin, but sadly neither did much of anything else. I got the teasing promise of a lovely, grassy floral, but it faded down to nothing within half an hour. Slathering might help, but I think I"ll pass this on to someone whose skin will treat it more kindly.