Moana

[Gwydion]

Seaweed, awapuhi, and sea foam.

In bottle: Intensely tropical fruity. Wet: This is like good tropical punch made with real fruit juice and not corn syrup. As it warms on the skin, the sea comes out, like a light breeze blowing in from the ocean over a grove of ripe fruit. It is sweet and pleasant and it lightens in affect as it wears and the sea scent lifts it. This would be glorious on anyone liking fruit/aquatics. It is slightly strange on me, but that is not the scent’s fault, trust me. Dry: Goes a little strange as the oceanic and fruit elements separate out. It’s still wearable, but less striking.

[penemuel]

I like this one -- it's floral, but not overwhelmingly so. It's fresh and green, definitely aquatic, and sweetened by the florals. I didn't buy a bottle, and won't search for one, but I can see myself wearing this again.

[zankoku_zen]

Ah, Moana. You and I did not work out. I had high hopes for the awapuhi. And in fact, that delivered. It delivered me straight into the memories of White Rain shampoo - which I think there was an awapuhi one. Way back in the day.

 

Never mind. If you want to relive lush tropical shampoo time, this one would be it. I liked the shampoo. But my perfume to smell like my shampoo? Not so much.

[quigza]

something magical & sweet with seafoam

 

In the bottle: Sweet. I don't know what this tropical sweetness is, but I like it. It's over an ocean tang- there is a faint hint of kelp as well.

 

Wet: I don't know what this tropical sweetness is, but I like it. The aquatic is growing into a cool tidepool scent. I'm not sure exactly how to get across the kelpiness here. It's not the rank, rotting kelp. It's freshly harvested kelp scent, as well as freshly caught (live) fish. This somehow works with the salty sea note & the sweetness

 

Dry down: Tidepools & sweetness. Nothing rank or sour about it on me.

 

After a day of work: Faint kelp & sweetness. I find it comforting.

[mothglitter]

Gorgeous!

 

Hawaiian white ginger, white & soft & delicately sweet, swirled on a lazy current of faintly salty seafoam. Mildly aquatic, adding a crisp, cool silver shimmer to the already celestial white ginger. The perfect blend of cool & sparkly with creamy white flower.

 

Unfortunately, turns to crap on my skin. Beautiful, though, and I wish it worked on me :/

[Wench457]

ITB: lovely Awapuhi, with an overlay of Aquatic. I'm rooting for Awapuhi, but Aquatic is favored to drown everything else out on my skin.

 

On: Oooooh, yum! How I adore Awapuhi! Alack, here comes bully Aquatic to beat the crap out of her! But wait! Awapuhi is pulling out a pair of brass knuckles and holding her own! It's a back and forth battle folks! Who will win?

 

Dry: And the winnah is...Awaupuhi! The crowd goes wild! Lovely and light and fresh and wonderful Awapuhi! Every now and then Aquatic raises her head from the mat, but that wonderful Awapuhi just knocks her back down again. Oh, how happy I am that I swapped for a bottle of this one!

[Malista]

I love Beth’s salty aquatics in a way that just ain’t right. Whether any particular blend works with my chemistry depends entirely on the other notes. I didn’t have any hesitation in picking up a bottle of Moana, as there wasn’t anything listed that has given me problems before. I’m always happy to add another oceanic blend to the collection.

 

Wet on skin: gray-green salty aquatic with sweet ginger blossom and smooth, greenish gold seaweed, which doesn’t smell as much of iodine as kelp, so I’m not sure what sort it might be, but I like it. Yum!

 

Drying and dry: less salty, and the awahpuhi and seaweed combine to make something almost fruity but not overly sweet; there is still enough of the ocean in this to make me very, very happy. I smell like I went for a swim, then for a long walk in the jungle, where growing things brushed up against me and left subtle perfume. More yum! There isn't a lot of throw, and it doesn't seem as though it's going to be a long lasting blend (I've had it on for maybe an hour and half, and it's fading fast), but it may get stronger if I let it sit and marry for a few days or weeks.

 

I love perfumes that make me smell as though I’ve just come in from somewhere.

[slave1]

MOANA

 

In Bottle: Sweet and salty

 

On Skin: This is a very unique scent. You can smell the salty sea air, the aquatic ocean waves and blended in with it all is a sweet green tone, very fruity and floral. This scent has an extreme ozone and aquatic feel. The tone is green/white/blue, very much tropical and very much the big sea. I like how fresh it is, very clean. I could see this being unisex and liked by many. It’s pretty but not really my style. It has an average to strong throw and fairly long wearlength.

[iiinterstate]

Yay! just what I had hoped for. Awapuhi has always been great on me, and the seaweed keeps everything from getting too sweet. A great summer blend. I don't know what seafoam is supposed to smell like, but I like it.

[tartchef]

Mm, sweet & fresh, but with a dark lurking note that's going oddly... caraway? Whatever it is, it fades quickly, thank heavens, leaving a very true "seafoam" scent - airy & frothy & wet, clear watery green, kelp & sand swaying in the current. Very evocative, a lovely natural beach scent...

 

ETA: Oh The aquatics are turning on me. After a few hours' drydown, I'm left with a weird vegetal note, akin to the celery soda note from Christmas Rose. Phooey.

Edited May 27, 2008 by tartchef

[gchris]

I love aquatics and that is the main reason I decided to try this. It was not what I was expecting. It smells perfumey to me and does not have the usual aquatic scent that I have come to love from bpal. Therefore, I imagine that many aquatic non-lovers will like this blend. So if you say you don't like aquatics, give this blend a

try. For me personally I did not love it.

[contrary_wise]

The Tikis have been my go-to scents all summer long. Moana is my favorite for really humid days like today was. I've learned to slather it on and its aquatic sweetness lasts and lasts -- over 8 hours so far and it's still wafting around my body.

 

Like other reviewers have said, Moana has notes of tropical fruit punch, almost a watered-down Hawaiian Punch scent. It also reminds me of a fresh, clean tropical shampoo. I don't really get salty or ocean out of this. It doesn't smell like a typical perfume either and that's just right in the heat. I want to scent body wash and lotion with this so I can layer it for even more staying power.

 

Moana wasn't one to leap out and grab me but it's slowly winning a prized place in my BPAL collection.

[maryamblue]

In the bottle, it boded heavy on the ocean smell, with only a tinge of awapuhi.

 

On? Mmmm....seaweed. With froth. With just a gentle overlay of florals. But mostly seaweed, which ought not to smell so nice, and yet, it does. This is an incredibly accurate distillation of ocean smell, without the undercurrent of dead fish. Which is good, not having the dead fish.

 

Mmmm....seaweed...

[aquazoo]

Tropical fruit! It's kinda spicy, with the slightest hint of beach. Some sea scents tend to be salty on me, but in this case it turns out really nice.

[voodoocatwoman]

I found Moana to be the equivalent of sniffing the ocean breeze through a dense thicket of tropical flowers. There's a little spice to be had as well. Lovely fragrance.

[tehriaz]

oooomg - I LOVED this one instantly. someone said something about the little mermaid, and that's an absolutely perfect description - it makes me want to watch it! fruity, tropical, beachy. this is such a fun scent!

 

ohhh I hope hope hope this doesn't dry down to single note "bitter crap" on me like 90% of bpal does... because this is lovely it makes me feel hydrated - how strange!

 

 

ETA: yep. it was nice for 10-15 minutes, and there it is - straight nose-burning bitterness without the slightest hint of the former loveliness. this is un-fucking-fair.

Edited December 6, 2008 by tehriaz

[Shollin]

First sniff: Ooh. This is nicer than I expected. It’s an aquatic, of course, but instead of a cold-rainy-ozoney aquatic like I’m used to, this one is a warm, sunny, green aquatic that reminds me of snorkeling in the Caymans on my honeymoon.

 

Wearing: Gorgeous and sunny and soft and relaxing. It wraps me up in a happy cloud of memories.

[PurringPulsar]

Moana

 

In the imp: melons and ginger surrounded by turquoise sea water.

Wet on skin: the tang of ginger and salty sea breezes over sweet flowers and fruit.

Dry: grapefruit? Now I smell citrus in here, for some reason. This is a really lovely sea scent…mainly because it isn’t turning to WASHING POWDER!!! on me. It smells just like salty seas and crisp sea breezes…but there’s more to it. There’s a sweetness to it as well. This sweet-salty contrasting scent reminds me of Kingsport and Olokun, though more of the latter because of its slight melon-like scent. I smell the ginger, which is both spicy and fresh like a ginger root, but also floral. There’s a hint of citrus to it, and also a pleasant clean ozone (clean as in, it smells airy, not soapy). But overall, this evokes the colour turquoise-as in crystal clear turquoise seas, coral islands fringed with white sand.

After a while: it loses its initial ‘wet’ scent, its actual watery sea scent, a little. Now it’s much more ozone-scented, to me. It’s crisp, fresh, bright…like white linen drying in a sea breeze. Though at this point I do get a hint of the dreaded ‘tumble dried and static covered’ scent I get from most ozone scents, but in here it’s not too bad. I also smell more seaweed here now. It’s a little bit like a tropical Selkie, because of that mix of salty ozone and floral notes. But I do prefer this to Selkie.

After some time, this mellows into the same salty-sweet-ozone-foam scent I got in Mary Read, but without the rum and bay and woods. Just a sea breeze…

Verdict: whilst Aeaea evokes the Mediterranean, Kingsport is reminiscent of the cool Atlantic, and Olokun brings to mind the Caribbean seas, this is how I’d imagine the Pacific to smell. The first time I wore this I got more of the genuine sea scent, a wonderful turquoise-aquamarine scent evocative of coral sands and warm clear waters, before it did it’s usual trick of turning to ozone and squeaky-clean on me. the second time I tried it though, it turned to soap and static ozone and washing powder not long after applying, I didn’t get the slight hint of gingery floral from before. Where’s my tropical ocean scent? I was a little disappointed. I think I’ll stick to Aeaea if I want to smell like the sea without smelling soapy.

Emoticon rating:

Is it a keeper? Initially yes, but I think this turns soapier with age (with me at least).

If you like this, try: Water Phoenix, Olokun, Mary Read, Sea of Glass, Kingsport, Thalassa, Pool of Tears

[ShadowsDance]

In the bottle it is a light and sweet scent.. slightly floral, yet fruity at the same time.

It's a very light scent, very perfumey. It's a very clean scent, and reminds me somewhat of shampoo or soap (without being soapy). I would put this in with my florals rather than my aquatics, I'm not getting that at all from it.

[Monster]

In the bottle: Sweet, light floral aquatic.

 

Wet: Just like in the bottle, but with more of a sweet, slightly peppery floral note. This isn't something I would typically go for but I'm really really enjoying this!

 

Dry: I really can't pick out individual notes...this (again) slightly sweet, mildy floral aquatic scent. It doesn't smell like bathroom spray, or laundry detergent or mens aftershave(as many aquatics do to my nose). This is femenine, pretty, clean and really pleasant. Definitely "beachy"!

 

Overall: I've been wearing this one a lot even since I picked it up a couple weeks ago. It's not my regular, masculine, smoky, resin, scent...but I really enjoy the way it smells on my skin

[yewberry]

Anything with awapuhi smells like high-end salon shampoo. This is no exception. A bright, clean, soapy scent, but not really something I'd wear.

[DifferentDances]

Bottle: Soapy aquatic.

Wet: Sweet water with a touch of salty green. Kind of fruity. Surprisingly pleasant.

Drydown: There's some sort of coconut note here. Ew. I hate smelling like sunblock. Must be the awapuhi - I avoid shampoos with that scent like the plague.

Dry: Pure Awapuhi.

 

Would I ever wear this? No.

 

My rating: 1/5

[filigree_shadow]

I usually don't mind aquatics, even though I don't really wear them much, but this one is not for me. It smells like salty weird coconut hair spray on me. And yes, I know it doesn't have coconut in it and I have no idea why I'm making that association. Perhaps I am familiar with some kind of awapuhi-coconut scent from somewhere else so I'm leaping to coconut when I smell awapuhi. IDK. Alls I know is that this is not the perfume for me.