O

[achildoftime]

The scent of sexual obsession, slavery to sensual pleasure, and the undercurrent of innocence defiled utterly. Amber and honey with a touch of vanilla.

 

Vanilla and I are not particularly good friends. We tolerate each other if there are enough notes to create a buffer, but with just three notes there is no hope of peace. All I get is an overly sweet vanilla due in part to the honey, and part to my chemistry. But I really just smell like the over-perfumed vanilla candles they sell at home goods stores. It's a shame, too, because honey works so well for me and when it breaks through, it's beautiful.

[h_yeti]

Wow, out of all the BPALs I've tried, O has definitely transformed the most with ageing. Fresh, it smelled pretty much like play dough with like this really weird hint of bodily fluids... I put it down to the honey just not working on my skin AT ALL and I've been avoiding honey blends ever since. Then last night I decided to try it again just to see if anything had changed and oh my goodness, it's so good! Wet it smells like actual, real honey. Dry, I get a really beautiful sweet lightly vanilla-ed honey, over a base of slightly powdery amber. Stayed very close to my skin but when I woke up could still smell it, so it did last a long time. Will absolutely have to get into trying more honey blends now, the honey scent in this is so good.

[Cali]

Ok so I'm not a honey fan, but this bears a lot of resemblance to me in memory of a strawberry honey I got to taste at a bee farm in New Zealand once.

If you love honey, you'll love this. I'm mostly getting honey with a touch of amber and the vanilla adds that tinge of extra creamy sweetness.

[garbagewitch]

First try: powder, and then just warm skin. Not even sexy warm skin, just. Skin.

 

Second try: I decided that since I already don't really like it, there's no point in being sparing with it. Slathered my wrist in O, with a good three dips of the wand, and that certainly seems to make a difference!

 

The scent is recognizably honey now, though it still has that soft dryness to it--a bit like raw, crystallized honey, almost. There's also a distinctly floral tinge to it, not enough to make me think of actual flowers, but just enough to remind me of where honey comes from. It actually makes me think of a few lines from Hadestown: "the smell of the flowers she held in her hand, and the pollen that fell from her fingertips... and suddenly Hades was only a man, with the taste of nectar upon his lips." (Which actually really makes me wanna try this layered with Persephone...)

 

There's still definitely nothing sexual going on here; if I was gonna pick out a mood, it would actually be a bit closer to sad? Even strangely wistful? Not innocence defiled so much as it is innocence with a painful awareness that its ending is inevitable, maybe even soon. Like that hazy part of late childhood / early teens, when you know your days of being carefree are limited. It's Alice's sister sitting on the bank, thinking of how Alice will have to grow up some day, or Ada drizzling honey on her bread in the morning light, as she watches Van walk away from her. It's skin sticky with honey and warm from the sunlight, and long, loose hair, dusted with pollen from rambling through the garden--sweet, a little playful, but ephemeral.

 

It fades down to (again) just warm skin. And again, not sexy, just pleasantly warm, like a loving hug from a small child. Not what I want to smell like, but I think it'll be nice for writing certain scenes / characters.

Edited June 19, 2018 by conflagrantThief

[DryFrogPills]

Of course I had to try this one... it's supposed to be super-sexy, and well, while I found the end of Story of O rather sad, I won't say the subject matter wasn't intriguing!

 

Imped: What comes out to me when I sniff it is honey, vanilla, and big BAM of voluptous sexiness, like Jayne Mansfield turned into a perfume, blonde and faux innocent and taking your breath away.

 

Worn: This one comes off my skin in clouds, all honey and vanilla and a faint hint of amber. It's more sweet than sexy worn, though... I guess it's still trying to obey the Hays Code on me! It's a very feminine, sensual fragrance, but it seems more of an innocent tease than the aftermath of sex that some seem to get.

 

Long term: And I do mean LONG term - I could still smell traces of soft honey and faint vanilla on the back of my wrists over 24 hours after first application. This is not a scent that fades and disappears! Luckily, it's a very pleasant one, growing a hair less overwhelmingly sweet, but still staying more flirtatious than sexy. To me, this is very much an ingenue's scent, at least as it wears on me.

 

Overall, while I don't think I need a bottle, I'm pretty happy to have it, and I'm curious to see how my swain feels about it, since it seems popular. When I get a chance!

[torischroeder9]

In the vial: I get the vanilla upfront, tempered by the powder of the amber. The honey is there if I search for it, but it's not at the forefront.

 

Wet on skin & the initial drydown: My skin eats vanilla and amps amber and honey, so O does this weird thing on me where, for some time after the initial application, all three of these scents are competing to be the top note on my skin. The vanilla disappears on me almost as soon as the oil is dry; then amber is the dominant note. For about an hour or more (~30 minutes to ~90+ minutes after the initial application), the scent almost disappears on me, transforming to what I'd call a subtle, close skin musk.

 

Long term: Eventually, the honey does come through, and I get honey grounded a bit by the amber and warmed a bit by the vanilla. This version of the scent has a lot of staying power on me (I could still smell an evening application the next morning) but not a lot of throw (which is unusual for a BPAL honey scent on me).

 

Ideally, I suppose I'd like a bit more throw from it, but the same notes that are keeping the scent closer to my skin are probably also helping to temper the honey note and prevent it from being overwhelming.

[RedPersimmon]

I get amber, honey, then vanilla. Gets plasticky in the drydown, though.

[clockworkcrypt]

Snake Oil was at least wearable if not amazing. But I think that I have the skin chemistry that kills that, and O is completely dead. Honey on my skin normally is kind-of powdery, with some blends working alright, and weird with others. However O is by far one of the worst downfalls of my skin chemestry.

In the bottle I didn't get a huge amount other than some faint honey, and on my skin it is Play Dough- SN. 

Like straight up I haven't smelled this in years and I can practically feel it in my hands. Bletch. At least I'm safe from a lot of popular variant LE's but still a disappointment.

[spookyumbrella]

Warm, snuggly vanilla amber. Just a teeny bit powdery, but not enough to scare my powder-hating self away. It's quite potent, too!

 

In a word? Cozy. I absolutely adore this one.

[follis]

Testing a large splash aged in cobalt bottle.

I have tested O fresh and I did not love it (I frimped it immediately), but aged, it's so different-- dark, resiny, golden and quite like honey. It's a little bit floral still but in a definitely honey way, like how certain bees make certain tasting honey.
I completely agree with h_yeti on the transformation. I would never have tried it again if I had not been gifted a golden freebie from a bPal Looking forward to seeing how the honey ages in other scents now too.
The amber on this is more prominent during the dry down. I probably won't buy my own bottle to age as I am not a fan of the amber, but it was nice to know the honey is not ruined on me.

 

Verdict: Age your O! Aging brings out it's honey golden loveliness!

[jojocialist]

wet: amber amber amber. maybe ylang ylang, some kind of spicy/smoky note. heavy and sensual, a little goes a long way.
drydown: there's a sweet note coming out here but i think it's only partially the honey. i'm getting a lot of orgeat. 
3 hours:  amber and amber and honey and amber. i think it's pretty straightforward, but what an amazing combination. there's an odd, not unpleasant, but odd floral note that reminds me of honeysuckle.
verdict: sexy. i'm a sucker for amber so a 5ml is probs in my future.

[feyofthefellwood]

I was expecting a much more polarizing scent from this (and I've learned that I don't mind some dirty honey), but on my skin, fresh O is actually pretty tame. It's a mild, sweet honey/amber/vanilla, no surprises. I like it enough to keep my imp, but I have other honey scents more interesting to my nose. 

[torikitty]

I keep waffling between whether I enjoy this or not. While I'm not a honey fan, I know this is popular, so I wanted to retry it. I decided to try a fresh imp from the lab, instead of the aged one in my swap box. I think I enjoy fresher better. The amber is more apparent, and the honey hasn't gotten to the "spit" stage. The amber has a bit more of a fancy perfume feel, so it doesn't have that bawdy, dirty, sexy feel. But with the honey, it still is a bit sexy. I'd recommend that people who usually shy away from honey give a fresher imp another try.

[Old.cupcake]

This smells deeply of amber in the imp, a scent I’m not a fan of. Wet on the skin the Amber is even more present. As tin dries the honey and vanilla begin the develop but it still smells highly of Amber. If you like very top amber notes this scent is for you! 

[Permanent.Black.Ink.]

Am I the only one who does not wear this scent well? I got an imp and the honey turned to cat pee on me.  I ended up having to wash off in short order.  Very disappointed.

[fairybites]

Smells just like vanilla with a drizzle of honey, can't smell any amber in this. It's super sweet! Disappointed about no amber, so I might have to try a lab fresh sample of O to see if I'll like that more. I bought my imp second hand so I am not sure how long it had been aged. If you're not a fan of amber but enjoy the other notes, keep your eyes peeled for an aged version. A little does not go a long way with this scent in my case, so I'd recommend putting extra than you normally do with BPAL oils.

 

If I didn't have any similiar scents, I'd grab a bottle of it. So I'll hold on to my imp for now.

[Freya778]

This is one of my absolute favourite BPAL scents, and I am sadly out of O at the moment.

 

The imp I used for this review was aged for about 10 years so my review might differ from reviews made by others of the new and fresh scent.

 

I smell vanilla, amber, musk, honey and perhaps some almond and/or a very light cinnamon. Maybe a tad hint of something lightly floral. The scent is warm, comfortable and cozy. Innocent but also strong, confident and sensual. It is also a positive/happy scent. Sweet but not overly foody. In another review someone said that the honey in this scent smells like clover honey and I totally agree with that. It is not a liquid kind of honey but a creamy one. Scent throw is strong (The strongest out of all the BPAL oils I tried so far) and I can smell the scent wafting around me. After dry-down the scent deepens even more.

 

This scent makes me feel so comfortable, both in my own skin and in my own person (if that makes sense). It makes me feel grounded, strong and confident, comfortable and relaxed. Like I am balanced in every possible way (physically, emotionally, spiritually). It is a great scent to wear when you are already feeling wonderful but it also a great scent to wear when you are not feeling so great because wearing this will make you feel better and more balanced. O is at the top of my wishlist because it is simply that amazing!

 

Even though this scent can be very sensual if you are in the mood, how others perceive it will depend on how you are feeling, so it can safely be worn anywhere and anytime without it being inappropriate. So you can wear this on your wedding night or a first date, but also on a job interview, while taking care of little kids, while visiting your 90-year-old grandma, etc. I have worn this on lots of everyday errands and even to physical therapy appointments without problems or weirdness. If wearing O makes you feel like rolling on the floor naked every time you are wearing it, then perhaps this is more a special occasion scent rather than an everyday scent for you, but unless you have such a strong response to the scent every time, you can wear it whenever and wherever.

Like all BPAL scents I feel this is great for all genders, nothing is masculine or feminine, it is whatever and however it makes you feel. In the same way all BPAL scents are also innocent and sensual at the same time because it depends on the wearers personality, mood and vibe. And it is suitable for all ages (most BPAL scents are in my opinion, perhaps only the ones with alcoholic notes and tobacco/smoke notes are not). 

Edited October 15, 2021 by Freya778
Typo's

[Beary Strange]

It's finally happened: the infamous eraser effect I see other people occasionally remark on with some notes (I feel like vanilla?) has shown up on my skin with this one. It wasn't even subtle erasers. It was like someone threw a bunch of those pink rectangular erasers into a wood chipper and then shoved the shavings up my nose. An unfortunate miss for something I was expecting to really love. On the plus side, looking at other reviews it doesn't seem like a common occurrence so it's probably still worth trying an imp for those who also love notes like these. 

[MamaMoth]

back when i was into bpal a million years ago, and O was available, i tested and rejected it.  all i remember of it was a cloying, powdery honey. 

 

fast forward to me today: renewing my love of bpal, with shiny new skin chemistry and tastes in perfume.  and of course i find it beautiful now, a golden glowing honeyed amber.  and of course, now it's nigh impossible to find.  o cruel fate! 

Edited July 3, 2022 by MamaMoth

[MolyH]

Anything with honey in it really turns absolutely foul on my skin, but once I got an oil diffuser, this was one of my first picks for it, and oh my god. I agree with everyone here that this is a truly decadent, sensual, goshdarn amazing scent. It smells like running your hand down warm, flushed skin in a dark room. I swear, I could get drunk off the smell of this alone. I am definitely getting a big bottle of this for, ahem, special occasions.

[sudenmorsian]

Is O discontinued and how long it's been out of stock? I've bought my bottle somewhere around 2019 or 2020 and I remember I instantly fell in love with it. Somehow I forgot it for a couple of years and found it now and decided to wear it today. 

 

In my opinion O hasn't changed a lot during time. It's still as sweet and soft as earlier, all the notes are balanced and lovely. Sensual amber, honey and vanilla. Only difference is that I think it's somehow a bit dustier now when it's aged a bit. Lovely scent.