The Apparition

[Clueit]

When by thy scorne, O murdresse, I am dead,
And that thou thinkst thee free
From all solicitation from mee,
Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,
And thee, fain'd vestall, in worse armes shall see;
Then thy sicke taper will begin to winke,
And he,whose thou art then, being tyr'd before,
Will, if thou stirre, or pinch to wake him, thinke
Thou call'st for more,
And in false sleepe will from thee shrinke,
And then poore Aspen wretch, neglected thou
Bath'd in a cold quicksilver swear wilt lye
A veryer ghost than I;
What I will say, I will not tell thee now,
Lest that preserve thee; and since my love is spent,
I'had rather thou shouldst painfully repent,
Than by my threatenings rest still innocent.

Quicksilver-cold and heartless: white sandalwood, immortelle, zdravetz, and oudh.

 

I've never been one to pick out the individual notes and from the bottle and fresh on skin I was fretful.

In the bottle I get fertilizer after being watered into the soil and some crushed greenery.
However since I've smelt this before in a number of things I gave it a chance and tried it on.

On my skin, wet, I was hard pressed not to wipe it off and go scrub with a peppermint bar. Dirt, soil, fresh from the bag and still high with nitrogen. Laziness won out however and I left it on.

Settled and dry, it smells like my step-father on his way to work. He has a natural musk to him that smells a little dirty. It keeps me between interested and repulsed depending on his last shower. Anyways, it also smells of a somewhat masculine cologne he and I have. Its soft, earthy, and a little sweet. Very close to the skin with the fainest throw (could be due to the small dab i put on however).

All in all I like it enough to keep an imp but the bottle may be out the door at some point. As for a gendered use of it I'd suggest masculine moments but given the right chemistry it really could go a number of ways.

[Salsa Shark]

The earthiness of the sandalwood definitely makes itself known while wet. It gives the blend a much more masculine feel than I was expecting given the floral notes, but it's nice, especially once the sandalwood dries down and softens a bit. The florals definitely feel more 'floral' than green to me though - pale grey/purple kind of thing rather than full on white floral though.

 

To me the blend has a similar kind of feel to Bow & Crown of Conquest and Doc Constantine - that cold masculine edge, just not as strong or as sweet. It's got a much more subtle, ethereal feel; a shroud of cold yet comforting earthiness.

[stellamaris]

Pretty sure this is an apparition of a guy wearing Expressive Head.

Strangely I know there are days when nothing else will do.

[zagadka]

Smells like my husband's deodorant, which isn't a bad thing.

 

Its very crisp and fresh, lots of green and aquatic notes. But, it smells very commercial, like they could sell tons of this at Sephora.

 

As much as I genuinely love scents that are more masculine, this one is too much so and will be given to the hubs.

[fairestrocza]

Very high-pitched in the imp. Wet on skin, the sandalwood starts to come out, with a slightly dryer-sheet background. The sandalwood lends some warmth to the blend, but that background scent just isn't working for me. Several hours in, there is a lovely lingering fragrance, slightly spicy from the sandalwood, slightly sweet from... something. But by that point, I have to get very close to my skin to smell anything at all. Glad I got to try it, but I won't be needing this one. I have a sandalwood-obsessed friend, and I think she might like it quite a bit.

[boomtownrat]

This is a high-pitched light grey floral kind of scent that seems to be making me sneeze. Sadly, I don't detect much if any of the woody aspects that made me try the scent. It's a good thing I only bought a decant, and I don't think it agrees with me enough to keep even that.

[milo]

Quite high pitched and woody masculine blend. It fades somewhat, and it's more cologney than anything, a dude cologne. Not unpleasant, but not really my thing, as I don't generally like to wear masculine scents.

[DangerInRed]

This smells really, really familiar. It must smell like some product, but I am not sure which. It is very fresh but high-end/classy, and I would say unisex, if not leaning masculine.

[Zorra]

I must have a different Apparition from everybody else. In the decants it smells perhaps a little like the descriptions above, but once on my skin there is a delicious sandalwood/oudh scent that doesn't get too woody because of the zdravetz. I can't really pick out the zdravetz, but it must be what is lightening the blend. I don't get anything that smells like the immortelle I have as an essential oil, but I could imagine it disappearing in the wood blend. The only thing I could say against this scent is that it doesn't smell cold or heartless at all.

[zankoku_zen]

Crisp green aquatic men's cologne. I swear I've smelled the commercial equivalent of this, but I can't put my finger on the name. Definitely a men's cologne though.

 

On me its mainly the oudh and zdravetz, and my guess the sandalwood is grounding both of these components.

 

Fresh, green, manly.

[Little Bird]

I was expecting this to be dark and woodsy, but it's sharp and slightly soapy on me, with some powdery sandalwood in the drydown. Manly soap and non-manly powder. Pass...

[kjirstiben]

When I first put this on I was reminded of The Unicorn, sort of a wispy floral scent. Since it's dried down, however, it's definitely a dry sandalwood + light greenish wet floral. The wet/dry feel of it is interesting. It's quite well-behaved, almost faint. It feels, to me, like a morning in early spring... with mist and the burgeoning tips of new grass emerging everywhere. I'm not sure if it's "me", exactly, but it's a nice scent.

[jkfagtongpun]

First on it's oudh and it's a lovely oudh and nothing else to my nose. Then it dries into a very dry smelling man's cologne. It reminds me of a guy I used to work with that wore Lacoste... Definitely not for me.

[Monday]

Interesting. This starts out smelling exactly like CK One with some leather added. The 'leather' fades on dry-down and it turns into all cologne all the time.

[MissMercurial]

This leans masculine IMO. Not TOO strongly, but certainly a bit - like 60-65% masculine and 40-35% feminine.

 

I had a chance to smell/test Bed of Nails at a recent MnS and to me Apparition is very similar to it; perhaps less complex/layered and a little softer (like, maybe less densely packed, dulled nails, haha), but it definitely hits the ozone-leather-woody button.

[crebbsgirl]

I was trying to figure out what this reminded me of, and Monday nailed it! This smells exactly like CK One plus on my skin. It's very cold and cologne-y. Not very me.

[thekittenkat]

In the decant: White florals backed by sandalwood and oudh.

 

Wet: Much as when sniffed, but the florals are higher and brighter.

 

The dry-down: The high pitched florals calm down, leaving a touch of floral sweetness, and the sandalwood and oudh combine into a pleasing dryish incense. This was what I was hoping for, being rather worried about the zdravetz note beforehand.

[theseagrows]

got a frimp of this in a swap

 

it starts off !zingy green! and aquatic, kind of like irish spring soap. then a little sandalwood comes through. this is like a very fresh, masculine shower gel or soap. alright, but not really my preference. if you want something crisp, cooling and clean, this is it. would probably be nice in summer.

[LizziesLuck]

I hadn't realized this was a re-release! I never took note of it before.

 

This is the 2017 version. Very intriqgued by the immortelle, and I adore white sandalwood. I had to look up zdravetz - this is the description I was able to find of what it smells like, "a rich, green-herbaceous, earthy, sweet-woody aromatic profile with a radiant warm roseaceous-woody undertone which is both delicate and tenacious". Even more excited to try this now!

 

Wet: Ooh. That's some nice sandalwood right there. It's a tad masculine. I for sure get the green herbal notes from the zdravetz. This is really nice. Very outdoorsy. It's quite a dry scent, not as sweet as I usually prefer, but I am still enjoying it.

 

 

Dry: Sadly this goes through a phase where it smells like generic cologne, and then it fades to almost nothing. I had high hopes, but this is not for me.

[DiZZysTARdust]

My first thoughts when this goes on were both "golden" and "reedy". This is a surprisingly herbally, almost grassy blend. One thing i worry about with geraniums is that they tend to turn rosy and take over but that doesn't happen in this. No rosiness whatsoever. As it dries the sandalwood peeks out but it's very subdued. As it dries the herballness goes away, leaving an almost bitter after scent, which blends quite nicely with the sandalwood tbh. Despite the strong players this is a pretty subdued scent with a medium throw, staying closer to the skin for 3+ hours after application on me

ETA despite the strong words in my description this is actually a lovely scent imo

Edited June 9, 2019 by DiZZysTARdust

[Cali]

White mossy, damp oudh! Masculine and clean.