Fire Monkey

[stellamaris]

A new year’s blessing! Peony, China’s national flower, with bamboo for flexibility, orchid for luxury and elegance, pomelo for luck, plum blossom for perseverance, courage, and hope, tangerine for wealth, lychee for household peace, pine resin for constancy, golden kumquat for prosperity, pussy willow for growth, King mandarin for good fortune, cypress for longevity, and peach fruit to represent the fourth phase of Wu Xing. This year’s Lunar New Year blend also has an extra dollop of wild orange and flaming red dragon’s blood give you fortitude and strength, and, of course, to assist in scaring away the rampaging Nian.

I am so happy I pulled the trigger on this little monkey with my Luper order. Wow this is so amazing, and very powerful.
It goes through so many phases and is so long lasting, and every phase is so colorful and lovely. On my husband the wet was very citrusy, with seemingly the tangerine being right out front, and the dry down turned immediately into orchid!
I love this, still exploring it. At the very end I smell the pine resin.

[Teamama]

This review is based on a teensy decant-ette that came with my Luper decants (thank you Azzie!) Upon opening Fire Monkey, I was overwhelmed by how great it smelled.

 

I could also tell that FM was likely to smell better on my daughter than me: she's the herbs & fruit one, I'm the resins and flowers one. I called her over, and had her sniff the implet. No sooner had she smelled it than she snatched the vial from me, and began applying it to herself, declaring "This is Mine, and I must get a bottle!" Since there is only about 1/5 of an imp to test, I have been informed that I must wait until the bottle arrives to test it on myself .

 

My impression is: FM is hanging out in the flowering plum thicket, next to a pine tree, pussy willows, and a stand of bamboo. She's got a basket full of fruit with a few peony blossoms, and is alternating bites of the lychee, mandarin, and peach.

 

I was reminded quite a bit of Elf, with added fruit.

Edited March 7, 2016 by Teamama

[ChessCheval]

I love this! My first buy from reading review... place holders.

 

Can't thank you enough. It is like walking through a fragrant garden of fresh blooms.

 

At each phase it remains young. Never sense/scent of anything old, aging, or tired - always buoyant and alert. It constantly triggers Fresh in my thoughts and makes me smile. That's so cute.

 

Big love.

[LiberAmoris]

Wow, Fire Monkey is one glorious bouquet of notes. There are so many that it's tough to pick any one out. I mean, look at this list! Peony, orchid, pomelo, plum blossom, tangerine, lychee, pine resin, golden kumquat, pussy willow, king mandarin, cypress, peach fruit, wild orange, and red dragon’s blood. The overall effect is a luscious, lovely fruity-floral, dripping with citrus that smells so real it makes my mouth water. The floral notes come out after about a half hour, and they take on the glow of the fruits somehow. This is happy and bright in the way that Terra Vigoris is, and I couldn't be happier to have a bottle. This will be great for springtime!

[VetchVesper]

Squeeee! This is so fun. I bought a blind bottle and am very happy.

 

This smells like red fruit punch in the bottle, but not the cheap kind. We're talking the good stuff. Fire Monkey stays fruity on me and doesn't go fake. The orangey citrus notes take center stage, but there's a lot of morphing and complexity around them. I get some evergreen sharpness adding to the citrus tartness. I get sweet hints of the florals, and I think I catch a whiff of the dragon's blood grounding it all, but throughout this remains very fruity McFruit fruit, and I LOVE it!

 

Reminds me a bit of Shango, and also of Tanuki w/out the floral notes. Also, the beginning stages of Winter in My Room, which I loved before the floral messed it up for me. Darn you tuberose!

 

Fruity mixed drinks on hot summer nights. Yum yum yum.

[torikitty]

I agree with ChessCheval's review. Very fresh and lightly sweet. I was expecting more fruit to come forward, but they remain in the background, while the florals are the star. It's a really, really interesting blend. I can see fresh garden and blossom fanatics enjoying this. Oddly, my skin eats up the entire smell after a couple hours. It's too floral for me, into the swap pile.

[zankoku_zen]

Fire Monkey reminds me to Fire Pig. Lots of juicy blossoms, mandarin, lychee, peach fruit, tangerine. This one is much fruitier. Good throw.

 

It's a very happy and super Asian fruity blend.

[theredkilt]

This is a juicy fruity sweet blend. Not getting any florals. It's euphoria incarnated.

[gloame]

I am so glad I got a bottle of this when it was live. It's taken me a full year to fully appreciate it, but now I couldn't imagine letting it go. It's incredibly orange, but layered — mandarin, tangerine, kumquat, all blending so perfectly. And underneath all that, you can smell the peony and the plum blossom. It's beautifully floral underneath. I feel lucky wearing it!

 

ETA Where I'd wear this: When you need to feel like gold and sunshine

Edited July 15, 2017 by gloame

[crystaltongue]

This is fourth lunar new year I have had the privilege to smell, and it is possibly the most delightful yet. The citrus is DEFINITELY forward in this one, but it is a candied citrus rather than a fresh one. It has all the usual lunar new years notes, and its commonalities with the authors can definitely be smelled on the skin as well as the bottle. It is really too bad that we collectively only managed to source one bottle, because I would wear this more often if I had the opportunity.

[ShadowEtienne]

I just got the bottle of this that was on ebay, and I am sampling it tonight. It is delightful in the vein of the other Lunar New Year scents that I've been able to try, with notes that very much bring me to the fruit and candy platters my foster family would set out during Lunar New Year celebrations. 

 

The most powerful notes are those of candied citrus, and while I can smell the tangerine and the wild orange and kumquat distinctly, they merge together well. There are lovely light floral wafts underneath, that brighten the scent and keep it from being oversweet. 

 

I think this is my favorite of the Lunar New Year scents I've been able to sample so far (Wooden Goat, Water Dragon, Fire Pig are the ones I've sampled or have).