Good Ship Venus

[zankoku_zen]

Salt-crusted wooden planks warmed by cardamom, 7-year aged patchouli, tonka bean, mace, and black pepper.

[HawthorneWitch]

I wanted this to be a bottle I would love (and I will, just perhaps less so than other members of this collection) 

 

In bottle: a film of salt over an ethereal blend of dusty spices. Tonka appears with patchouli hand in hand at the tail end of the scent- a wandering afterthought that scampers off quickly. 

 

On: The wood of the ship is more pronounced- oaklike, and slightly musky layered beneath an almond-leaning tonka. Each spice moves in and out of the periphery, mace tricking my nose with her nutmeg like resonance. A crackle of black pepper lifts occasionally above the other components. Medium throw, medium wear length.

 

I'm happy I have half a bottle, but won't need more.

[puellacaerulea]

In the decant, this starts off with a spicy blast of cardamom and black pepper, with the salt and wood notes just under it. On my skin, the spices fade fast, and the wood and salt notes get more pronounced and a little camphor-y. I never do pick up the patchouli and tonka. End result on my skin is camphor, woods and salt air, with a breath of spices underneath. Sort of like the Teakwood, Moss, and Salt Menage, but with the camphor toned down some and a bit of extra warmth from those faint spices.

[Casablanca]

Although it's close to the skin on me, this does remind of a salted wooden plank on a ship at first. But it soon warms into a woody spice blend (I think of cardamom, allspice, and pepper over a worn, woody patchouli), and the saltiness recedes.

 

The tonka is also soon noticeable, and a nice touch. With the salt also in play, the pale tonka scent almost reminds of sea foam. I could see tonka + salt as a conceptual sea foam.

 

If this perfume ages as my spice blends usually do, the spice will grow a bit in strength over time. The patchouli is already smooth in this blend, but it might become still more so with age.

[groovyrooby]

Where Haul on the Bowline was all canvas sails, this is all wooden planks! Fun! Tested from a decant that rested a few days.

 

Very fresh, almost fir smell to start. Tart oak and crisp, bracing ocean air. This is the vessel at sea - spicy, woody, and breezy. As others have mentioned, neither the tonka nor the patchouli jumped out at me, but I'll hang onto this imp for a bit and revisit to see what happens!

 

[Lucchesa]

I'm still trying to get a read on Good Ship Venus, having tested it more than once now.  Wet it's almost camphorous, and I'm not sure where it's coming from -- there are big patchouli notes that are almost camphorous, but here I'm getting only the camphor, not the patch.  I'm not getting the chewy salt note from Asleep in the Deep but more of a saltwater note.  There is only the faintest whisper of spices on my skin. The patchouli never arrives, although the tonka shows up after an hour or so, but by that time the whole thing is awfully faint. I was expecting Good Ship Venus to be my favorite of the shanties, but it just isn't coming together for me. 

[zankoku_zen]

Cardamom, wood, and a whiff of patchouli and pepper. This one is a dark woodsy spice blend. Good throw and wear length.

[Abyssgazesback]

If you liken the Fire Down Below line to a tour on a ship, Good Ship Venus is what you smell standing at the prow while the ships cuts through the water at high speeds. It’s bright and speaks to sunshine and sprays of salty water over planks of dark wood. It dances on the deck. It’s joyous and full of laughter.

[starbrow]

A strange one. I get Arm & Hammer Baking Soda toothpaste from it in bottle/fresh on skin. A strong spearmint and baking soda kind of combo that is really strange as a perfume. As it dries down, I get a sharp-pitched salty aquatic wood that attacks my sinuses. I hate both phases.

 

This one is not for me.

[Irish Sea Mermaid]

In the bottle - as soon as I smelled this it evoked a deeply emotional reaction. Of something long forgotten from a life far away in time.

 

Wet - It’s the salty, wet deck of a ship mingling with the musk of ropes and barrels full of spices with wood ages by the sun and sea.  

 

Dry dow - this is probably one of the most gorgeous scents to come out of this collection. (It’s a tough call between Haul on the Bowline and this one TBH).

 

The patchouli is there singing in the background, without upstaging the other notes. It’s got an “oily” feel to it, like the traditional Oilskins (not the modern ones) worn by fisherman mixed with a musky spicy alluring scent.

 

To me, it is the scent of a selkies skin, hidden between rocks on a beach as they dance in the moonlight...

 

It’s familiar and foreign at the same time. It’s beautiful yet rough, it’s salty yet sweet. It is land and sea and sky. 

 

I think if my soul had a smell it would be this. 

 

I think I may need all the bottles.

 

All. Of. Them.

 

[Estamets]

In the bottle: this is almost boozy? 

 

Wet: Middling aquatic, with dry spices underneath. 

 

Dry down: friendly, dry spice - like if you rub spices on a grilling plank, then store that plank in a cabinet for a while, then open it and a big spiced woody waft comes at you -- but the cabinet is on a boat and you're on the boat and the boat is in the ocean.

 

This isn't foodie at all. It's almost too "clean aquatic" for me, but it's such a nice sun-bright scent with all the spice and woods that I love, that I'm going to give it a go just behind my ears, where I can't stick my nose all up in it's business, and see how that goes. 

 

ETA: (From a lab-new bottle that has rested 4 days.) I wore this for a day (behind the ears and a dab between the boobs) and something in it made me a little nauseous; it might be the teensy bit of salty aquatic coming on too strong. The primary note when worn this way was black pepper. 

Edited July 14, 2021 by Estamets

[Viiinylflowers]

When I first got this it mainly smelled to me like a sort of recognizable “aquatic” scent in like medium-low range on the perfumey aquatic scale- so I’d say fairly safe for aquatic sensitives like myself.  Kinda 50/50 perfumey/realistic for me. 

What made it especially unique was the overall poignant wistfulness of the scent as well as something that evokes sea spray to me ~ like sea spray splashing up into your face from a ship cutting through choppy water as you coast through the ocean.  It makes me think of that image and feeling, and of like a pirate majestically standing on the bough of a ship deep in reflection and with great purpose as the sun sets in the distance ~ 
 

There was a hint of something darker within the spray that nods to the idea of a worn salty romantic ship ~ like dark brown and salt crusted worn wood, the spices and patchouli weren’t really readable to me and more well blended.  Its not sludgy-intense thick tarry black as night dark (which is where my mind generally goes to when I think of a dark scent), but it’s a bit dark under the sea spray  nonetheless.  
 

As it’s rested some months, those romantic ship notes are becoming more prominent to the point that I can pick up on a well blended patchouli hiding within and mingling with cardamom and salted wood. There’s something a little sour-leathery about it after a while, it reminds me vaguely of how some tobacco scents can sit on the skin sometimes for lack of a better comparison, but it never gets out of hand and is intriguing. 
 

The sea spray is just as prominent before and looking at the notes i wonder if the black pepper and/or mace maybe add to that “texture” but what do I know ~ 

 

The longer I wear it, the tonka  starts to peek through the wooden slats ever so slightly, helping to mitigate what wants to turn a little sour on me and weaves through all of the notes like an ethereal airy just barely sweet breeze I can’t quite isolate.  
 

It starts to warm and sweeten the darker notes in an airy dry way and the sea spray kind of settles into them but doesn’t disappear.  It makes a nice contrast and kinda smells like an elevated version of the sweeter notes in wood when I imagine what wood constantly soaked by ocean water and dried in the sun would smell like. 
 

It continues on in this fashion ~ sweetening and warming with the tonka and the base notes keep blooming. 

I went from a “not so into it” to “would probably like a FS if funds allow” especially now that the deeper notes are becoming more prominent on me as it ages. 

 

Edited August 25, 2021 by Viiinylflowers
Grammar

[Cali]

Oh this is very interesting. This almost smells like sharing a memory from some seafaring lad in the past. 

In the bottle this was almost a little too in my face; but on application it quickly calms down; there's almost... There's a few images going through my head here; one of a crowded old bar where beer bottles clank, one of a rainy day on board a ship, one of... Perhaps a dark knight where boots clank on cobbled streets, and someone is doing the last bit of cleaning of a building before they turn in for the day. 

A soft salty sea spray, well worn wood, a warm and molass-y sweetness added by the cardamom, patchouli and tonka bean; and the other notes that add just a touch of depth to all of this. Really quite gorgeous.