Autumn girl seeks summer scent

[badseed1980]

I haven't placed a BPAL order in YEARS, but I'm finding that I am starting to wear perfume more again now that I'm working from home. Pretty much all my favorite scents are things I feel are more cool-weather scents, or just plain heavy-sexy. I do a LOT of amber and musk. I need to find something that is summery, but MY summer, not everyone else's summer. Stuff I currently love:

 

Bien Loin d'Ici

Sed Non Satiata

Palmyra

O (but it can be a little sweet)

Snake Oil

The Lion (but it can be a little cinnamon-heavy)

non-BPAL: Habanita by Molinard, and a solid perfume from Hawaii that smells like tiare flower.

 

I vaguely recall a very bitter-green-warm solid perfume I had in college that was fig and neroli. It was not at all fruity fig, but a green fig. (Strangler fig is nice enough, but there's not much THERE there for me).

 

In my cart now: Horses, Lyonesse, Morocco, La Petite Morte.

 

I don't do great with really rose-heavy scents, fruity stuff, or wine scents. I love stuff that is WARM rather than cool. Sun-soaked. I love white ginger. Pele is nice but again, it kind of disappears into a generic wisp of shampoo or something on me. I can wear jasmine and ylang-ylang well, but they are often really heavy. I can wear gardenia-like scents. I'm having trouble thinking of other florals I like. Most resins and ambers and musks work nicely on me. My skin amps honey something fierce, and it can get really thick and heavy unless it has more heavy stuff backing it up. I would LOVE some help finding a summer scent!

Edited March 25, 2022 by badseed1980
Stupidly hit submit too early.

[wendyb1063]

A few suggestions:  

 

Belle Epoque:  this is a gorgeous GC that doesn't seem to get enough love.  It is a warm scent;  a rich orange-gold in my mind. 

Sudha Segara:  a warm ginger

Xanthe the Weeping Clown:  Not as fruity as the notes make it sound

Balancing the Sake Cup:  a fairly recent LE;  ginger and neroli

Mermaid:  an older Lilith perfume with tiare and gardenia but also has some vanilla and other notes; not that aquatic. 

So Below:  Amber, coconut, musk, but kind of summery

Some harder-to-find ones:  Queen Mab Lace, some of the Snake Oil flankers (Banded Sea Snake, Dragon-Smooched Snake Oil, Snake's Kiss, Peach Brandy Snake Oil), Marae, Et Lux Fuit, Signoir Dildo, Oval Portrait. 

[doomsday_disco]

If a citrusy aspect like white tea isn't an issue, Kumiho is a nice white tea and ginger scent that's great for the summer: A sharp, biting blend of crisp white tea and ginger.

 

Baobhan Sith is a bit more complex if grapefruit and apple blossom aren't dealbreakers: Grapefruit, white tea, apple blossom and ginger.

 

If you like Morocco, you might also like Inez! Golden amber, vanilla musk, myrrh, cedar, carnation, and red sandalwood.

 

If mandarin isn't a no go, you might enjoy Kubla Khan: Through sunlit caves of ice, roses unfurl amidst dancing waves of serpentine opium smoke and amber tobacco, golden sandalwood, champaca, tea leaf, sugared lily, ginger, rich hay absolute, leather, dark vanilla, mandarin, peru balsam, and Moroccan jasmine.

 

You may also enjoy Kit (Kit’s scent is soft and dry as bone: Mysore sandalwood, a tattered and patched 16th century waistcoat, inkstained, still scented with the marjoram and benzoin dry perfumes of his youth.), or if you like vanilla, the new activism scent that features the same sandalwood plus a warm vanilla: And Though They Are With You Yet They Belong Not To You - A gentle vanilla sandalwood blend, serene but mighty.

[Supertrooper Omni]

Oh wow, I love your likes. It can be worth it to look on the sales forum or other spots on the internet to buy or swap imps before you commit to a whole bottle.

 

There's a new Womb Fury in the Lupercalias this year. I've really liked the previous iterations. It's a much loved combination of snake oil + honey scent that many reviews think smells like a combination of o and snake oil. This scent is a spring release that returns every few years. 

 

I really like sed non satiata a lot too! I was pretty into Anteros at the same time, as I was in love with red musk.

 

How do you feel about fruit, spices, patchouli? Cedar? Aquatic smells? Sometimes navigating around what I dislike helps too. Or what I only sort of like sometimes. I typically dislike lilly so I unfortunately have not smelled lyonesse.

 

The reviews are super helpful. I also really like reading ascentadays reviews. 

 

If you're ordering from the BPAL site directly, honestly I'd look at the hair gloss and if any of the descriptions stir you, go for it, I've never been disappointed in hair gloss and it's a great body spray too. 

 

There are a bunch of limited edition scents up that I'm pretty crazy about right now, like pumpkin snake latte snake oil, Pumpkinville (this is a sweet red musk floral).

 

It also seems like you like scents that feature red musk, are blends with floral, have honey, have Amber, frankincense, myrrh, sweet resins, potentially clove, white florals, tuberose, cognac. Leather. Patchouli. Sandalwoods. And snake oily scents.

 

Have you tried Smut? That's a boozy red musk. Oh! Also The Organ Grinder is really nice. Stimulating sassafras strengthener is also great, in root beer cowboy territory, but super heavy. Tombeur is a lavender scent that I really liked which matches the your notes to some degree to. 

 

white rider and black rider are general collection sandalwood leather scents which seem to be loved in the community. My fave general collection is voodoo. But I also really like nosferatu (blood wine dirt ).

 

There are also several lupers/spring scents available now that have ginger right now. I tried to paste a link but both of the Penis with yellow ribbon, the red ribbon, and penis penetrating a pickle something something sound awesome but I haven't tried them and hope to catch some reviews and find a decent second hand maybe. I'd be curious what you thought of chibi skull... Which is a sweet patchouli From the recent yules.

 

Hopefully this gave you some ideas! Your scents sound rad. Did not mean to overwhelm, and i tried to recommend scents that are currently available and not an ultra rare seasonal release from years past.

 

I've been waiting a while for a big shipment of decants to arrive so I've kind of been trying to figure out what I'm waiting for and read the descriptions maybe too many times waiting for my package. Good luck! Please update with observations!

 

I'm sorry I didn't embed links but I'm on a tablet. 😕

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 26, 2022 by Supertrooper Omni
Typo

[amokslime]

I can't recommend Lyonesse enough! It smells soft and sunny, but like... sophisticated and ambery at the same time. I also own Horses, and while it feels wintery to me, that's all subjective. It's warm but not super heavy, so I bet it would be great as a summer fragrance.

 

As far as fig and neroli goes, Carnal is fig and mandarin! It's described as bold, bright, sensual and earthy. I'm also really interested in The Apothecary which is a green scent with fig, but I haven't had a chance to try it out yet. I love green fig though, so I'm gravitating towards it.

 

Edit: I just remembered Brisingamen, which is a beautiful beautiful BEAUTIFUL mature amber scent. It's lightly floral and aromatic from the apple blossom, carnation, and myrhh. But it's like a spicy, subtle floral that compliments the amber really well. I think the myrhh takes it out of sweet territory. The amber is definitely the MVP.

 

I hope this helps!

Edited March 26, 2022 by amokslime
adding brisingamen

[hhelix]

We have similar tastes -- I am an autumn girl too. These are my "summer" suggestions:

 

Bastet - luxuriant amber, warm Egyptian musk, fierce saffron and soft myrrh, almond, cardamom and golden lotus.

Black Lotus - black lotus flower, amber, myrrh, and sandalwood

Eden - fig leaf, fig fruit, honeyed almond milk, toasted coconut and sandalwood

No. 93 Engine - balm of Gilead, benzoin, frankincense, balsam of Peru, beeswax, saffron, galbanum, calamus, hyssop, mastic, lemon balm with white sage

The Caterpillar - heavy incense notes waft lazily through a mix of carnation, jasmine, bergamot, and neroli, over a lush bed of dark mosses, iris blossom, deep patchouli and indolent vetiver

Vixen - orange blossom, ginger, patchouli

Cognac-Stained Sheet Ghost - from the Halloween collection that's still up - vanilla-infused balsam, white cognac, and tumbleweeds

Frog Moon 2021 - maybe you could find it on the forums - green tea, wet green musks, pine moss, fresh patchouli leaf, bamboo leaf, tulsi, pond grasses, and a pinch of wasabi

 

I also agree with the above posters about Brisingamen and Smut.

 

The Lab's website still has this one available -- one of my favorite Snake variants:

Snake Eyes Gleaming in Spring's First Twilight - Snake Oil and threads of pale lavender with shadowy oudh, sweet oakmoss, violet leaf, and rose geranium.

 

Thanks for the question -- it was fun thinking about summer scents!

 

[badseed1980]

Thanks everyone, so much, for your suggestions! I think the recommendation to look in the forums for imps to buy of the scents that aren't offered as imps is a great idea. I am always hesitant to commit to a full bottle of an untested scent (Horses is an exception, as it sounds like pure perfection in my mind, and I've also bought full bottles where money goes to nonprofits I support). I've tried a few of the ones suggested here (#93 Engine is one I really like). I actually have an imp of Brisengamen (got the amber imp pack a long time ago), and should probably give it a serious try. It's been a long time since I did anything but sniffed the bottle. Womb Fury sounds awesome. Inez is one I was considering ordering. You've all given me some stuff to think about, and I appreciate it!