Three People Plucking a Mandrake

[Seajewel]

A tangle of mandrake root and patchouli root bound by champaca resin.

[forspecial_plate]

I think I'm mostly smelling the mandrake root.  It's very rooty, but I can smell the other 2 notes too.  There's a little bit of an "ashy" feel that I think comes from the champaca.  It's not amping on me like I kind of expected it to.  The patchouli doesn't stand out strongly to me. 

 

This doesn't change much from beginning to dry-down.  It basically smells like what it is, a win in my opinion!  It just smells like "bpal" to me, in a good way.  Like it's a new and different scent but very characteristic of a classic bpal scent (if that makes any sense).  Kind of like Tattie Bogle maybe?  But I haven't compared them side-by-side.

[groovyrooby]

This is a fascinating blend! I first got the spicy green of plucking weeds in the yard. Spicy like a radish, not spices. Wet and juicy spice. And dirt, which is usually a note I avoid, but I found myself enjoying it here. Just a really vivid smell of the yard. 

 

After an hour or so, the patchouli and champaca resin rolled this into a gorgeous, bold perfume to my nose. I think it's the dirt note that turned kind of 'ashy' as @forspecial_plate mentioned, because I got that, too. Overall, it conjured some great memories of an elementary school teacher who I admired, who always spelled of a spicy oriental perfume and a faint trace of cigarette smoke. She was nurturing and also no-nonsense, brazen but tender. And I think that's an apt description of this scent. A unique kind of spicy. A little bit mysterious and glamorous, but intriguing rather than distancing. Great surprise frimp! Never would have chosen this and SO glad I got to try it!!

[ghoulnextdoor]

According to the 1812 Family Herbal written by John Hill, the fresh root of mandrake is a violent medicine, the object of so many strange superstitions, Satan’s apple, and all that sort of thing. I imagine this book was found in the loamy earth surrounding the vestiges of forest temple ruins, fringed with fern and moss, sticky with whispers. Phantom incense, balsamic, honeyed and heady, clings to the pages, is embedded in the nearly illegible inked letters.