Dragon Moon '08: Our Dragon Moon represents the forces of rebirth and the vigor that springtime brings: dragon's blood resin, galbanum, blue sage, lavender, peppermint, sweetgrass, frankincense, moonglow magnolia, bergamot, and green cedar.
In the bottle: A delicious herbal blend of mainly sage, sweetgrass, bergamont, and a bit of cedar. Where is the dragon's blood?
On me: This is deliciously sweet herbal. I'm getting a lot of sage, frankincense, and cedar. The other notes are there, but blended so well that I can't pick them out. I like this very much, and it is very different from all the other BPAL I have.
Inez: Golden amber, vanilla musk, myrrh, cedar, carnation, and red sandalwood.
In the imp: Vanilla amer-y goodness, with a touch of carnation.
On me: On the carnation!!! The carnation is the most prominent note, deepened a bit by the amber and the musk. There's a touch of cedar and sandalwood adding to the spiciness of the carnation, helping it stay promiment. This is absolutely gorgeous.
Another MUST have.
Marcilla: Blue lilac, lily of the valley, golden musk, beeswax, white ginger, bergamot, green tea, and nectarine.
In the imp: Beeswax! A beautiful glowing scent, a lot of delicious bergamot and nectarine, but so well blended that I couldn't pick the notes apart.
On me: Bergamot is definitely in the forefront for me, and the musk just makes it more spectacular. It is beautifully blended, so I can't pick out the other notes, I can only say that this is a gorgeous sunny yellow scent. Bottle is a must.
Coral Snake: Snake Oil with blood orange, red apple, lemon peel, plumeria, and gardenia.
In the imp: Is there really snake oil in this? And where's the plumeria and gardenia? This smells very apple-y to me. Reminds me a bit of Bath and Body Works apple body splash.
On me: Wet was ALL apples. As it dried, the florals peeked out and it was a delicious blend of snake oil with fruits and florals. And then it dried down and the florals went away, leaving apple. After a bit, the plumeria decided to come out to keep the apple company. The snake oil is hanging out faintly underneath the apple and plumeria. This is definitely a complex scent.
Verdict: It smells good, I alternate between smelling BBW Plumeria and Apple body splashes, and sometimes get straight up snake oil. It smells good, but it's not really my kind of scent.
The Grindhouse: Florentine iris, red musk, mimosa, magnolia, Damascus rose, clove, and vanilla bean.
In the imp: OMG it is love at first sniff. A lot of musky mimosa, and some yummy magnolia to blend in beautifully. All of this is softened up by the vanilla.
On me: Wet, I smelled like a sexy dirty brothel - love! And then it goes limp. It has a very light throw, and loses the muskiness that I loved in the imp so much. I get very faint vanilla and gardenia, maybe a bit of musk, but I can hardly tell. This was very disappointing.
The Flower Song: Pomegranate wine, lotus root, river reeds, hyssop, and barley.
In the bottle: Not floral, as the title would suggest. I get sweet pomegranite and lotus, with something else I can't identify (I don't know what hyssop and barley smell like).
On me: Oh this scent was made for me! The predominant notes are pomegranate and plum (no plum listed, but it smells like plum to me), with deliciously sweet lotus root and river reeds right behind them. I'm sure the hyssop and barley are there, I just don't know how to find them.
This is exquisitely blended, and works wonderfully on me. This was a last minute, unsniffed add on a whim even though most of the Lupercalias didn't do much for me. I'm so glad this fell into my shopping cart!
Boomslang: Snake Oil with cocoa, teakwood, and rice milk.
In the imp: Strong snake oil presence and some cocoa. Teakwood and rice milk? They are hiding.
On me: HEAVEN! Slather PLEASE! Delicious snake oil with a lot of cocoa yumminess. I think I may sniff a teeny bit of teakwood, but I still don't know where the rice milk is.
This smells sooooo good! It's got more throw than Snake Oil, or any of the other snakes I've tried so far.
Boomslang is a dark oil, and when it was wet I could see it on my skin. I'm sure if I hadn't rubbed it in it would have stained my skin, so must be careful with that.
This is most definitely a bottle need.
Resurrection of the Flesh: Frankincense, hyssop, heliochrysum, ylang ylang, copal, angelica, and rose geranium. Featured in the Salon: detail of the fresco.
In the imp: WoW! The resins and ylang ylang blend so beautifully together. A quick test tells me this will be a favorite.
On me: a delicious incensey blend fused with the beauty of ylang ylang. For maybe half an hour. And then it fades to almost nothing. My skin ate it, and in eating it the fragrance that is left isn't even classifiable. It's something, but so faint that it isn't much. I am very disappointed by this.
The Torture Queen: White amber, vanilla musk, white tea, ambergris, gardenia, and chrome.
In the imp: With such a name I was expecting a dark scent, but this is light and bright. It is a beautiful blend of tea, gardenia, and ambergris.
On me: A very fresh scent. I get a hint of ambery vanilla? The Gardenia and white tea are prominent and do smell lovely together. Unfortunately my skin seemed to love it, so it swallowed up the scent very quickly. Throw was light. I'm on the fence on this - I wish it had more staying power.
Snake Oil: By far, our most popular scent! Magnetic, mysterious, and exceedingly sexual in nature. A blend of exotic Indonesian oils sugared with vanilla.
In the bottle: It smelled weird. A funky bitter spice, no vanilla at all. I sniffed it at different times thinking it was me, the moment, etc. Nope, still weird. Knowing all the rave about it and loooooving the entire Snake Pit, I decided to still give it a shot.
On me: At first it was the same weird smell. And then it dried down to a lovely spicy vanilla. The spice toned down a bit, which took the bitter edge off while still leaving a lot of spice. And it blended really well with the vanilla to make it a very warm spicy scent. As the day goes by it's smelling different, I can't pinpoint it though. I think I want to buy a bottle and age it, since apparently it is better aged.
Swadhisthana: Sacral:
The Glory of Vishnu, The House of Varuna, One’s Own Abode
The Six-Petaled Lotus.
The unconscious, the sweetness of life, desire, pleasure, sexuality, procreation, emotion.
Swadhisthana is the manifestation of passion, the reconciliation, balance and union of the masculine and feminine within ourselves.
In Swadhisthana, we learn to give and receive pleasure. It is the stimulation of the life force, the basis for life itself, and our force on the physical plane.
In this chakra, our samskaras are cloistered, and in this chakra they find expression.
Because of the highly sexual identification of this chakra, many find its temptations and trials very difficult to overcome.
**This is the first Chakra that I've tried, and WOW! I need to try more of them.
In the bottle: A deliciously dark incense blend, very sensual and unique. The reviews say floral and/or citrus? But I got none of either one. I did get a bit of an iodine type of smell too.
On me: Whoa. Well, it works, it is very sexual! On me this was a very sensual incensey blend with a sharp something that my nose couldn't identify (the iodine-ish type smell, but not in a bad way).
At one point (once the chakra started working...), it turned into waffles with a super strong throw, and then went back to being incensey without any waffle traces.
I'll have to reserve this one for special occasions.
Stormclouds Over the Midway: Thunder-charged ozone, plum-colored incense smoke, opium tar, and wormwood.
In the imp: dark, broody, incensey.
On me: Midnight on the Midway's more sinister cousin. The incense is sweet with the plum, but it gets all dirtied up by the opium tar and wormwood. This is a dark burgundy feeling scent. It has a pretty strong through and very good staying power.
It's what I wanted Blood Phoenix to be, and has a similar feel to Midnight Kiss. This is definitely a must have!!
Dionysia:Wild plum, pomegranate, raspberry, Siamese benzoin, plum blossom, patchouli, frankincense, and mahogany
In the imp: Plum and pomegranate yumminess.
On me: Heaven!!!! It's a beautiful plum scent, and the frankincense comes forth to make her a sweet plum incense blend. Wow. This is SO very me. It is beautiful, sweet, incensey, a tad bit earthy, and absolutely amazing.
I NEED a bottle.
Moon of Ice: The Moon of Ice shines its pale white light on snow-blanketed hills and barren fields. Icicles dangle from skeletal branches, and the desperate howl of starving men and beasts echo through the darkness.
Frost-crusted winter flowers, white pine, eucalyptus, and traditional lunar oils.
In the bottle it reminded me a bit of Zest soap. It definitely has a good "splash you awake" feeling to it.
It was cold today (weird for Miami), so I decided that Moon of Ice was appropriate. I am loving the combination of scents in this. The flowers, pine, and eucalyptus blend together and I can't really pick out any specific notes, they just all create a cold wintery fresh scent. It's got a pretty strong throw, and I'm definitely doing a lot of self-sniffing.
From smelling this in the bottle I didn't think it would work on me, but it has! Yay.
A funny note, two friends of mine said I smell like incense. I didn't really get an incensey feel from this, and I would have squeed if I had because I love incensey smells. But....yeah....I smell like incense to unindoctrinated noses.
Fae: A brilliant, ethereal scent: white musk, bergamot, heliotrope, peach and oakmoss.
In the imp: sweet and peachy.
On me: The white musk and peach have blended beautifully on my skin!! In the background I smell a floral green, which I think is the heliotrope and oakmoss. It smells very meadowy and I can almost see the fairies.
On me, it reminds me of Ebisu Making Love as Two Octopuses Look on. This is a great thing because I opted not to buy it, and instead got Dream of the Fisherman's Wife. Now that there's a GC scent that smells like it, I'm going to be all over it!! And it's $15 vs $27.50 - pretty big difference.
Tiresias, the Androgyne: Dark, moody, and bittersweet: black currant, patchouli, tobacco, cinnamon leaf, caramel, muguet, and red sandalwood.
In the imp: It smells totally foody, I get A LOT of sweet caramel. No sign of patchouli, tobacco, cinnamon, or sandalwood. Maybe a bit of currant.
On me: OMG it is heavenly!! And it morphs. The throw smells all foody and caramelly. When I put my nose up to my wrist to sniff (which I've been doing very frequently), it's a completely different scent. I get a caramel sweetened black currant with a fair amount of red sandalwood to balance it out and make it non-foody. I LOVE THIS!!!
It has very good throw and medium wear time. I wish I would have brought some with me to work to reapply.
A bottle of this is definitely needed.
Zarita, the Doll Girl: Soft, yet sociopathic: white carnation, iris, orange blossom, and sugared cream.
In the imp: A floral-ish cream? Yum!!
On me: a nice sweetened floral blend, but I think I need to wear this again before deciding on whether or not I need a bottle.
Agrat-Bat-Mahlaht: Amber, cream accord, white honey, apple blossom, skin musk, caramel, and teak.
In the imp: Amber and caramel. I am such an amber whore.
On me: The amber and caramel blend beautifully with the honey, and I get a hint of cream. The teak adds a bit of kick to the blend.......no hint of apple anywhere (thankfully, as it's not a favorite).
This is definitely a "Mia" scent. Need!
I think this is going to be one of my favorite categories!!
Madonna: Hyssop, pomegranate, Angel’s Trumpet, Indonesian patchouli, iris, white orchid, and frankincense.
OMFG I need buckets of this!!!!!! The white orchid dominates, but is balanced out by the pomegranite to make this a very sweet beautiful orchid. The hyssop (I think) sweetens it up nicely, and the frankincense makes it resiney enough to give a bit of an incense feel. This is heaven!!!!
Bottle - yes, must have bottle.
Love and Pain: Lavender, Balkan tobacco, black musk, dark vanilla, and golden copaifera.
This is the most beautiuful lavender blend!!! The tobacco keeps it from getting overly floral, but didn't stand out on its own (thankfully, because I amp it like crazy). The dark vanilla and black musk work beautifully to turn the lavender into a very dark purple type of scent, very sensual.
Bottle is definitely needed!!
Death and Life Completed: Grey amber, carnation, lemon balm, hydrangea, Chinese peony, white sandalwood, cypress, juniper, cedar, hibiscus, and African daisy.
Peony!! This is what I wanted peony moon to smell like. For me it's mostly peopny and hibiscus, no amber anywhere unfortunately. The sandalwood and cedar complement the florals very niceley and give it a bit of a woodsey feel.
Cleopatra Testing Poisons on Those Condemned to Death: Accords of peach kernel, hemlock, aconite, and belladonna, with bitter almond, saffron, honey, myrrh, hyssop, frankincense, and palm.
It's hard to tell what I'm smelling specifically, but the honey in this is amped A LOT! I think it's the honey/almond combination. This is so well blended that I can't pick out the notes.
It smells very good, but it's not "me" so I'll probably pass on this one.
Lucretia: Iris, black amber, sage, Kashmir wood, vanilla musk, mandarin and violet.
In the bottle: Yuck - pure iris! I almost didn't even test it, but thankfully I did.
On me: A sharp violet! The iris hides, thankfully. The violet blooms and definitely takes the forefront, its beauty is accentuated by the amber, sage, and vanilla musk. They blend beautifully to de-floralize the violet while still keeping a strong violet presence (confusing, but I don't know how else to describe it).
This is a gorgeous scent.
Philosopher in Meditation: Smoldering woodfire embers, Galen’s Kyphi, and Abramelin incense.
In the imp: Hot - fire hot and incense smoking. I'm not familiar with Galen's Kyphi so I'm not sure what I'm smelling.
On me: Incense!!! Deep, dark, delicous incense!! It is sweetened up by something that I can't quite figure out, and smells so very lovely.
If I smell like incense, I am happy, and this is no exception. It's a unique incense, different from the other incenses that I've tried.
Methinks a bottle is needed.
The Organ Grinder: Almond milk, sarsaparilla, tobacco smoke, black patchouli and white pine bark.
In the imp: A delicous almondy scent, though not as strong of an almond as those with almond oil. I also get some sarsaparilla and pine bark, but this is so well blended I can't pick out the other notes.
On me: Better than in the imp! A beautiful almond/woodsy scent. For about half an hour/45 minutes that is.
It then decided to turn into disgusting SOURED MILK! About as bad as Milk Moon 07 - ick. Thankfully the throw still smells pretty good, and I only get strong soured milk upon sniffing my wrists, but it's awful. And I can't seem to wash it off, so I'm stuck with it. And I can't smell too closely because it makes me nauseous.
So far it seems determined to last on my skin all freaking day. This is not nice.
Lust! Oh yes. And I usually don’t like patchouli. Do I smell coconut in here? I believe I do.
Jailbait - I like it, but it smells like Materva (soda) with a little bubblegum! This might be a Cuban/South Florida thing.
Lilith - I can’t pick out anything but I LIKE!
Blood Countess - Fruity and Floral? But I likes!
Obatala - a coconut that works!!! Oh this is delicious!! It's everything I wanted the Tikis to be.
Dirty Viking (HAEE)- Mint or eucalyptus? This will be good for hangovers.
Voodoo Punani (HAEE) - holy crap! More, now, please.
Skuld - OMFG my nose had an orgasm! This is up there in all time favorites. I must have buckets of this, and I’m so happy this is GC!!!!!
Golden Priapus - Amber, juniper and vanilla all in one? And pine that doesn’t smell like cleaning fluid? yay! The pine reminds me of Christmas, this will be a great holidays scent.
13 - I want to eat myself!!
Yvaine: The high, crystalline scent of a star-filled night with blue lavender and lush magnolia.
In the imp: Not sure about this, it doesn't smell very appealing and I get some sort of citrus?
On me: This totally blossoms, and the weirdness goes away. The lavender is sweetened up by something in there, and the magnolia peeks out but doesn't make the blend overly flora. It really does embody Yvaine, to my Stardust-loving-self.
This is very yummy and a bottle is needed.
Sunrise With Sea-Monsters: Ocean mist, kelp, ambergris, amber, white pear, osmanthus, freesia, and seafoam accord.
In the imp: Lots of delicious ocean mist, a bit of kelp, and the seafoam. Not detecting any freesia, pear, or amber in this.
On me: I definitely feel the humor in this, I can visualize funny looking sea-monsters splashing around. This is wonderfully blended, as I can't pick out any notes in particular. It definitely reminds me of the ocean.
