eyeska

Sweet and boozy - reminds me of my beloved Centzon Totochtin, only not so dark.

I can see where you could pick cinnamon out of this blend, as it's got a spicy feel to it. I didn't think I would like it as a non-foodie sort of person, but the buttercream just sweetens things, rather than making me wonder if my arm would be delicious. This is a scent that strikes me as having some real potential in November, when things are cold and murky but you can't break out the Yules just yet.

So. Pretty.

As I keep trying BPAL oils I find I love musk more and more, and this is no exception. It's very close to the skin and very beautiful - my first thought after sniffing it involved wearing it for a particular gentleman who loves nuzzling my neck. This is something I'd love to have for summer nights. I'm going to let it sit for a bit, and see if I need a bottle, but it's a definite possibility. I don't find it too powdery at all.

When I first sniffed this in the imp, I was a little dubious, and unfortunately it being on my skin isn't changing things a lot.

I'm getting the cinnamon, but I'm also getting a vaguely banana-ish scent, much as I got with Sacred Whore of Babylon. Normally I amp jasmine, so I'm a little surprised not to smell it, or maybe just barely smell it. Overall there's sort of a chemically scent. I can see where folks are getting the 'herbal cola', definitely, but unfortunately this is definitely not for me, and my skin chemistry is ensuring that. Hopefully I'll be able to give it to someone who loves it.

While I agree that this is a generally good idea, you might wish to send this sort of advice to the Customer Service email. To the best of my knowledge, while some of the Lab staff can be found around the forums sometimes, they don't read everything because they don't generally have the time to. You'd likely get a response to such a line of inquiry, as well.

So I finally got my paws on the Aquae massage oil, and it is looooovely. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions for things in the way of perfume oils from BPAL that might compliment it or serve as a substitute when I want to sniff it but don't want a massage? I know that some of our forumites have successfully used the bath and massage oils as moisturizers, but I would like something a little simpler to apply and transport.

The scent consists of: Roman chamomile, frankincense, sandalwood, helichrysum, davana, geranium, and lavender.

@Eyeska : O_O Wow, that's a really big list! Thanks for compiling it for me. I'll have to compare it against the particularly tantalizing-sounding oils. :D

*grin* Glad my notes could help.

As for the not really knowing what you liked in the way of perfumes - just think about what you like to smell like, or might like to smell like. Flowers? Sandalwood? Musk? Spices? If you're really unsure, you might want to see about getting a widely varied imp pack (ie: with lots of different notes) just to see what you like to sniff and what happens to work with your skin chemistry, though that can be a bit tough.

Oh, and standard "get at least one imp that you're not sure of/that's very different from your other choices" advice here.

So of course I'm reading these threads just before I need to head to work, so I don't quite have time to edit or fiddle with this, BUT:

This thread is specifically on aging, and awhile ago I actually went through the thread and nabbed some highlights and stuffed them into a text doc for my personal use. Here are some of the things I gleaned:

Notes regarding aging:

Snake Oil, overall, seems to age VERY well.

Absinthe does not age well.

Lighter scents in general - Yggdrasil, Embalming Fluid (exception - three years later!), Midnight, Juliet, The Caterpillar - seem not to age very well, but keep an eye on citruses specifically, which DO NOT age well at all, and deteriorate quickly. Neither does lavender, or white musk, mint.

Jasmine, orris, patchouli, rose, sandalwood, frankincense, rosewood, cedarwood, Vetiver, violet, vanilla, (resins in general), chocolate, spice, all age well.

Dana O'Shee, after a few months, seems to improve and lose its "sharp bite".

Cathedral, Anne Bonny, O, Velvet, Desire, Queen Mab, Dorian, Sin(?), Fenris Wolf, Black Forest, Siren, Blood, Smut, Voodoo. Perversion, The Black Tower, Morocco, Dragon's Milk, Zephyr, Old Scratch, Oberon, Wicked, Fallen (leave for only a couple-five months?), Kali, Sloth, Iago, Bluebeard, Saturnalia, Blood Kiss, Queen Gertrude, Vixen, Eat Me, Maiden, Bliss, Blood Rose, Beatrice, Antique Lace, Haunted, Lust, Malediction, Lyonesse, Saint Germain, White Rabbit, Alice, Kubla Khan, Brown Jenkins, Priala, Crowley, Dragon's Musk, Coyote all age well.

Aged oils seem to wear a lot longer than fresh oils.

(A direct quote; I apologize for not having attributed it, but it IS in the aging thread. Thank you to the person who posted, this is excellent advice!) Some oils don't stay perfectly mixed, and have a tendancy to separate a little. I always roll my bottles between my palms for a few seconds before putting them on so as to be sure I get the full scent.

Faders: roses, ginger (but not red ginger), clear fruit notes, peach, citrus, clove.

Ampers: amber, lotus, cedar, violet, fig, most sweet notes, patchouli.

However, these are just the highlights that I personally gleaned, and I've not actually updated this since April. I apologize to anyone whom I've quoted without attribution - I've been trying to keep that to a minimum.

Hope this helps!

I haven't reviewed this yet?!

Zombi is beautiful and perfect on me, I desperately need a bottle. The rose and dirt balance amazingly, and this scent tweaked me into "I WANNA SMELL LIKE DIRT", which I didn't really think I had in me. My fiance even adores it, which is impressive because it's such a unique and unusual scent - I thought I'd only be wearing it for me.

Once this dries on me, it's the most delicious gingersnaps ever with an extra hit of ginger. Very nice.

The long-term wear, though, makes it ever-darker and after about three hours it's definitely got more of the corrupted incense I was anticipating when I read the description. It's dark, malevolent, and almost burnt with just a little bit of sweet left. You can't bury your nose in it anymore.

Very cool. I don't know if I NEED a bottle, but I'm very curious to see how my imp ages.

Alright, people, today is my first day at the new job and since it's member appreciation day, the theme is pirates for some reason.

 

I don't have any of the pirate-y smells, but I do have Whip -- which has leather and roses. Would that work?

I don't see why not! Very cavalier-pirate, kinda privateer-y. Alternatively, if you have any aquatics at all, those could work.

Or Greed, which is actually rather green and woodsy and delicious.

Lovely, very feminine, floral with something earthy to drag it down. The fruit is not nearly strong enough to seem at all foody or light, and while sweet, she's not remotely cloying or problematic. I adore Arachnina and am lucky enough to be able to wear her. (Also: she seems to age fairly well, with 6 months not making a discernible difference.)

Some serious throw on me, though - I need to be careful applying Arachnina, lest she reach out and bind others in her smothering web. I may even cave and get a backup bottle of her before the Carnaval leaves, which I ordinarily would resist.

Ozone is mixed-review on me, and until now I was wondering if I could find anything with it that I could really love. Same goes for opium, actually, my skin chemistry destroyed the beauty in Opium Poppy as well.

However, Stormclouds is LOVELY. Unless ozone's a deal-breaker for you, I definitely recommend giving it a shot. This is lovely, smoky and mysterious and wet without being any of the iffy soapy/odd things that ozone can end up being combined with my skin chemistry. I'm seeing a very dark purple, which is fun, because I don't usually find colours in scents.

Also, you can smell the wormwood, and that is SO COOL.

I even got an unsolicited compliment on it from the fiance, who hugged me and commented without my mentioning that I was wearing perfume, let alone testing out something. Good sign! I'm going to see how my decant ages over the next month or two, but I'm putting this on the "need a bottle before the Carnaval leaves" list in the meantime.

Wet: . . . is that Froot Loops?

Dry: A sweet, fresh floral with a tiny bit of citrus. My nose isn't sophisticated enough yet to pick out the beeswax on its own, but I get little nips of tea and something grounding in the background - might be the beeswax, might be the musk. The ginger adds a nice bite, too.

After a couple of hours, this is ends up being little more than slightly flowery, sweet musk - and delicious all the way through, once dry, at least.

I'm enjoying my forays into florals! I don't know that I'd get a bottle of Marcilla, but she's definitely beautiful.

er..I guess this is the right topic.

 

Canada Customs.

Yesterday I received my Snake Pit order. Unfortunately, I was also smacked with a fee from Canada Customs. A few people I've mentioned this to are sure this isn't normal, though I'm certain I've been hit with fees before (on non-BPAL related orders.) Is this normal for larger orders? Do I just have bad luck?

 

I've been crawling all over the CBSA website this afternoon and might have missed something... I don't want to make a fuss if it's a normal procedure for the CBSA.

 

Anyone know CBSA inside and out?

I'd need to google this again and I don't quite have the time, but I remember looking this up and yes, orders over $20 or orders over $50 that are marked as a gift will receive $5/$8 as a base fee and then GST/PST on top of that.

Not every order will be caught by customs - some will sail right through - but yeah, we get to look forward to having our big BPAL orders receive that kinda treatment from now on (there's a note in the Announcements forum regarding Canada customs having stern words with the Lab - EDIT: here it is). There was a brief discussion about that in, I think, the latest Halloween thread as well.

Your mileage and skin chemistry will almost certainly vary, but Penumbra and Arachnina, the Spider-Girl are startlingly similar on my skin.

Yes, in spite of the only things they share being tobacco, an element of musk (albeit black and red versus purple), and red fruits. I've not done a side-to-side comparison yet, but Penumbra seems slightly more floral and sharper but otherwise very similar.

Got Neisthai Whipped today and my first thought once I got it on my skin was "Oooh, this would go so well with Embalming Fluid!" A similarly lemony tea would probably layer very well, too, though Embalming Fluid is the only BPAL tea scent I'm especially familiar with.

*pokes thread* I'm leaving in a few hours. Anyone?

If you have enough to double-stack them, I've found a Penguin Mints/Altoids/etc tin works very very well for transporting 20-or-so imps. (I don't have my tin with me, and can't double-check the exact number. It's something like ten across, twice, and four over top to keep them from wiggling.)

This is the aforementioned RP thread.

I'm not too sure with incensey scents - not my major area of interest, though I do have a few incensey favourites that unfortunately wouldn't be appropriate here - but Hetairae I've tried, and that does fit the bill of being feminine and sensual but not floral.

A greener, gender-neutral scent that might fit the bill for the cloak could be Odin, though Yggdrasil has a sweeter scent to it, to my nose. Both are somewhat herbally, though, which may or may not be what you're looking for.

Beaver Moon (I figure it's appropriate ).

Bahaahaha, indeed!

On the Szepasszony, feel free to disregard me because I am Canadian and have a warped perception of what equals "hot" and "cold" but Szepasszony doesn't feel exceptionally cold to me. It's more of a warm spring garden rain than something cold. From the GC, I'd say the coldest scent is probably Ultraviolet, all it's not particularly fall-y. If you're willing to get a bottle/hunt for a decant, I'd rec Cloister Graveyard in the Snow or The Death of the Gravedigger from the Salon.

Pfft, Canadians! What do they know about cold?

I've got both on order with a circle I'm in, so that's fantastic to hear! Ultraviolet, sadly, didn't work on me - I also tried Kumari Kundam, which was nice and seemed to fit fairly well, but I kind of want to compare it to something. Plus I like 'snow' smells. Thank you for the header, it's good to hear my instincts are working.

I'm wearing Robin Goodfellow to celebrate Midsummer.

 

Is it too early to start thinking about what scent I'll wear for Halloween and a costume to go with it?

 

Well, I've been trying to hunt down a scent that's appropriately chilly on me for my ice fairy costume since May . . .

 

I haven't tried it yet, but in terms of description Szepasszony sounds pretty good. It sounds all wintry and icy. It's on my list of things to try.

Hehe, mine too. Thank you for the nudge, though, I've been putting it off. *grin*

Hey, for those of us celebrating Canada Day (Greensleeves!), any thoughts for wearables? I may end up going with something to beat the heat like Embalming Fluid, but I'm just outside doing cookouts and setting off fireworks that day. Anyone got anything that might be more Canadia-y? Old Moon could do, with the evergreen going on in those bottles . . .

I (now) usually do wrists, neck, and cleavage, and have only managed to finish one imp off so far. I estimate maybe 12-20 applications from an imp, and by extrapolation 60-100 applications from a bottle.

Hmm. Methinks I need to be less worried about running out. Ever. *eyes growing collection*

Does anyone have any suggestions for Melpomene? ("Her scent is rife with pathos, and inspires us with the ability to express our grief, loss, and the pain in our souls in a cathartic, creative fashion: dark cypress with mint, geranium, Bulgar lavender, orange blossom and passion flower.")

I get a fairly light (in terms of throw and general initial sense), citrusy floral that's got an unusual depth and almost creaminess to it, when I wear it, though I get no mint. Anything out there that's similar? I suspect my frimp won't last past the summer.

I'm wearing Robin Goodfellow to celebrate Midsummer.

 

Is it too early to start thinking about what scent I'll wear for Halloween and a costume to go with it?

Well, I've been trying to hunt down a scent that's appropriately chilly on me for my ice fairy costume since May . . .

Not to run this on a tangent about Centzon, but I got my bottle today and nervously tried it - I ordered it because a friend's imp was so incredible, but I haven't tried it since - and it is, still, TOTALLY INCREDIBLE. It dries down to sweet wood smoke (I know, maybe that's what blood is on me? it is incredible, anyway, and it's definitely not the alcohol or chocolate) and booze on me and I want to smell like it FOREVER.

I just remembered I'd been wondering about something earlier. I put in a couple of orders that I paid for by sending money to the BPAL PayPal address back in mid-May. At the time PayPal didn't say anything to me about shipping costs, and in one of them I made a note that I wasn't sure what to do about shipping, let me know plz. No one ever emailed me saying "you still owe us money, genius," (or at least I didn't get it; Gmail just a few minutes ago so kindly let me know that customer service had emailed me a question about one order on the 19th) so it kind of slipped my mind. How do you calculate what you owe in shipping for BPAL orders?

Shipping (except for large international orders, which you need to email to ask about) is on the BPAL FAQ page:

The shipping rates for the US are as follows:

Orders totaling up to $150.00: $6.50

…up to $300.00: $11.00

…up to $500.00: $13.00

Shipping costs will be waived for all orders over $500.00.

There are international shipping rates on there as well, but I'm assuming you're in the US because of your flag there.