tinyvulture

This is tough to identify, maybe it’s the olive blossom? Or the sweat? Because it feels sweet but also briney and salty, and also creamy from the orris butter. (I don’t like dry orris but I do like orris butter, weird.) I’m not getting any cedar or sandalwood. I keep coming back for another sniff! I think it’s a keeper!

I love me some creamy florals, and this is a lovely bouquet of cherry blossom, plum blossom and gardenia (not getting any honeysuckle, sorry), smoothed out with cream. Sweet and cheerful, like a sunny spring day.

Exactly what it says, sweet orange juice and rind, drizzled with golden honey with a little bit of a burnt caramel twang.I probably don’t need a full bottle of this sugar overload but I dig it.

One of the loveliest apple blends I’ve tried. Apple, vanilla, and sweet benzoin are the prominent notes, with the amber and red musk in the background making everything warm and glowing. Super sweet without being explicitly foody, thanks to the strength of the benzoin resin. This might need to go on my bottle wishlist!

Ketkrokur - This does not strike me as a patchouli blend. I think the labdanum is stifling it. I get sweet, resinous labdanum and then the faintest presence of dragon’s blood and clove. Honestly I wouldn’t pick out the clove if I didn’t read the notes. I enjoy dragon’s blood and its powdery sweetness, and it blends nicely with the labdanum here. It’s not one for the bottle wishlist (where ARE you, patchouli?) but nice to have a decant.

At first sniff - STRONG honey and vanilla sugar. Like a caramelized, toffee scent. Barely ANY floral. A couple minutes later, that is still what I’m getting. Just a hint of floral in the background, can’t even really describe it better than that, it’s so faint. I love honey and vanilla so it’s fine with me, just saying this is definitely a foodie blend not a floral!

At first sniff - peach and apricot! Almost pure fruit. As it dries the warm sugared amber, light creamy rice milk, and gently spicy carnation are noticeable. So lovely, a bold fruitiness but also really feminine and lovely.

Simple and nice. Like a cinnamon mouthwash, clean and sharp. The cinnamon and clove seem equally balanced. I will pull this out at Christmas.

Green tea, aloe and lemon. There's a creamy note, also, like a lotion. I love these bright, clean notes. Reminds me of Shanghai. Feels like something I would put on after a shower on a hot sticky day, to continue feeling clean and refreshed.

Wow. Love this one. Lush rose and cognac -- a note I always adore -- what a pair! And then a touch of spicy carnation sends it over the top. Tremendous throw. Will get a bottle if it ever comes back around.

Interesting - at first I get aquatic and moss, and then the smoke is noticeable. Many different scents of nature! Unfortunately the aquatic gets too sweet and cloying on me, as it often does. Off to swaps for someone with different chemistry.

I had a sniffie of this and I got layer upon layer of sweet resins (myrrh, patchouli, opoponax) and also a bit of hairspray scent. Oh and skin musk, i.e. sex smell lol. (Think O.) No leather on me! Super hot -- I’ll have to keep my eye out if more than a sniffie’s worth is ever available.

Here is the lab’s sweet, slushy snow note, front and center. “Echos” of incense and frankincense indeed, since they are faint, supporting notes. Not really picking up “marble.” This is nice but overall not very strong and not a blend that really stands out.

Red musk blends often smack me in the face with red musk! Not so here -- the jasmine is the star, backed by tobacco and sweet carnation. I can never resist a jasmine blend so I’m quite pleased. I am really not getting any red musk at all which is wild. I was also nervous that the tobacco would be overpowering (it can make me sneeze) but it’s very tame here as well. Yay! So overall, I have a jasmine with a carnation accent, perfect for me since I love both of those florals! It doesn't really seem related to sea shanties but I'm ot on TikTok so I don't even care about that lol.

I wanted this so I could have a better idea of what these notes are like. The osmanthus is very in-your-face at first with a blast of sweet, spiciness, like a strong black tea? The agarwood (oud) has a greenness, a wateriness to it. Not poopy! Lol. After 30 seconds the osmanthus disappears completely. I’ll have to swap this one because I have no idea where that osmanthus went!

I wanted this so I’d know what narcissus smells like when it’s mostly on its own. It’s a creamy white floral. Not powdery on me at all, rather very creamy. I’m not really picking up the “snow” aspect. As a perfume, it doesn't really have enough of a personality. It would make a great lotion scent!

Extremely sour grapefruit, not sweet like I was expecting from the yuzu. Off to swaps, it’s probably a skin chemistry thing.

Soft pink roses, a bit soapy at first. Feels a bit nostalgic and haunted, like the perfume of a sad ghost bride. I wait a few minutes...same vibe. No peppercorn here. I think I’ll give it to my daughter who’s quite into haunted hotels and such at the moment.

If you want to meditate by fixating on an object of beauty then I would suggest this blend. 😍 The jasmine, rose, lotus and lavender together are a glorious jumble of floral notes. Easy to imagine oneself in a peaceful, fragrant garden oasis. So glad to have a bottle!

Lovely spring/summer scent. I love the rice milk, it adds just the right amount of creaminess and delicacy to the sweet, bright mango. A happy, cheering blend.

Cotton Phoenix 2003 - Snake Oil (vanilla and red musk and spices) plus almond. I am not picking up any Snow White but that’s cool with me. Maybe a little marshmallow, but Snake Oil is generally very sweet on me anyway so it’s hard to tell. I could not pick out cotton blossom in a crowd but after this dries down, I THINK it’s there? It’s a very light, white, fluffy scent, cheerful and sweet.

Strawberries and Honeycomb - Summer in a bottle! Fresh, sun-ripened strawberries bursting with ripeness, and a drizzle of lush golden honey. You can never go wrong with a strawberry blend in my opinion. I’ll be needing more of this -- I’ll wear it all spring and summer!

A whispery vanilla rose, gentle saffron, and I’m not really picking up any lavender. Ethereal. Very light and pink like the qualities of a rose quartz! A little bit like a shampoo note but not bad. Like a chic spa as Happicuppa noted. Sadly my daughter spilled about ¾ of the bottle but I’ll be rationing what remains!

This one is so sweet and fun. I want to say it’s like the milk left over in your cereal bowl from Fruit Loops or Fruity Pebbles. But it’s a little more layered than that. There’s the milk of course, and the white chocolate is definitely noticeable - one of my fave notes. The marshmallow and honey dust are also there. Others really noticed the vanilla cashmere, but I didn’t pick up on it. It’s all so well-blended, though. The overall feeling is just sweet, foodie, happy, childlike. Spoopy milk for adorable little ghosts.

Here’s the lab’s snow note which has been around for a long time, think Snow White...slushy and cold, intensely sweet, but with a sharp sour evergreen needle aspect. Now...with marshmallow! So, the sweetness and creaminess of the snow note is really compounded and intensified here. Which is nice! If the evergreen or floral concentration of Snow White is too intense (it is for me!), maybe try Marshmallow Snow if a sweet winter slush seems more to your liking.