marared
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I have not really worn this since I originally got it. With a year and a half of age, it's bright blood orange and labdanum - the peach is there, but this is distinctively more tart-citrus with the labdanum making it quite effervescent, and the sandalwood is a nice smooth base. Within ~10 minutes or so, it loses a lot of the brightness, and at this stage I like it somewhat less. I don't dislike it, but not sure this is something I will reach for again.
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Mandarin, Black Vanilla, and Patchouli
marared replied to Seajewel's topic in Duets & Menage A Trois
I don't know that I would have bought this on a blind sniff. BPAL mandarin is a chilly sort of citrus here, rendering the bottle very cool and honestly a little intimidating. On my skin, it takes a little while, but the mandarin recedes to the background, the black vanilla warms things up, and makes them almost a little toasty. The patchouli never really comes out to play - it's there but it just grounds the scent and adds to the overall toasty impression. Don't get me wrong, this is not gourmand or foodie-sweet at all, or even particularly cozy, but I went to sleep with the test dab on my hand, and it was really nice when I woke up. I'll have to try it again in a few months and see how it's changed. -
Chocolate, Cinnamon Bark, and Chipotle Honey
marared replied to Silvertree's topic in Duets & Menage A Trois
From the "I Forgot I Bought This And Should Probably Test It" files. In the bottle it's a dry and spicy chocolate, definitely a Mexican hot chocolate scent as has been mentioned by others. I don't really get the chipotle or the honey, just cocoa and cinnamon. On my skin, it's much less chocolatey, gets even drier, and there's the chipotle peeking out. If you liked Caramel, Smoked Chili, and Black Vanilla, but wanted something less SWEET but still gourmand, this would be a great one to try. -
Mallow Flower, Honeysuckle, and Vanilla Bean
marared replied to Silvertree's topic in Duets & Menage A Trois
I completely forgot that I ordered this, until I went through the upper shelf while looking for scents I don't wear as often. It's had a good six months to age, which is why I think I put it up there in the first place: to let the florals calm down a little. At this stage, it's a sticky-sweet, feminine, white-gold floral. Sharp at first, but it softens over time. The honeysuckle is there, but it takes a back seat to the mallow flower and vanilla - it's too flowery to be marshmallowy to my nose, but it's definitely sweet and summery. The scent is loud on my skin, and it's got quite a lot of throw even without being activated by body heat. -
Dirty hippie scent is right up my alley! The patchouli is calm and self-possessed, not fresh and stanky, the vetiver joins the frankincense and myrrh in giving it more depth but none of the vegetal or scorch that most people hate nor any of the powderiness that the resins can leave, the labdanum perks the whole scent up with just a hint of effervescence, and then amber just kinda blurs through the whole thing adding warmth. It's a very grown up, give no fucks kind of scent. If you hate vetiver, I don't think this will change your mind, but if you're on the fence, I'd give it a try.
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Piercingly sharp white floral, I'd classify it as almost aquatic. Mums are usually much richer than this, but the aldehyde is so harsh that it puts a damper on the flowers. The whole scent puts me on edge and not in a good way.
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Clove tries to dominate this right out of the bottle, as it does, but wait it out - the aloeswood shows up and calms things down and it's quite lovely. If good quality Japanese incense is too pricy for you, this would be a great alternative to drip in an oil warmer. While I would classify this as quite masculine, it's honestly very atmospheric - I would love for my whole house to smell like this in its drydown stage.
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An Aroused Prostitute From Maruyama Yukatu and a Merchant From Qing
marared replied to Seajewel's topic in Lupercalia
This smells like a Bath & Body Works candle - not a generic statement, there is a very specific scent this reminds me of and I cannot for the life of me think of what it is, but it's probably a Halloween scent, because I am totally parsing this as pumpkin rather than peach, and I have no idea why. It's loud and spicy, no cream to speak of, doesn't have a lot of depth to it - at least not so far. -
Contest of Colors, Pink Peach Blossoms and White Plum Flowers
marared replied to Seajewel's topic in Lupercalia
I originally almost posted this under Aroused Prostitute From Maruyama, because the bottles were sitting side by side and it made sense with the notes! My first impression, without checking the notes, was peach tea - it reminds me of my bag of peach oolong but less astringent. The amber comes out almost immediately and makes the peach warmer and fuzzier, and does that "expensive dryer sheets" thing that amber sometimes does, but the labdanum takes over after a few minutes and pushes the amber down. It takes a while for the other florals to peek through and they're very low-key. It's just a very warm resinous peach, and I bet this will be smashing to layer with! -
Orris root is about 85% a death note for me and I'm always a little nervous ordering something with it, but I had to give this one a shot. Loud, sweet pear, and it smells realistic at the forefront of my nose, but when I get a deeper inhale, ehhhh there's the orris root. We'll see how this develops over time. The honey, vanilla, cream, and musk are thoroughly blended and no one note really peeks out over another, it's just a very nice undercurrent to the pear. As long as I don't inhale too deeply, the orris root behaves, but I'm going to be giving this one side-eye for a while.
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Fresh out of the mailbox: absolutely delicious honeyed vanilla with just a slight bit of effervescence from the labdanum and the pink pepper. I've never smelled bushman's candle and there's nothing in this that hints at something different from the rest of the scent. The honey is NOT overpowering or sticky, but it does develop an aspect that makes me think of vanilla flavored hard candy. It's not the same vanilla, but this is what I hoped for from Love's Philosophy back in the day - I had to sell it off because it just didn't work right with my chemistry, but this is niiice.
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On me, this smells like cheesecake with strawberry compote. No pastry note that I can detect. I like Pomegranate better, but this is still super delicious!
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Dirty desserty patchouli is the ODDEST thing. I think what I am parsing as dirty is the "oily" benzoin, and the marshmallow fluff definitely qualifies as sticky. No caramel here, just gooey fluff. I'm getting some kind of soil aspect to this too. It makes me think of the marshy area around a pond where I used to go hunting for tadpoles when I was a kid. I don't know. It's so weird. Not at all what I expected!
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I am having a hard time picking out any of the actual notes except the hazelnut, but boy, this is delicious. Warm, friendly, fuzzy but not TOO fuzzy, with a little cool and bright zing from the mandarin cutting through it all. After several minutes, the "peppery" part of the musk shows up and the hazelnut and mandarin recede a bit, but it's still so so good. It's fairly strong on my wrist, but not a huge amount of throw.
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I did not parse when I first ordered it that this was blended with Snow White. I hate Snow White on my skin. It is one of the (relatively few, thankfully) scents that goes stale/sour and requires multiple scrubs to get off. So I tried TKSnow with an awful lot of trepidation, and surprisingly, it does not behave as badly as SW does on its own. There is is a period of about ten minutes where I can smell the SW and the ick is lurking, but it gets subsumed by a cool dark vanilla. Regular TKO cycles between marshmallow and lavender on me, but this one stays mostly low-key sweet.