oatmealneko

Eeep. Cherry. Dragon's blood resin, clove? I was sure it wasn't going to work, but I tried it anyway. Cherry & dragon's blood resin, when wet, sure enough, cherry, though there in small amounts, turned medicinal instantly. Dragon's blood resin quickly covered that up, but I can still smell hints of cherry cough syrup here & there. I get zero clove, which is normally very strong on me.

Florence smelled lovely at first. Iris & sweet berries, with a touch of musk (maybe those were spices, wrong oil, wrong scent, try again?). Then it dried. Ugh. Berries disappeared. Iris & amber. The iris was strong initially, but then the amber popped up. Amber & iris blended, but then it smelled weird. Almost like burning rubber. I had to wash it off after 15 minutes, horrible horrible, & it started out so well too! Amber's been an iffy note on me, too.

I dabbed a bit of this on my wrist. Normally, heliotrope, rose, & I don't play nice together. Even now, it's very strong. Lots of floral. Mostly gardenia & rose, the heliotrope is beginning to rise up as well. I can't wear this kind of florals without suffering from a headache. Definitely in the swap pile.

Update: Sadly, I had to let this sit for three weeks. The revised review

 

In the bottle: Peppermint, chocolate

Wet: Minty. Minty, but slightly chocolate.

Dry: It's somewhat minty, but the chocolate is also there. I think I pick up a little bit of rum, also. It's good, but I don't love it.

Intrigue was a very interesting scent. It morphed a lot, & finally turned into something lovely from something I disliked on first sniff. Mabon was interesting as well, but different. I tried it recently. It's very complex, it confused me a little. I think it's a scent that needs a few wearings to understand it.

Wet: Spiced apple cider with hops, a touch of blackberry wine. I think I also picked up the sage & myrrh, possibly when it was wet. It was a confusing whirl of various scents, almost put me off completely. I suppose it was like being at an autumn festival in the countryside, & had one too many to drink & so you got everything at once.

 

Dry: Blackberry wine faded. Fast. Normally wine notes do well on my skin, but not this one. The apple cide smelled less cider, stronger in hops, I suppose apple beer? Closer to the description than the cider at this stage. Sage & myrrh also were starting fade. I smelled like hops at the end. Er, apple hops.

 

It's definitely an autumn scent, I would not wear this any other time of the year. But it perfectly captures the imagery it was going for.

I haven't heard of Mabon until recently, & then I read the description. I'm getting a decant in the mail, so I haven't tried it yet, but it sounds like something I would love. It also looks like a hard-to-find fragrance. Does anyone have an idea what's it similar to?

I just got a decant of this yesterday. Oooh, I can see why this is a popular scent.

 

Wet: Strong florals. Orchid mostly, some jasmine also. Smells lightly fruity.

 

Dry: Orchid. Then, the orchid burns off & the plum pushes its way through to the top. More plum than orchid. The plum is dominant, with some orchid. However, the plum isn't launching off my skin, probably because Kitsune-Tsuki doesn't have any wine notes in it.

Phantom Queen is very floral, all orchid & some apple blossom. I have another orchid scent, Goneril, which I do love more & when I compared them the other night, I figured out why.

Phantom Queen is a sweet-smelling orchid. I think the apple blossom may be the cause of that. It's sweet & light at first, but then it gets heavier later (still sweet). Sniffing it on my wrist gave me a bit of a headache. A bit cloying. I think I'm ready to let this imp go.

There's a particular scent that I'd love try that I haven't yet, but the spelling of it was a bit of puzzling to me. Aizen-Myoo. I thought it would sound like "aizen-myu", but it just still looked weird to me. When I looked it up online, it's actually prounounced as "Aizen-Myo-o".

In the vial: sweet & creamy.

 

Wet: Almonds! A strong almond scent hit my nose immediately after applying it. The scent quickly turned sweet.

 

Dry: Drying down, the scent slowed turned creamy. I ended up with creamy honey almonds. Too sweet for my tastes, I do like a little spice in there (like Dragon's Milk). I might finish off my imp, but I doubt I will get this in a bigger size.

I got zero florals out of this one. Lampades was tart cranberry & musk on me. Tart cranberries that didn't fade or disappear within a half hour of applying on my skin. The musk was a little strong on me, but it's always like that for a good 10 minutes until it dries out. The best thing about this scent was that the cranberries never turned sweet, but they remained tart. There's been quite a few oils with berry in them that have turned sweet on me.

I received Wolf Moon in the mail last night & finally got a chance to try it.

 

Oh, this was lovely, very lovely. My first lunacy blend was Cold Moon & I loved it, but I think Wolf Moon was a little better.

 

Wet: I was afraid that I would smell pine, which has been noted by many reviewers. I don't like pine at all. Forunately, no pine. None, whatsoever in my bottle or on my skin. Instead, I smelled a wood note, soft & dark.

 

Dry: The wood note faded away & the scent changed into a green scent. Lots of greenery, & I thought it was going to turn soapy on me, but I wasn't used to smelling so much green on my skin. No florals, just green. Definitely wasn't pine, might have been juniper, I remember that note vaguely from another scent I tried recently. Then, it changed again - I started smelling berries. The wood note & green note were gone. The only scent left at the end were berries. Semi-sweet frozen berries.

I received this imp yesterday as a freebie.

 

Arrrrgh. Pomegranate & rose. One note I love, but I can't get it to work on me. One note I hate & goes overkill on me.

 

In the vial: Pomegranate with rose.

 

Wet: Rose with some pomegranate

 

Dry: Rose. ROSE. ROSE. *coughcough*

I wanted to like this one, but Kabuki didn't work out for me. I can't wear anything with cherry notes. I had tried The Red Queen, but I thought that it was the wood note that didn't agree with me, but I guess not.

 

In the vial: sweet, ripe cherries

Wet: Cherry cough syrup

Dry: For a short time, I smell the cherry & musk as separate notes, & it's lovely. Then it turns back into cherry cough syrup.

 

Arrrgh. Another note that utterly despises me.

This one wasn't even on my wish list, but I decided to give this one a try. At first, I almost washed it off because it was entirely made up of this strong wood scent. Wood scents & I normally don't mix. Wood becomes overwhelming & I get a little nauseous. When it dried, it became a different scent. The other elements came through, while the wood faded to the background. There's dark cocoa & the spiciness of fig, plus another element I can't place. It smells coconut, but it's probably the black palm. it's a wonderful scent, I'm definitely hanging onto my imp. I don't know if I would get a bottle, but I might.

If you want cinnamon, then I suggest you try Chimera. Warm & yummy cinnamon.

 

Blood Amber seems like a "red" scent to me.

Wet: limes + lilacs = Lemon Pledge. Yet lemons smell like lemons on me.

 

Dry: Lemon Pledge scent is gone, but I reeked of lliacs, which made me extremely sneezy. It was like Endymion (another heavy floral which caused much sneezing) all over again. I washed it off when it became apparent the lilacs weren't going to fade anytime soon.

I think I put too much of this one on. It's heavy, cloying, sweet floral. The floral scent is easily detectable in the air. I can smell some greenery by sniffing my wrist. I like florals, but this is too heavy for me. It's very perfumey & it's starting to give me a headache.

This smells like sweet grapes to me. Grapes, grapes, & more grapes. Very strong when wet on my skin. Unlike many other scents, this one doesn't change or have any variation on me. It smells like grapes, then it fades. I wore this layered over Dragon's Milk, which smell delicious together (think: grapes with spicy cream).

I could pick up the lavendar right out of the vial, & a secondary scent that I still can't figure out. I don't think it was eucalyptus either, because I'm used to smelling that around my workplace (there are eucalyptus trees all over the place here).

 

On me, Baku smells like a mixture of lavendar & mint, but lavendar is still the dominant scent. Drying down, the lavendar is softened, while the mint is coming through strong. I finally pick up eucalyptus in the air.

 

I haven't made up my mind about this one at all, but I'm going to try it again at night, before I fall asleep. It's not one I would wear during the day.

Like Water of Notre Dame, a little bit of Blood Amber on me goes a long way. Seriously, this one has a lot of "throw". I think I put too much on, I feel a little sneezy. After dabbing it on my wrists, it smelled good. Dragon's Blood alone is overpowering with roses. Amber prevents the rose scent from becoming horrendously amplified on my skin. It's a warm, comforting mixture.

Bordello has had the most "throw" for me, of the ones I've tried. I'm wearing a bit of Blood Amber on my wrists right now. First time wearing it, LOTS of throw, probably due to the Dragon's Blood in it, which I detected immediately. Dragon's Blood is mostly rose, which my skin instantly amplifies. Ditto for Nyx. Port-Au-Prince, also, because of the clove. Water of Notre Dame had the same effect, I'm not sure what's in it, but it doesn't take much of that before I can smell it in the air around me.

Soap & water usually work for me, except for this one case. A friend of mine asked me to take a whiff of Depraved, possibly the foulest concoction I have ever smelled. I got a little bit of the oil on my fingers when I popped the imp lid off. I washed my hands three times with soap & water, but I still couldn't get the smell off my fingers. Later that day, I took a shower, & the smell was gone. Finally.

 

I think it's the patchouli, that stuff wants to hang on forever.

I tried this one again, the first time I wore it, I wasn't really paying attention to how it smelled.

 

This scent smells identical to Embalming Fluid. The lemon & green tea notes stand out on my skin, as they do in Embalming Fluid. I can't pick up the honeysuckle wet, but when it dries off, I think it's this oil that causes Shanghai to turn soapy on me (vs. Embalming Fluid where it fades away). This scent doesn't last that long on me at all - 2-3 hours, tops (Embalming Fluid lasts about 4 hours, maybe a little more).