kythryne

How is it that no one has mentioned Zombi yet? Dirt + roses. I don't personally care for it, but I always get people to sniff it because the reactions are great.

Scarecrow is also interesting. Very hot and dry and dusty. Eat Me and Drink Me are worth a sniff, and so is the Highwayman. I'll second the suggestion of Mata Hari, too. Very unusual mix. Miskatonic University is interesting. Wanda isn't all that strange, I don't think, but it's a very complex dark scent -- all wine and musk. Hurricane and New Orleans.

I've been searching for a neroli scent for a while now. Ditto for sandalwood.

This doesn't smell overwhelmingly like either to my nose, but it's beautiful. It has the gorgeous sandalwood from Underpants anchoring down this spicy-floral scent that's just lovely together. I'm not sure I've found either my holy grail of neroli or sandalwood, but I HAVE found something really nice.

I'll join the GIN! choir.

Mind you, gin is my poison of choice (although I usually drink it with cranberry juice, not in martinis) and I quite like the smell of it. The juniper is very crisp and resinous, which I like. I like strong gins, though.

I'm not sure I end up smelling like booze -- it goes more herbal/resinous on my skin after a few minutes. It's a very pretty scent, in my opinion, and I will probably wear it fairly often.

Oh, this is PRETTY. It reminds me of a place I used to live in Florida, about ten years ago; someone in the neighborhood had an enormous night-blooming cactus growing on his fence, and I'd go walking at night with my dog and luxuriate in the smell of the warm summer night air and the cactus blooms and the salt breeze blowing in from the ocean. And orange blossoms, which were usually gone by then but sometimes summer would come early enough that they'd overlap.

This is ethereal and beautiful and I'm going to have to buy a bottle. I can't pick out any distinct notes, just a beautiful and very unique scent.

Sniffing from the imp I got so much mint that I set it down and went to make sure it didn't contain pennyroyal before applying it. Very, very sharp mint/herbal/green scent. On my skin, though, it almost disappears! I'm normally not a heavy slatherer, but I think I will make an exception for this one because I really like it and want to be able to smell it. It morphs from the sharp herbal to something very cold and crisp and also soft somehow. It reminds me a little of Pele, which is probably the white ginger and florals -- the same sort of tropical warmth, but tempered by icy herbals. I think this may become a regular summer scent for me, because it feels delightfully cold and fresh without being medicinal.

I had high hopes for this based on my experience with Sleepy Moon, which I love to bits. So when I first sniffed it in the bottle and thought it was going to be too sweet for me, I was sad. But I slathered anyway, and wow, so glad I did.

As others have said, this comes across as a very crisp, spicy floral with a sweet undertone. I can pick up a whiff of the honey (which is odd in and of itself, because that's a note that usually goes O HAI THAR on my skin) but mostly I smell the florals. And I think ClaireN is dead on about the surinam cherry -- I ate those as a kid, and this has the same sort of astringent sweetness that those do. How odd, I've been trying for YEARS to remember what those were called, with no success. I'm also getting the green notes that are present in some of the rose blends, and a little bit of spiciness that I can't quite place. It's a very pretty, deceptively simple scent.

I'm posting a review despite the fact that I haven't personally been able to test this yet. My partner saw the imp when I opened my package in the car after retrieving it from the post office, demanded that I apply some to her, and immediately appropriated it the imp. And then I walked around Home Depot for a while, ostensibly trying to decide on new flooring for my office, but mostly going weak in the knees and occasionally grabbing her wrist to sniff it.

It started out as a lovely mellow root beer (and I don't even like root beer) and then mellowed out to a spicy warm vanilla-wood-sassafras thing. And did I mention the weak in the knees part? Because yeah.

This is an amazing scent. At some point I will have to wrestle the imp away from her (probably by presenting her with a bottle) and try it myself, but yowza.

ETA: Finally tried it myself, and it went to cheap root beer on my skin. We have radically different skin chemistry, though, so I wasn't surprised. I may try it in a scent locket, but it's easier to sniff it on her.

I get sweet citrus out of this, with the very slightest undertone of mint. A very light, fun scent. It's a lovely cool spring/summer scent, and I think I'll be wearing it a lot more frequently now that the weather is warming up. I'm pretty sure I want a bottle.

One of my cats came up while I was putting this on today, and insisted on investigating the imp. I think a bit got on his nose, because he gave me a filthy look and started flying around the house as if pixies were pulling his tail. Of course, he does that pretty much every morning, but it was a little more pronounced than usual today.

This smells like rose geranium to me, with a hint of other sharp herbals -- lavender, maybe? -- somewhere in the mix. It's a very clean, herbal scent, not something I'd wear for perfume, but I happen to love rose geranium and I've always found it calming.

As for its intended use... it works. I have rather horrendous PMS, and it works wonders for calming me down and restoring sanity. Definitely a keeper.

This is one of the few LEs for which I've sought out multiple bottles, which tells you something right there.

The night I got my first bottle, I had a raging headache, and I'd been working all day and running into problems at every turn. My partner got home from work late and wanted to go out to dinner, and although I didn't feel up to it, I grabbed my purse and dabbed a bit of Sleepy Moon on my wrists and went. On the two block walk to the restaurant, my head cleared, my fatigue lifted, and I started feeling pleasantly calm and a little sleepy. Let's just say that my wrist stayed glued to my nose for most of the rest of that evening.

It smells pretty much the same in the bottle and on my skin: clean, herbal, and green/purple. I can pick out individual notes if I try -- lavender, bamboo, chamomile, poppy -- but it all blends together into a gorgeous, calming whole.

I don't wear this much during the day, because it does tend to make me feel a bit drowsy, but it's a perfect bedtime scent.

The first time I tried this, all I got was plum. Fruity scents aren't my thing, so I put the bottle in my BPAL box and promptly forgot about it, figuring I'd either try it again at some point or swap it away.

A few nights ago I was bored with my usual scents, so I decided to give this one another try. Now I honestly have no idea why I didn't like it. Maybe it just needed to age for a few months in order to work on me?

The plum is still there, but it's mellowed to a light sweetness in the background, with the peony and reeds coming out to play. I don't get much of an aquatic note, but there's a hint of it deep in the mix, rounding things out nicely. It smells rather pink to me, but not a bright pink, more of a deep, rich pink. It's very summery, but not overwhelming -- a good day or evening scent, feminine and strong and slightly quirky.

Severin is lovely. Tea and leather and lemon. I second the suggestion of Embalming Fluid, as it's a nice light citrusy scent.

The older version of 13 smells very orange-ish, at least to my nose. It's also chocolately, and I know it has vanilla but I can't smell that at all. Maybe as a compromise between foody and citrus?

The first few times I tried this, my impression was "meh." It was nice enough, but it went kind of sweet and craft-store-ish on my skin. Not bad, just not something I wanted to smell like.

Tonight, I decided to try it one last time before I put it in my swap pile. I'm very glad I did, because it blossomed out into a gorgeous, gorgeous spicy carnation scent. It's still just slightly fruity, but not overpoweringly sweet like it was the first few times I tried it. I can really smell the carnations, and it actually reminds me very strongly of Lush's Red Ruby Slippers. This is a good thing, as that's one of my favorite scents ever.

I don't think I'll buy a bottle of this just yet, but I'll keep an imp or two around. Hopefully it's not just hormones making my skin chemistry go weird, because I really like what it's doing tonight.

ADDED 10/26/07:

I just described this elsewhere as "...a spicy carnation/musk/plum scent that smells slightly like fall at a craft store, only not so twee." This is a really gorgeous scent for early fall, since it's warm and spicy and slightly sweet without being cloying. It reminds me a lot of the Lion in feel, though not so much in scent -- they both have this lovely warmth.

I use this one quite a bit, especially when things are stressful. I have a three-branched candelabra on my altar that I bought in New Orleans this spring, and I usually keep red, yellow, and orange candles in it, annointed with this oil. I always feel calmer and more grounded when I'm burning those.

My cats seem to like it too. Especially my little girl cat, who is firmly of the opinion that she is Queen of the Universe.

The scent? Fruity, sweet, and warm. It's a comforting scent.

I've had Hymn to Pan for quite some time, but unfortunately, I keep forgetting to use it. When I do remember, interesting things happen. Usually nothing too dramatic, but I often find myself falling into a bit of a work trance, and then I come out of it several hours later with sore hands and a pile of finished pieces on my workbench. It's good stuff.

For some reason, I always feel compelled to dab a bit of it on either side of my neck. I have no idea why, but it's impossible for me to open the bottle and not do that. I've used it to annoint my hands and to annoint candles, and I'm not sure which works better.

The scent... meh. It's a working oil, so I'm not too fussed about how it smells. It's sharp and herbal and feral. Not unpleasant, just not something I'd wear if it was a perfume.

This is an amazing scent. To my nose, it smells slightly sweet in the bottle, and goes on a bit soapy-clean, but then it warms out into this marvelous warm, happy scent. It reminds me of that relieved, almost weightless feeling you get when you realize you've been through something really stressful and come out okay. I can't pick out any specific notes, just a warm rich sunshine-ish scent. It smells like calm summer afternoons.

I'm going to order another bottle before it goes away. 10 out of 10!

Are there any BPAL scents that smell like the Big Blue ballistic? Or heck, ANY perfume oils? I might consider making an exception to my BPAL-only perfume policy if I could get something that smelled like that.

It's been discontinued for over a year, but if you can find some Chiroptera somewhere, that was a lovely night scent. I think Neo-Tokyo smells kind of like a damp summer night, too.

Yow. This is strong stuff.

I've been having major focus problems lately. I have some reason to suspect that I have ADD, but for the moment, I can't take ritalin or anything of the sort because I also have high blood pressure. *headdesk* So, when the TAL site went live and I saw this, I nabbed a bottle.

The day it arrived, I was trying to do a gigantic website update, and I was full-fledged "Don't disturb me, I'm worki... oh, look, a buttterfly!" mode. I promptly hauled this bottle out of the box, cracked it open, and applied it to my hands per the directions on the website. My mind cleared surprisingly fast, and I went back to work and completed the rest of the update without getting sidetracked once. I've used it a couple of times since, with equally good results.

So, yeah. This works, bigtime. It's a strong herbal scent, although I can't really pick out any distinct notes, and anyway, I'm using it to wake up my brain, not as perfume.

I ordered this partly because I've heard so much about it, but also because I wanted to have something calming and cleansing and it just seemed like the right choice.

The first time I used it, I just dabbed it on my chakra points and sat quietly for a few minutes before I started work for the day. It seemed to help a bit, but I was underwhelmed, and I actually strongly disliked the scent that day. It did the same thing upon encountering my skin that jasmine usually does, and well... that's not good.

I decided to give it another shot, though. In addition to dabbng it on the chakra points, I also annointed a pendant that a dear friend made for me a few years ago as a calming/protective talisman. The pendant has fluorite, a herkimer diamond, and an incredible quartz point that acts as an amplifier for good energy, and it's one of my favorite pieces ever.

I put the pendant on a long chain and tucked it inside my shirt, and then again sat for a few minutes before starting work. That day went noticibly more smoothly than usual, and I felt very clear-headed and calm the whole time. Every so often when I'd move around the scent would waft up to my nose, and I actually started liking it by the end of the day. (Maybe because it wasn't really on my skin?) I wore the pendant again the next day, without re-annointing it, and it was a similarly good experience.

Verdict so far? Absolutely a keeper, and I'll be buying it again. I'm going to use it in ritual work whenever I need something cleansed, or when I need to bring calm into my space, and I think I'll be annointing all of my "functional" jewelry with it on a regular basis.

While I love rose as a note in complicated blends -- Wanda is my very favorite BPAL of all time -- the purer rose scents tend to go soapy on me, and I'd almost given up on them.

Then I got an imp of this.

To my nose, this has the same sort of sexy warmth that Wanda does, but without the booze and complexity. Which isn't tosay that this is a simple scent, because it's not. It's very rich and lush and warm, and the amber does fantastic things against the rose. It's a very romantic scent, I think.

Also, I got complemented the first time I wore it out of the house! Admittedly, by another BPAL fan who was trying to figure out what it was, but still.

Yum. That is all.

... Okay, maybe not all.

Again, this is another one I didn't order, because I evidently had a bad case of the dumb when the VD scents were released. I got my paws on a bottle of it today, and while I wasn't at all sure about it from sniffing the bottle, wow. It melted into a fantastic boozy musky sweetness on my skin, without being overpowering or cloying. Very sexy, and it does smell a bit like good bourbon to me. I should compare it to the bottle of bourbon I brought back from New Orleans.

Definitely a keeper.

I didn't order this initially, because lotus has always gone bad on my skin and I don't do fruity, which I thought it might be because of the plum blossom. But last weekend I realized I'd been a fool for not ordering the February LEs, and I managed to snag a bottle of this from a lovely forumite.

It's beautiful. Very light and faint -- although I just took a bath with a rather heavily scented Lush bath bomb, so my nose is a bit overwhelmed by that at the moment -- but incredibly delicate and beautiful. It's a damp floral to my nose, but not a warm, humid damp -- more of a cool early spring rain. It did go slightly sweet and a bit fruity, but just lightly so, not at all overpowering. I think this will be a perfect early spring scent for me.

I bought a set of the Muses because I loved the concept and I like using Beth's oils as background inspiration and grounding when I work. (I'm a jeweler.) I wasn't sure I was going to like this one, but it seemed the most appropriate for today's project -- a bunch of pieces inspired by Arthurian legend -- so I dabbed a bit on and went to work.

On my skin, it twists and morphs a lot. At first I got sharp herbal astringent scent -- probably the lavender. Then something dry and dusty -- the parchment? comes out to play. Then it twists around again and I get musty, loamy, leaves and fresh-turned soil. It's very complex and lovely.

It's been a couple of hours, and it's faded down to a dusty sort of floral. It reminds me a bit of musty linens and books. Very faint and pretty.

I'm not sure I like this enough to get a bottle, but I'll definitely keep an imp around.

Oh, pretty pretty pretty. I hesitated over this one, because all the other Lunacies I've tried so far have gone soapy on me, but the bamboo and tea convinced me, and I am so very very glad.

From the bottle, it smells green and damp and slightly sweet, a little like walking into one of the candy shops in Chinatown on a rainy day. On my skin, it starts off slightly sharp and lemony, and then the bamboo comes pouring out and it all mellows down into a gorgeous wet green scent. I'm having trouble picking up the tea note, but the bamboo is there, beautifully clear, and there's something mysterious and foreign to me that must be the oude.

When I was a kid, we had a little stand of bamboo growing wild near our house, and sometimes I'd pick a branch of it and play with it. The bamboo in this and in Neo-Tokyo smells SO much like that -- clean and astringent and woody and fresh.