fathom

The very first scent I bought myself, when I was in seventh grade or so, was a Crabtree and Evelyn Carnation eau de cologne, and I still love the spicy floral of the carnation. Its nice to encounter it in such a sophisticated blend now that I’m (sigh) all grown up. Morocco is very pleasantly incensey and spicy. I am really not into patchouli, and this scent is one of the select few incensey scents I’ve encountered where the patchouli is just right. It gets to be more carnation and less incense as it wears, I think, eventually going through a very spicey phase. Very nice— could be a wonderful everyday scent for the fall. For all year, really. This might be up in my top five favorites.

A very lovely light, grassy, woody scent. I might have called it incensey, but that implies smokiness, I think. And it’s not smoky, but very fresh and airy. Like sunlight on sandalwood. Or like dried out prairie grasses. Very wearable, and very unique. This was a gift imp, and I am so glad I got to try it. I was drawn to the lab description, but I was put off by the other reviews and had not ordered it because of the iffy comments. So if you are on the fence—give it a try! It’s fantastic!

At first this smells very like vanilla and almond, but after it dries the scent changes remarkably on me. Once dry it is more complex, definitely. A lovely honeyed fig scent, with a slight hint of wood. Very sunny and friendly. Like Eden would have been! I really like it. I was a little worried about the honey in it, since I thought honey scents went bad on me, but from this and a couple other recent imps I’ve realized that some honey scents are awesome, but some (like Sudha Segara) really don’t work. Now I gotta go order a bunch more honey scent imps…

This is the first of the Seven Deadly Sins scents I've tried-- it was a gift in my latest order. I never would have ordered it myself, since I am not a real patchouli girl, but I was really interested in trying this blend. Wet: Damn, this is a real musk. This is heavy incense laden with musk, a scent for hardcore patchouli lovers. Once on the skin, it stays pretty true to the scent in the imp. Since it’s named Lust, I guess I expected it to be sweeter, but this is not a sweet scent. It seems pretty gender-neutral to me, and I can imagine it smelling pretty good on a fella. I don’t really think it is a very sexy scent, though a lot of the other reviewers do. Frankly, this class of scents doesn’t really turn me on, but to each her own! I'll take the coconut and rum scents...

The lab description on this one is right on. It’s a peachy floral, with a hint of greenness. There is a definite ozone tang to it, too, which keeps it from being boring. There are a lot of mass-market perfumes that try to smell like this and fail— Neo-Tokyo is a total success. I guess it’s not my favorite class of perfumes, and I am not sure I would need a bottle, but it is a really lovely rendition of a light floral. This seems like a very proper scent to me, good to wear when meeting your future in-laws or something like that.

The Spirit of the Divine Messenger, the Lord of the Crossroads, He Who Owns All Doors and Roads in this World. He is the intermediary between the Orishas and mankind, and stands at the intersection of humanity and the Divine. He opens all paths of communication, both mundane and Heavenly. His ofrenda contains coconut, tobacco and sweet, sugared rum. Oh, hell yeah. So rich. Like a mink coat in a bottle. Very dark and compelling to my nose. Yes, tobacco, rum, coconut… but also coffee, pecan maybe, cocoa perhaps? The coconut here is definitely not sweet like in Black Pearl, one of my favorite BPAL scents. I still love the coconut in this stronger permutation. Dang this is nice. I can imagine this wouldn’t be a scent for everyone, but for those of us who love the nutty, foody, rummy scents this is a winner. (edited for typos...)

In the imp: delicious! Very spicy and inviting. This smells like a purely spice scent to me. On the skin: Amber waves of grain. This smells grainy, somehow, like a good oatmeal cookie with plenty of spice in it. I imagine this might be a very seductive scent for the right person. It gets a little soapy on my skin as it fades, though. Not badly, just a little bit. It's still beautiful.

A gentlemen's blend, possessed of dignity, charm and refinement, but in truth masking a corrupted, hideous, soulless core. White musk, lime, lilac and citron. Fresh lemon peel, tempered with a gentle ashy note. As it dries, I can smell the ash note more intensely—it smells like scorched paper. As it fades, the lemon disappears almost entirely on me, and the papery scent starts to go soapy. Very interesting scent, but not working at all on my skin. Oh well...

Dark but sweet. The patchouli in this scent never dominates the blend. It’s well married to the musk, I think. There is a slight fruityness to the scent, and especially as it dries I can smell the apple. This could definitely be a good everyday fragrance, I think—it doesn’t really make a giant statement or jump out at you, but is very appealing and lasts forever. It’s like a good pair of jeans that fit perfectly. Really, a lovely unique scent, a very wearable, masterful blend from the lab.

Thick and sweet, like tangerine candy. And this scent has tremendous throw. While I like a good fruity scent, I think this one might be too young for me. The sweetness is so intense, it almost smells sticky. Since there aren’t any woody or musky undertones to balance the sweetness it ends up being kind of overwhelming to me. (edited for a silly typo...)

In the imp, it smells very spicy and delicious. The dark, dark color of the liquid makes the scent seem even more mysterious and inviting. Wet on the skin, it still smells spicy, but the musk overpowers the spice. It dries down into a sharp musk on me, though. Some red musks are piercing, almost irritating to my nose, and this is one of them. Unfortunately, it just isn’t working with my skin…

The Dark Side of Earth: deep, brooding forest scents, including juniper and patchouli. The scent of upturned cemetery loam mingling with floral offerings to the dead. Well, this scent has made me reconsider my aversion to all patchouli blends! It smells foresty, and dark, and foggy. I really, really like this, and the patchouli and juniper blend so, so well. The patchouli darkens and deepens the scent, adding an earthiness to the blend and evoking upturned earth. Some woody scents smell like cut wood or polished wood or incense; Burial is the scent of living trees in a living forest. The scent of a whole forest. It lasts pretty long on me, and stays pretty true to the scent on application. I didn’t find it particularly masculine, unlike some other reviewers. To me it seems earthy and outdoorsy, a scent for a very independent person of either gender. If you like woody/evergreen scents then you definitely need to try this one.

In the imp: Mint, but a round mint, not a sharp mint. Mint julep, not Altoids. Wet on the skin: Very watery and clear sea green. Its mintiness is not the scent of candy mint to me. It's the scent of the mint plant, perhaps after a heavy rain has loosened the soil it grows in. This scent seems to sharpen my focus and draw me to attention, somehow. To me it is a good scent for a summer day, but not a sensual, sexy, weekend sort of summer day. A long summer day where you have to keep your shit together and negotiate your way through some treacherous shoals.

In the imp: dark, spicy amber and a little hint of musk. On the skin: The amber predominates on my skin at first-- the wet scent is so warm and golden it almost smells like food. It's lovely. Dry: the warm sandalwood begins to shine through. This is the kind of wood scent I love: rich, but not cloying. The scent becomes increasingly a straight ahead sandalwood scent as it dries. Hmm, somehow I never smelled any floral notes in it, wet or dry. I don't know that I would term it masculine, though. I think it's a strong and clear scent for anyone.

In the imp: light floral with a hint of vanilla. On the skin: a really warm, honeyed floral. Jasmine... honeysuckle... As it dries the light musk comes through. Oh, this is a really sweet and gentle floral. Feminine, but not too girly for me. (edited, because I posted the review for a different scent here at first!)

This one is really green and fresh at first. Lovely, like a spring breeze, but not girly or flowery. If it stayed like this all day I'd be happy. Pretty quickly on my skin the scent shifts, though. It gets a little soapy, and the greenness fades away. It smells more like wildflowers and less like grasses. Then the whole scent fades away within half an hour. Oh well... think this imp is destined to make a great room scent.

An ancient, free-willed race created from the essence of Fire, much as man was created from Earth. They prowled the land at night, vanishing with the first rays of dawn. Myths surrounding the Djinn paint them as many things: benevolent champions of mankind and slaves to mad sorcerers, malicious incubi / succubi and energy vampires, or malevolent harbingers of madness and disease. The Djinn are ruled by Iblis, the Prince of Darkness, who bears unspeakable contempt for man. The scent of black smoke, of crackling flames, and smoldering ashes. In the bottle, I smell incense, ashes, and a wet mossy note. On the skin, I smell rosewood and sandalwood, with a tiny tang of mint in the back of the nose. It smells powerful. Other people have mentioned housefires... I kind of get that resonance too. Last spring my neighbor's house exploded (gas leak, not meth lab) and there is something of that vibrant, crazy, 25-foot-tall flame in this scent. As it wears, it gets less ashy and more herbal. It kind of smells like an incense holder after a lot of incense has been burned in it.

This oil evokes a strong and kind of strange reaction in me. I really feel uncomfortable just wearing it around-- like it is charged somehow. I smell patchouli and orange, definitely, but there is a lot more in there too. Even before I knew that Obeah was a word for sorcery I felt like this oil had a pretty intensely magical feel to it. I have a lot of respect for this oil but I don't think I'm up to wearing it myself. Hopefully I'll find it a good home.

Ooo, I like this. I don't drink at all, and I am not sure what rum smells like now that I think of it. Or Bay Rum, really. So my review is from that perspective... I didn't think of alcohol when I smelled this in the imp, which is good-- I was a little afraid it was going to smell really boozey. On the skin I smell warm spices, cloves and vanilla mostly. And cinnamon, but not dry spice-rack cinnamon. More cinnamon rolls or something. It starts to smell like marzipan to me as it wears. Mmm, marzipan kicks ass! I also smell a sharp note every now and again, something peppery and almost metallic. But mostly, it smells sweet and delicious. Like a warm breeze through a beach town. Amazing.

In the imp: Black cherry. Not sweet red cherry, and not sour acidic cherry either. Black cherry, like the kind in black cherry ice cream. And something else... a little bit sharp. It almost smells like a hint of iodine, somehow, but not in a bad way. On the skin, a dark cherry married to fresh-cut hardwood. A very evocative and familiar scent, very sweet. As it fades, I think it smells like burnt caramel. I go for the fruity scents, and this one is pretty nice, but maybe not up in my top five.

In the imp: full, lush lotus scent, very sweet and heavy. On the skin, once it dries I start to smell coffee and the scent gets very shadowy. It's still floral, but a very dark and gloomy floral. As it wears, somehow it went wrong on me. I was glad someone else mentioned used motor oil, so I know I'm not alone in this! It started to smell like dirty pavement to me, somehow. Oh well...

It is a pretty scent. A very pink and girly scent. It smells like candy to me, with a hint of jasmine. And apple. I think I was hoping for more oakbark in this scent when I ordered the imp... Though really, I think this does seem like a good approximation of the garden the Hesperides might live in. Golden apples, indeed, with a profusion of light blossoms in the background.

Named after the Roman God of Sleep. This blend helps bring on deep, restful, natural sleep. I got this imp as a giftie in my last order. I almost never have trouble getting to sleep these days, so it wouldn't have occured to me to try this one otherwise. I did try it anyway one evening... It smells clean and soapy, just out of the shower. There is a sharp herbal scent on drydown. Like most nights, I slept fine. Can't say I noticed any difference, but then, I was asleep (haha). Now if they would make a scent that would get me out of bed in the morning I'd be all over it!

Mmm, fabulous. I love this one-- I think I love all the warm-latitude Wanderlust scents. In the imp: green banana with a pineappley undercurrent. I don't smell any of the fake-banana scent other reviewers have mentioned. On the skin: warm tropical fruits with lush wet flowers. The woodiness of the palm comes through after it dries fully, too. I smell a dry hardwood scent, perhaps a hint of sandalwood. This scent stays true on me for ages. Its the tropical fruit scent I've been looking for! I definitely need a 5ml for hot summer days...

In the imp: very subtle evergreen forest scent. Definitely not simple pine, it's tempered with some incensy notes. On the skin: As soon as it dried it turned very quickly to a burnt-baby-powder scent that lingered around for a long time. How disappointing! I think the black musk disagreed with my skin chemistry.