Little Bird

Oh, happiness . Sudha Segara is such a wonderful and beautiful scent. Light creamy milky notes mixed with the sweet spice of ginger. That is all I get from this - no soap or citrus in there to mess it up. Just creamy sweet spicy goodness. It is very light, I have to reapply about every 3 hours... but wow... it's just so good... I want to eat it.

This smelled sour and off to me when I first got into bpal, but I've grown to really like wine scents and have learned that some scents need to age a bit before slathering. This is dark, plush red wine that's sweetened with cherry (but not turned sickly sweet from the cherry), with bits of dark, sultry spiciness from the clove and hint of vetiver. It smells dark and aggressively sexy to me lately, which I like a lot when I'm in a certain mood and this is one that I find gets better (less sour, more sweet & smooth) with some aging.

In the bottle and on my skin at first, this is mostly violet. Very sweet, slightly powdery violet. It keeps making me think of violet flavored bubblegum. As it dries down, the gardenia adds a creamy, tropical floral edge to the violet candy and something pops up with a clean edge that doesn't quite go soapy on me. Veil feels like a little girl's super-sweet violet perfume, trying to grow up into something more heady, grounded, and clean edged. It also has that somber, moody feel that I usually get from violet scents. Soo... dark and moody little girl starting to grow up into adulthood? I have to say, I would be very intrigued by a girl who was wearing this, if I were to sit down next to her. It's floral, but not perfumey or drugstore floral. It's a unique and interesting floral with a mix of sweet, clean, and heady/rich notes. --- Wearing a lab gifted sample in 2022: This smells like I grabbed handfuls of lilacs, violets and a sprig of mint from out in my yard, bits of clinging greenery and all, and churned them into a soap that's floral, earthy, sweet, and a lil clean smelling. I still get that pop of bubblegum that I did in 2005. I still feel like I'd love a woman who smells like this. It's gothic-yet-freshly-scrubbed and it smells like it would be in a band run by a 20-something-woman with good business sense. Someone artistic, but calm and calculated. I don't know why I never full bottle this beauty.

All that I'm getting from this is sharp bitter rose. I either love or hate rose (love it when it is a dark wet rose like in Whip, hate it when it is a high pitched whining rose like in Viola). This is a floral that I find to be very headache inducing. Too much bitter rose, and it just gets stronger and more overpowering the longer that it is on my skin. I'll definitely be swapping my imps of Viola.

I've gotten two different version of this over the years. One version is a very dark, reddish brown oil and the other is a light, almost clear, pale yellow. Obviously very different. The dark red/brown oil smells deeper, darker and more amber-y and kinda makes me think of a dark chocolate truffle with honeyed cream oozing from the center. It's warm and rich with a warm, amber-y undertone that actually doesn't turn to baby powder on me like almost all of bpal's ambers do. The pale/clear/yellow-y version smells like a cool honey musk. As it dries down, it actually smells like a floral wildflower honey. I've been getting this clear version more often lately with lab frimps, so I wonder if this is another scent that got randomly reformulated without notice...

This reminds me of going on a Disney cruise for my 15th birthday (happy times <3). It's like creamy coconut scented sun tan lotion, ocean breezes, sand, and - most importantly - a hint of nonalcoholic pina coladas. It is a sort of light scent on me, but very long lasting and definitely not so light that I don't catch hints of it at random points throughout the day. Black Pearl is sweet, creamy, and refreshing on me. A perfect summer scent. Very tropical-vacation-lovely

For about a half hour on my skin, hemlock smells exactly like burning dried sage leaves. But I decided to wait out that bad smell in the hopes that it would change into something wonderful. It doesn't. Oddly, it morphs into a weird bubblegum scent on me. You know those long powdery strips of bubble tape that you get in those plastic tape measurer containers? That is exactly what hemlock smells like on me - powdery bubblegum with an extra dusting of baby powder. No thanks.

When my father was alive, he would often drive me into town and take me to breakfast at this place called The Walnut Bowl. It was an oldstyle restaurant in our old little town. The structure itself was made out of all wood logs and planks, like a log cabin... and you could smell that sort of sugary wooden smell. Then insert the smells of buttery pancakes and maple syrup... and you not only have what The Walnut Bowl smelled like, but also what Hellcat smells like on me. Pure old-fashioned pancake house. I don't really want to smell like a pancake house... but I have used up several imps of this just because it reminds me of better times with my father. Thankyou BPAL...

Fruity scents usually smell very youthful to me, reminding me of something that a young energetic girl would wear (especially if they have grapefruit). So I expected this to have that young/juvenile feel to it. But this is fruity all grown up. It is so well balanced. Like a sophisticated older lady's perfume, but with energizing grapefruit and plum slathered over it. The result is rather elegant and sexy, and I can pick out all of the notes as they swirl around each other. It's not one of my all time favorites (I have trouble loving fruity blends so it seems)... but I like it. A lot.

This is a very boring and fake/synthetic smell to me. It is very sweet and fruity, but something about it bothered me. Then it hit me, this smells exactly like Bath & Body Works' sun-ripened raspberry fragrance. That same sickly sweet candied raspberry that always made me gag. Nothing like a real tart raspberry smell. My sister loved this and agreed that it smelled like her favorite B&BW lotion.

I agree with those who have said this reminded them of any commercial perfume floral. You could get a similar cheap floral scent in almost any department store. It is a light floral, I guess would be good as a summer scent for those people that like safe florals. I just have a hard time warming up to floral blends, and this one is lacking anything unique or striking that would make me want to work with it. BPAL has so many unique and wonderful scents that I can't find anywhere else, so I would buy a hundred other oils before getting around to a 5 ml of this one. It's just boring to me...

I so thought that I would fall in love with this one, dew-covered grasses and crushed herbs <3. Unfortunately, this is another BPAL that just turns into that awful baby powder smell on my skin. I left this one on for about 5 hours, hoping that any other note would come out, but the baby powder smell just kept getting stronger and stronger. So... while I hate the scent... this one has great staying power.

Yup. Smells just like Dior's Pure Poison fragrance (which also goes musky and overwhelmingly sharp/bitter on me). This is such an amazingly strong and overpowering scent. Reminded me of the 80's, big hair, and shoulder pads. The kind of fragrance that wears you rather than the other way around. On me it started smelling like funky throat clogging hairspray. I didn't get any berries or lime out of this at all, it was sort of sharp and musky. And it's so long lasting... it stuck around even after repeated furious hand washings as I attempted to get it off of me. I definitely want to leave this one back a few decades... it frightens me with its power.

This smelled wonderful when I first put it on, the lemon and vanilla came out strongly and it was such a wonderfully creamy scent. However, after about five minutes, the musk took over and smelled like nothing but baby powder. I hate it when a great BPAL scent turns to baby powder on my skin. Boo.

Juke Joint would be completely heavenly to me if it were only warm bourbon and sugar, minus the mint. I never have been fond of anything with mint in it. For about the first half hour after putting this on, it smelled like a minty lime bathroom cleanser. After that it begins to soften and get sweeter as the sugar and warm bourbon come out (which I love), but they are still dominated by mint. It is definitely interesting... but still too bathroom cleanser for me to want to wear it as a perfume. The mint itself is very sweet and light, I just (sadly) have trouble wearing anything minty. If you like mint at all, this is very lovely.

Sampling Hecate was an odd experience for me. It smelled very strongly of Cherry Dr. Pepper for about five minutes... then, nothing. I seriously had a moment of confusion where I wondered if I had somehow lost the wrist that I applied the oil to. This was the most quickly vanishing fragrance I have ever tried before in my life. It was like my skin ate the fragrance o_O. I reapplied and really slathered it on, same result. I'm going to have to try this as a room scent and see what happens...

This scent smells so amazingly dry. The kind of dry chemical smell that makes me feel like I'm getting a nosebleed (does anyone else ever get that feeling or am I just strange?). At first it reminded me a bit of Lush's Cosmic Dreamcather massage bar, sort of dry woods and peppery spices. Then it quickly took on a scent that reminded me of a car repair shop . All of the oil, rubber, gasoline, and grime... I don't know if it's just my skin chemistry, but this was a horribly foul fragrance on me. I'd say it was more masculine, but I don't like this on my boyfriend either.

Kali sounded so good. I was so lusting over the blend of wine, tobacco, and honey... and it was PERFECT when I first applied it. It was delicious tobacco and honey, sort of smelling chocolatey. But this stage was gone in about five minutes and it was completely taken over by rose and lotus. Thus turning Kali into yet another boring floral blend on my skin.

Given this one's description, I really *should have* loved Gluttony. Dark chocolate, vanilla, buttercream, hazelnut, and caramel are all favorites of mine. And I ADORE foodie scents. Sadly, this turned out to just be way too much, even for me. "Bloated with sweetness" is a perfect description. The problem is that it smells kind of fake, like the overpowering sweet synthetic smell you get from candles. I smelled just like my favorite Bakery Hodgepodge candle. Thus, this makes a wonderful room scent... but it was just too much for me to wear on my actual body. A tiny drop on my wrist lasted for hours and was so strong that it was migraine inducing. But it's heaven in an oil burner <3.

Intrigue was my first 5 ml bottle after I fell in love with an imp of it. I never would have imagined that I wanted to smell like fig, but BPAL's fig blends work so well with my skin chemistry. Intrigue is a lovely blend of fig, woods, and chocolate. It isn't exactly a sweet fragrance though, it is very subdued with the dry wood notes. But it's still foodie enough to me that I want to eat it . There isn't anything sharp or off in this blend. This is my nice calm scent that I wear when I need something unchanging and reliable all day, lol.

I've never understood why Snake Oil is so popular in the bpal fandom. I don't think that it smells anything like vanilla. To me, it smells like a sweet-ish, cheap, headshop incense and somehow a funkiness that really reminds me of sweaty, dirty hair. It dries down with a slight, ashy smokiness. I've tried to wear this scent out on many different occasions and have never met anyone who liked the scent on me (I've actually had a lot of people tell me to never wear it again and/or to go and wash it off :/). My husband always just says that it smells like 'sweaty person and cigarettes,' which kinda horrifies me. I'm also always confused when fans of bpal say that this smells so much better/different aged, because I have samples of Snake Oil from 2004, 2007, 2011 and 2012 and they all smell pretty much the same. It's one of the few Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab oils that doesn't seem to have been wildly reformulated again and again. The only difference I can tell is that as this gets older, it actually gets lighter (the samples that are 2+ years old only last about an hour total on my skin and don't have much throw at all) and it turns slightly plasticy smelling. The oil itself also thickens up, and I find myself hating the motor oil feel that it leaves on the skin. And it does leave dark smears on skin and clothing, so be warned. Nothing about Snake Oil really appeals to me, and I have kept re-trying it over the years. I'd like to smell this on someone who really likes the scent and see if it really does smell different on them.

Whenever I first put this on, it reminds me of Intrigue - with the fig dominating everything. Then a bit of patchouli comes out and offers a nice earthy background for the fig. And then it is all gone in a matter of minutes and all I can smell is the honey. There is a spiciness lingering around the honey, and a metallic, bitter edge from the ylang, but mostly it is just a funky honey smell. It has a bitterness to it rather than a natural sweetness. Reminds me of poisoned honey or honey gone bad...

Depraved is the first scent I ever loved from bpal. I carried my first imp around with me in my backpack and applied sparingly as I wandered around my high school. It finally broke in the bottom of my backpack and my books & everything smelled awesome, lol. It's a nostalgic scent for me now. The description says patchouli and apricot, but it always reminds me of leather and blueberries. The patch in this is very dark, cool and sexy. I thankfully have a couple bottles of this hoarded from before about 2008. After that, the patchouli in this started to smell different to me (more ashy, dirty and gritty) and the fruit note used is more sour & bright and less sweet & dark. It must have been reformulated with different notes, which is sad, because I haven't liked any variation of Depraved in the past four years or so. My old original bottles from 2005-2008 are awesome, though.

This is a very wet floral, but it is unlike any wet floral that I've ever smelled before (in a perfume bottle at least, in reality it reminds me of some of the areas I've gone camping in). The wetness reminds me of still muddy waters, covered with a vivid green layer of swampy plantlife. Then the florals are rich tropical blooms, bursting and dripping with the heat and humidity. Very swampy. Somehow it is a sexy swamp though. Bayou was one of my very first BPAL imps and it was one of the oils that was so unique and lovely that it made me want to try more from BPAL. It is wonderful and unlike any fragrance that I have ever tried. Swamp in a bottle - but in a great way .

I just wanted to add that I love Bliss with every fiber of my being . This is pure and simply chocolate on me. Reminding me of thick melty chocolate. Warm and good enough to eat. I was always looking for a great long lasting scent that was 'just chocolate' with no other notes in there to mess it up. Bliss is it.