sunshinedaisybliss

As others have said, I think Autumn Lace goes over to the same side of the Lace family as Black Lace, Tattered Lace and Mourning Lace - it's dark and melancholy, kind of mournful - it feels... sad.

The first thing that hits my nose is the cognac - KAPOW! BAM! Batman style!! It was a little bitter at first, which is probably the tobacco and/or laudanum, but after only a minute or two it started softening up and the incense and leaves started appearing. Ten minutes in, and the cognac has warmed up beautifully.. all soft and yummy. The leaves are woodsy - definitely brown autumn leaves, it's the smell you get when you walk through the park atop a carpet of fallen leaves. The linen note is definitely there - I recognise it from other Lace blends, but it's stiff and dark here - not white and soft/clean smelling at all. The tobacco is still there - it's quite bright on my skin, and the musk/incense combo is giving a lovely smokey backdrop.

Thirty minutes in and really all I can find now is the cognac, musk, incense and linen with a remnant of tobacco . The leaves have gone and the black tea never really showed up. It's developed a slightly bitter cologne-like vibe, which I attribute to the laudanum still lingering and brightening the cognac. And finally, the sugar shows up! That was a nice surprise - it's changed things completely.. that bitterness has almost gone now.

I was hoping for more musk/incense depth - the tobacco stops this from darkening on my skin, and when the sugar arrived it went slightly sweet, so it never quite gets to the place I want it to go - which would be dark/deep musk/incense/cognac. And I just can't shake the melancholy feeling of this one - it's kind of harshing my mellow. Overall, I find Autumn Lace to be very olde-worldy, and nice in its own way, but not really anything remarkable on my skin.

I'm a dude and I like woodsy earthy stuff (including leather) I'm drawn to Rogue cause of the patchouli and earthyness or druid for earthynessness. The pics for them are ladi,es though so, there's that. Any feedback on the two i mentioned or suggestions would be appreciated.

 

Thanks folks!

 

I'm sure I read somewhere that the RPG blends (or some of them?) have both a female and a male version of the label art??

 

 

 

The label art doesn't concern me just if it was tailored to be one or the other. I'm beginning to understand things a bit more and I see that much of it depends on body chemistry and personal taste.

That's very true - it's really all about personal taste and what works/doesn't work on your skin - and honestly that's something I really love about BPAL.. any person, regardless of gender or whatever else, can wear any BPAL and totally make it work. I personally don't pay that much attention to the label art, in terms of it influencing whether I see a blend as masculine/feminine but I guess it might communicate something.. even if it's only subconsciously. I just thought I'd mention about the different version(s) of label art - I think the RPG blends in particular are designed to be more character-specific than gender-specific

Jono - you might like to take a stroll through Rapaccini's Garden collection - a lot of those have that 'attached to the ground' kind of thing going on.

I'm a dude and I like woodsy earthy stuff (including leather) I'm drawn to Rogue cause of the patchouli and earthyness or druid for earthynessness. The pics for them are ladi,es though so, there's that. Any feedback on the two i mentioned or suggestions would be appreciated.

 

Thanks folks!

I'm sure I read somewhere that the RPG blends (or some of them?) have both a female and a male version of the label art??

Crowley is magnificent, but personally I find it to be more 'feminine' when new.. it's only after a few months of aging that it starts to get manly and awesome

OK you've already got Sin - good choice! and I second the rec of Kathmandu, and also Velvet (which isn't as chocolate-y as it sounds) - sadly (for me, anyways) many of BPALs sandalwood blends have floral notes that don't like me, so I haven't tried a lot of those. but here's some that may be worth a look:

Lorelei is nice: neroli, sandalwod and ylang ylang - soft, with a really pretty soft/sweet prettiness from the neroli

Anne Bonny: Indonesian red patchouli, red sandalwood and frankincense (warm and a bit kickass)

Plunder: tea leaf, cassia, cinnamon bark, allspice, sandalwood, tobacco, peppercorn and nutmeg (although on me, this is more about the spices than then sandalwood)

Mouse's Long and Sad Tale: vanilla, amber, sweet pea and sandalwood (just so pretty, dusty soft loveliness)

Maybe you could get her an imp pack? That way she could try a few different styles of BPAL sandalwood

Ooh - also there's Violens - five sandalwoods, dusty leather, and light musk - and also Miss Lupescu - musk, white amber, patchouli, ho wood, cypress, almond blossom, golden sandalwood and strange spices - (neither of these are available in imp-form)

And if you can find it - from Carnaval Diabolique there's Hand of Glory - beeswax, leather, black pepper, saltpeter, nutmeg, Mysore sandalwood and oak bark - this is an awesome sandalwood/spice mix with the beeswax giving it a lovely soft glow.

ETA there's a thread in the Recommendations topic for sandalwood here

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Does anyone know which Blue Moon has a label with artwork of the Cat and the Fiddle nursery rhyme on it? I know it's not 2007 or 2009 so it has to be either 2004 or 2012 but I can't figure out which.

Blue Moon 2004 is very rare, so it's probably not that one... and I'm not 100% sure about this, but a couple of Lunacy blends I have from 2004 don't have picture labels - just the old-style white label/black writing, so there's that too

You've probably got a 2012 Blue Moon - but there was three... a regular Blue Moon, and Blauer Mond (Brian's creation).. and then also the one from Puddin' - Luna Azul

Luna Azul had a black bat flying over a moon, so it's not that one...I'm not sure if that's helpful, but I'd say you've got either Beth's Blue Moon or Brian's Blauer Mond - both 2012. I think Blauer Mond has the label you're talking about - maybe look up reviews for those two and see if you can pick which one is yours?

LisaF1163 - sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but Gluttony is actually discontinued so you won't be able to order that one

If you decide to break your 'no LE' rule, I would definitely second GypssyRoseRed's recommendation of Gelt - it's a beautiful dusky chocolate+amber blend, really lovely. If you don't want to buy a bottle straight out (it's a Yule Limited Edition, available now) then I'm sure you could hunt down a decant in the For Sale area here on the forum

And since you mentioned florals - The Last Unicorn might be worth a try: Frosty lilac petals, iris pallida root, orris, violet leaf, white chocolate, coconut, wild lettuce, white sandalwood, and oakmoss. Not available in imp form from the Lab, but check the sales section

(Sorry if this is a duplicate.)

 

I know it's been a holiday weekend, but should I be worried that I made a large order via Paypal on the 20th and it hasn't been acknowledged in any way? I know I'm of course not going to get a CnS for some time, but when one orders through Paypal, is there any kind of confirmation that the Lab received the order?

Do you mean acknowledged by the Lab or by Paypal? If you mean Paypal, then yes, you should get a notice. I ask this because on my last couple of Lab orders, my PP notifications were delayed as much as a couple of days. I've never gotten an acknowledgement from the Lab.

Yep - what the lovely portalkat said... you should have received a payment confirmation email from PayPal, but I have also been getting these days after the payment's made - just in the last couple of weeks - where normally the email comes through just seconds after I send the payment. But nope - you won't get any confirmation from the Lab, so you just have to hope/assume that they got your order OK.

Saint-Germain (St Germain) - I am dying for more or a recipe that is similar. Can anyone help?

I never would have thought this one would be so difficult to find!

I have no clues about a smell-alike for that one, but just saw an imp up for grabs on a swaps post here

aww Fiam - what a bummer

ih8perfume has given you all the good advice already - I would second the suggestion of getting yourself a scent locket.. that way, you can still enjoy the lovely perfume of Mason En Pain D'epices without it having any contact with your skin.

I'd say it's a 99.99% certainty that it's cinnamon your skin doesn't like - although it's not a listed note in Mason, it's most likely part of the 'gingerbread' and/or 'spice' that are in the description. So you'll probably need to be careful with any BPALs that contain cinnamon - what a shame!

I would say though - give it one more try, just in case your skin was having a bad day (or, like you said - your freshly washed/skin was overly sensitive) - this time put some lotion or moisturiser on your skin first like an undercoat to the oil - but if you get the same burning, wash it off immediately and never do it again because that just doesn't sound like it was much fun for you at all.

Butterscotch Balls and Black Beetles has extraordinary, frightening throw.

Agreed. And I also agree with both Boo! and Snake Oil, which have been mentioned earlier.

Halloween: Las Vegas is one that I find to be very strong in the throw department.

 

hey there, emzebel actually has been doing one of these. The box was incredibly packed. Check with her because she said she'll do another round after the holidaze.

Ooh thanks - I must have missed that! Cheers

Monday very generously gifted her squirt of The Inn to me, because she's awesome

But of course, having read her review beforehand, I was fully expecting it to smell like bananas. And - guess what - it does! But now I'm a bit unsure as to whether it actually does smell like bananas, or it's just my brain telling my nose that it smells like bananas because that's what I told it to do. It's all very confusing

So let's just say.. there's definitely something fruity in here. And if it is banana, then it's not the fresh, perfectly ripe, stand-up tall kind of banana.. it's the mushy, few days too old, kinda brown and wrinkled banana. The fruit element definitely has a mead-like quality to it. Mushy mead, honeyish but verging on a beer-like smell. And there's something woody and smokey in here too.

I think it smells like warm dark banana bread, honeyed mead, and old wood - with a bit of lingering bar-room smoke. Quite nice, but also a bit weird.

Withjoy - that's really interesting! I didn't realise we have had a total of four Blood Moon lunacy blends

In the bottle, it smells really citrus-y and sharp but sweet - 'fresh' is probably the right word to describe it - so I guess that's the honeysuckle, although I don't usually get a citrus smell from honeysuckle. It smells... sunny. Hmm.

As soon as it's on my skin, I get a sharp blast of honey. Uh oh. I'm not really a fan of honey in my BPALs, it's not a note that plays nicely on my skin (stale vomit, anyone?) and it's the one note in here that I was worried about. But thankfully, a few minutes later it's mellowed right out and I can now smell the lovely patchouli and leather. The patchouli seems to have a slightly smokey note - I wouldn't have said 'sweet', but it's definitely not the earthy/hippy/feral slap-you-in-the-face patchouli we know so well from things like #Occupy - it's more the soft caress-your-cheek-gently type of patchouli like in Hippie Ghost. The sarsparilla isn't 'sassy' on me at all - actually it's pretty subdued.. it's just there, sitting quietly in the background, but it's adding a soft warmth and slight spicy spark that's quite lovely behind the sweetness of the honey.

Leather.. hmm.. yes, it's there, but not like LEATHER at all - more like leather - kinda quiet, and soft and fuzzy. And hey - there's the French vanilla! It took about 15 minutes to appear, but there it is.. and it's lovely - quite deep and rich, not candy-sweet at all. The honey/honeysuckle sticks around pretty much through the whole wear time for me, but it never gets cloying or nasty - woo! Badgers has totally laughed in the face of my anti-honey stance.

An hour or so later, I have a lovely soft smell of leather+patchouli+vanilla with just a hint of honey - very nice. And although it's soft and pretty, it's not weak or 'girly' at all - it has a bit of unff behind it for sure. I love Little Bird's description of a beautiful girl in a country song - that's it.. this is the smell of sunshine on your skin, laying in a field of soft grass and sunflowers. It's soft and snuggly but also a bit naughty - just like its namesake. Cute, but a bit badass - so actually, more like a honey badger

I wonder if there would be any interest in a makeup/B&B/cosmetics samples swap? I have SO MANY samples of various product (eyeshadows, mineral makeups, lip balm/gloss, soaps etc etc) and also there's all the GWP items I've accumulated - piles of stuff I've never even touched.

I'm thinking there would need to be some rules around cleanliness and hygiene - ie unused samples would be preferable - but it would be kinda neat to receive a swappee's 'beauty' profile (colour of hair, eyes, skin tone etc) and find stuff they may like - or even just send random packages of sparkly goodness to play with.

Sooooooooo... what say you, oh forum? Does this sound like something people might be interested in?

Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat is a very fresh (and not too sweet) melon scent on me.

Yep - me too. TTLB is the first thing I thought of for melon but I see you've tried it already and it didn't work. Hmm - that's a shame!

Here's a couple of others that you might like to look at -

Earth Rat - the melon in this is lovely, but there's a lot of other things keeping it company:

Peony, China's national flower, with bamboo for flexibility, plum blossom for perseverance, courage, and hope, tangerine for wealth, lychee for strong family relationships and peace in the home, orange for happiness, pine resin for constancy, golden kumquat and quince for prosperity, narcissus and King mandarin for good fortune, coconut for longevity, and candied melon for good health, with a splash of blazing red of dragon's blood... to help you scare away the rampaging Nian.

The King's Daughter (The Last Unicorn): this one has a lovely sweetness and the watermelon is very fresh:

Llilac musk, sandalwood, sweet pea, watermelon accord, pale woods, elemi, and oakmoss.

And then there's Treat #1 from 2006 - it may be hard to find, but on me it smells exactly like watermelon candy:

A super-sweet, glittering mountain of crushed hard candy: watermelon, pink lime, lemon, strawberry and piles upon piles of crystalline sugar.

Just re the Christmas ornament swap.. I'm pretty sure Dark Alice is planning on running the 'tacky' ornament swap again this year, so there should be no shortage of opportunities for ornamentage

Again, thank you. I'm a BPAL noob and your reply was a God send.

Well thank you, but you're very welcome

As you've noticed, people around here are always happy to enable help a new BPALer with their new addiction interest

Dark, spicy, animalic.. oh yes, yes yes yes. This is very much a 'You Tarzan, me Jane' kind of scent.. the one that makes you forget to be a strong, independent woman and just allow some manly man to pick you up, throw you over his shoulder and have his way with you. When I first slapped Heretic on (yes, I slapped it on - no wimpy *dab dabbing* or gentle swiping - this BPAL has to be slapped on) - I was immediately reminded of Panther Moon.. it's the same dark brown/gold colour, and does that same *thwap* you in the face with UNFF when it first arrives in your air. There's also a very WILF-like thing going on too. But I soon realise it's not really like either of those.. although it definitely has that same furry animalistic vibe as those two.

There's a real patchouli flavour to Heretic, which is perhaps weird since patchouli isn't a listed note.. but somehow I'm getting a patchouli-like smell from it... maybe it's just the overall 'incense' kind of tones that it has. The oudh here is gorgeous.. dark and smokey, but not in an overwhelming way - the beeswax is adding a beautiful creamy softness, and a hint of sweetness, and it's just divine. I was worried about the bois de cade being eau de pine disinfectant.. but nope - not at all.. there is a top note that has a bit of an evergreen, forest-y kind of feel, but it's not obvious. I just want to stick this straight up my nose.. I can't get close enough to it - I want this to be made in blanket form, so that I can snuggle up with it and be enveloped by it.

Overall, this is resin-and oude-heaven - deep, dark, smokey, rich, and sumptuous. Beautifully blended, completely voluptuous, and just drop-dead swoonworthy. It's loin-throbbingly good. If you think you're going to like it, you probably will. I knew I would like it, and I was right

Cute label, too

And I didn't see this one in here yet.

Heretic:

 

Ahh! You beat me to it!! I was just about to post mine.. but I will anyway, because yours looks darker/more yellow than mine (mine is a soft baby-yellow shade, like old parchment paper). I actually really love this label - simple, but perfect, and I love the triple dagger

Also.. the NYCC labels are nice, they look similar to the WC Champagnes. I kinda like the more 'plain' style labels, the ones with all the artwork etc are nice too.. but so teensy tiny that I can usually hardly see it anyway!

Aww pznivy - how disappointing for you!

Hmm.. let's see - it's probably a particular note (or note combo) in those blends that's causing the baby powder effect. So... here's the ones you've tried so far...

Cheshire Cat - Grapefruit, red currant, dark musk, Roman chamomile, delphinium, and lavender.

Alice - Milk and honey with rose, carnation and bergamot.

Elf - Pale golden musk, honeycomb, amber, parma violet, hawthorne bark, aspen leaf, forest lily, life everlasting, white moss, and a hint of wild berry.

So the first thing I suspect is honey - I have trouble with honey myself.. it pretty much turns into a sickly/cloying powdery mess on me - not exactly baby powder, more like baby powder mixed with vomit. A charming description, I know - but that's really how honey is for me most of the time. I think you might need to do some experimenting with different musks - I find that black musk in particular goes quite powdery on me, but there's so many musk variants in the different BPALs that it can be hard to figure out the friends from the foes. Another note that's notorious for going powdery is amber - and there it is in Elf (along with musk and honey!) - I actually like the powderiness of amber.. on me, it goes beautifully soft and dusky rather than icky baby powder-y, but I know some people find amber = baby powder every time. I'm thinking that with Cheshire Cat it could be the musk + chamomile combo that's causing problems for you (and maybe the lavender, but probably not), with Alice I would blame the honey, and Elf would be the triple whammy musk/honey/amber combo. I could be wrong, of course, but those might be things to keep a close eye/nose on if they're in other BPALs you're testing.

Then there's the others that you have...

Thalia - Plumeria, pear and white champagne.

Velvet - sandalwood warmed by cocoa vanilla and a veil of deep myrrh

Thalia *should* behave itself - none of those notes are known offenders with the baby powder problem - I can't do champagne at all, it stinks something awful on me, but for other lucky folks it's sparkling and pretty - so hopefully it will work nicely for you. The plum and pear combo in Thalia is lovely. But ah... Velvet - if amber = baby powder, then sandalwood will almost certainly be the same for you. Amber tends to be a little softer/sweeter than sandalwood, but both have that dusky/powdery feel to them - and Velvet is definitely a 'dusky' one. So maybe give it a try anyway, just to see how it goes.. if you get the Powder of Doom, then it's a pretty safe bet that both amber and sandalwood are going to be problem notes for you.

Having said all that, skin chemistry is a funny thing - a BPAL that goes straight to baby powder on you one day might be all kinds of awesome on a different day - so don't give up.. just put those imps aside for now, and try them next week just to see how they go. Also, try your imps on different areas - if you tested them on your inner arm/wrist and got the baby powder - try a different spot on your arm, or your chest etc - just to see if that makes any difference. But don't write off 'problem' notes completely - it really does depend a lot on what they're accompanied by, and also how dominant they are in a blend. And don't give up - as others have said, it might take a bit of trial and error but you *will* find some winners eventually. I would recommend checking out the 'For Sale' section here on the forum - there's loads of imps for sale, at good prices, so you can grab a whole bunch of things and experiment - that really is the best way to do it.. the more you try, the more you learn about what works for you

Mwah hah hah. I have freeshipped from the Lab on occasion. I think the threshold is less for the BPTP but don't quote me.

Yep - it used to be $300 for BPTP (having done a few group orders for Aussies over the years, I often got to >$300) but when I went to write that reply up there^^ I checked the TP site and it now says $500. But hey - what's a couple of extra hundred dollars between friends, right?

There's a free shipping mark? Color me clueless...

Oh yes, yes there is

For both Lab and Trading Post orders, it's $500

Hiya Lizzie welcome to the forum!

I lovelovelove heady incense scents too - and luckily BPAL makes some gorgeous ones! Since you're new around here, and you're looking for imps, it's probably best to stick to the General Catalogue (GC) blends for now - there's been some beautiful incense-y/earthy/sexy BPALs come out in the Limited Edition (LE) blends but you can only buy them at a certain time and after that they can be hard to find. But the 'For Sale' section of this forum is an excellent place to look for them, if you hear of an LE that you think sounds perfect - or even to hunt for imps, you can find plenty there

I looked up the notes/descriptions in those Auric Blends perfumes that you mentioned - it seems you like sandalwood, patchouli, vanilla, and woods-y notes, but two of them have jasmine in common, so I'm going to second a couple of things that have already been mentioned.. for the incense/earthy/sexy vibe - Cathedral, Sin, Urd, Obsidian Widow, Vixen, Perversion.. and for the lighter side Morocco, Tombstone, Dee and and Lyonesse come to mind.

You might also like to take a look at this post - it's a little index of recommendations categories, so there's one for incense blends, and pretty much everything else you might ever want to get recommendations on - with direct links

I can't do lemon at all, but one I remember being particularly lemon-y with a floral-ish background is Lolita: Bright, sweet and youthful, but swelling with a poisonous sexuality. Glittering heliotrope, honeysuckle, orange blossom and lemon verbena.