malanna

The first thing I smell is pear. After a while, it's an iced pear with dew-kissed petals on top. Color-wise, I think of this as a bright white-tinged green. This is pretty strong--I swiped my wrist and it completely overpowered The Magician on my other wrist.

After application, this smells like grapefruit astringent or just grapfruit juice (this isn't a fresh grapefruit). After a few hours, it fades to nothing, but still maintaining that bit of grapefruit astringent.

I don't like rose, but this isn't an obnoxious rose scent. This is rose ice cream. It's not milk-y, but it's not a fresh rose scent. It made me stop and think about whether I liked it or not (I tried violet ice cream today and that was my same reaction). I wasn't too sure what the answer was, but I was reminded of Persephone, which is a bright, sweet scent with rose tones. This has more rose and isn't so bright and sparkling. I couldn't smell the dragon's blood (which is very sweet), but I think the red currant was the thing that made this scent like Persephone.

I love foody lotion scents, so I thought I'd love this, too. Alas, that is not the case. It's definitely buttery, but with a sharp note (I guess the alcoholic smell everyone gets). I think this would be butter cookies if you dumped a bottle of alcohol into the batter. If not for that mead, I think I would have loved it. The mead also offers contrast to the butter and makes the scent too sweet.

I'm not sure if this is right, as I don't think I've smelled a blackberry scent before, but to me, the heather was more prominent. This is a warm breeze blowing through the heather. Actually, it reminds me a bit of Queen Mab (less orchid with kick and not mischievious).

ETA: I just saw Bewitched, which made me realize that it smells a bit like Bewitched, too. I guess it has a similar berry smell (but not bright) over the heather.

This is so hard to describe...it's not any of the typical scent categories, although it most definitely is berry. I expected it to be brighter and more playful, but to me, this was a more grounded berry scent. I've never smelled huckleberry before, and it wasn't like any of the other berries I've smelled. It's not tart, nor sweet, nor sour. It's a "grounded" berry (or scent, perhaps the neroli?). I think of it as the type of berry you would find in a thicket. You'd have to work hard to get the berry--you're crawling through a bunch of bushes, and you see, hidden, the berries. It doesn't mean that there's a green scent to it, though.

*Whomp! Cherry!* This is very bright and playful. It's very, very sweet and stays pretty much the same way throughout. It makes me think of a jolly rancher when you first put it in your mouth--that jolt of sweetness. Very plummy and very wet.

Initially, the wine is most prominent with a hint of leather. After it's dried, the leather and wine melds smoothly, like leather that has been soaked in wine, except with a less leathery smell. After a few hours, the wine smell fades and there's just a dry leather smell (leather that's been left in the sun for a few hours, not leather that was already dry to begin with). When I wear this, the leather I think of is not smooth leather pants, but black leather, with all the tiny little bumps (like the bumps on a lizard). I think this is a robust purple scent, like Bordello, but Bordello is bright and more direct. This is playful, but in an adult way.

To me, this was a very masculine scent. A dark orange bloom you would find in the rainforest, covered in the ash of a volcano. After a few hours of wear, it doesn't seem quite so masculine, but only because it isn't so strong. I think I could like the four-hours later scent, but it takes too long to get there.

Edit: spelling

I can't really describe the scent, because it wasn't very distinct to me at all. The only thing I can say is that it felt like I was smelling an air bubble. There was a scent beneath the air bubble, but what I was smelling was the air bubble.

Very chaotic, for sure. My untrained nose couldn't identify the notes, except the lotus (well, what I think is lotus--the strongest note there that made it different from other scents I've smelled). I didn't seem floral, aquatic, fresh, or any of the typical categories to me (which is why this isn't such a good review). It lasts pretty long, though and doesn't seem to be that strong, but that's because it isn't so obtrusive (so chaotic it blends with the chaos in the world).

This is a smokey scent, for sure. There's also what seems to be musk or amber and I say that because it smells a bit like what you think body heat would smell like (made me think of a room with the candle blown out, and a horse next to you--but that may have just been because I was looking at ebony_kawai's avatar). Not my sort of thing, though.

On, it smells like smoke, but soon, the lemon comes out. It isn't strong enough where I sniff myself and can immediately say, "Oh, lemon," but I have to sniff and think about it before I think of lemon. Just like the name implies, the lemon isn't that straightforward (or where would the mystery be?). Over time, the smokey incense fades a bit, with the lemon taking on greater prominence. Three hours later, it gets to be a bit soapy--sort of like light lemon soap covered in ash. The scent has a bit of a lemon cleaner quality to it, but not in a bad way. To me, this isn't so much the mystery of a sweeping cloak and a mysterious stranger, but the mystery of the musty clothes in a discovered trunk. Not my sort of thing, though.

This was so sharp and acridic, it gave me a headache. It's a sharp, brown scent, with a dash of Pine-Sol. On me, the lilies were nowhere to be found, until maybe, several long hours later, when it's a bit lighter and the brown bark scent (it's light enough where I can actually tell that it's bark) isn't so wham-bam-boom! I think it may be what lightens up the scent (several hours later). However, there still is that astringent Pine-Sol undercurrent, which is slight, but reminds me of the headache-inducing smell at the beginning and ruins any chance of me liking the scent. This review isn't very nice, but when I think of the headache I was getting wearing this....

On, I thought I was smelling Queen of Hearts. That was just the lilies speaking. However, I've learned to differentiate the two. While Queen of Hearts is more of a graceful, starched black suit, this is the prim, well-behaved daughter in a proper, white floating dress. The honey sweetens the lilies, making it not so grown-up. Still pondering this one.

In the imp, I smell a florally lotion sort of smell. On, it's lush, creamy blooms. To describe the creamy, it makes me think of big blooms plucked from a Hawaiian forest, soaked in cream, then, the cream with the blooms smell is used to scent a lotion. I didn't like it so much, because of that creamy lotion aspect. As it dries, it gets creamier and four hours later, it smells a bit creamy soap-y, with the blooms very faint.

I had asked for my June 17 and June 19 order to be combined, which Brian had said was a go. However, a few days later, Beth made the "No Combining Orders" post. I assumed my order was still going to be combined, since it had been combined before that post, but they came separately. Thus, I highly doubt that your orders were combined. My May 23 order was sucked into the void (haven't heard back about what's going to be done with that, yet), so perhaps yours was, too. If, when the Lab reopens, and you still haven't received your order, I'd email the Lab about it.

This was another, "Ahh, I love this!" on the first few applications. The white floral (lily of the valley, I s'pose) is what's predominant, with it getting softer over time. It seems rather like being at a tea party, with your back ramrod straight, but over time, it's like the person is fading away. Not so much in that the person is quiet, but like a photograph of that event, fading over time, with the details not quite as easy to make out.

I thought I loved this, too. The first few times I wore it, it reminded me of Snake Oil in that it was very comforting. The vanilla appears first, then the dragon's blood comes out. When the latter first comes out, it's a bit smoky (when it most reminds me of Snake Oil). However, over time, it gets very sweet. The image I get is of cherries, but it doesn't quite smell like cherries. Just very sweet candy (yet not candy). Either way, it's very sweet. Too sweet, in fact. When I wore this to play tennis one night, I kept on thinking that I would be a prime target for the mosquitoes (and I was, to a certain extent).

On first application, I went, "Ooooh!" It was hard to pinpoint my finger on what exactly it smelled like, but it reminded me of my grandmother. Not so much that she uses this scent, but it has the same feel of the scents she uses--brands, such as Chanel, that are so upscale, it feels like it puts a distance between you and the scent. I thought I smelled lime and the jasmine is pretty dominant, but the scent melds together so that it has a oneness. This oneness comes from this singular impression that I get from it. It's not in the nature of this scent to be "weak" enough to be identifiable by its separate parts. The impression I get from it is that it's a very cool, yellow (not pastel or bright yellow, but a cool yellow) scent. It doesn't feel cool on the skin, but afterwards, I think that it must have. It also doesn't smell very real. By that, I mean that it doesn't smell like it was made from natural ingredients. It smells like it was artificially manufactured, because otherwise, the scent would be intimate, which it most definitely is not. When I wear this, what immediately pops to mind are the makeup artists behind the department store counters (Chanel, Christian Dior, etc.) in their black suits and jackets, with impeccable hair. It's what you'd think they'd smell like (or the impression they give off). You can't imagine them off job and/or not being formal and distant.

Over time, my liking for it faded. Off to swap!

LUGHNASADH

It's bad that I'm the first one to review this, since I'm quite bad at identifying notes, but here goes....

In the bottle: Ooh, I love this. I think I've smelled this before, but I can't think of what it smells like (argh!). There's definitely what I think is cherry. A close approximation would be: a cross between a non-fizzy cherry cola and sweet cough syrup (but not bad-tasting), with a tiny undercurrent of Love Me (the cinnamon I'm picking up).

On: As it's drying, I think of Love Me (cinnamon-y), yet with a little bit of a ritualistic feeling to it. Over time, the cinnamon gets more pronounced, but something's pulling it back. It morphs even more--oh, this smells like another BPAL scent I've tried. What is it?! I did a search of the reviews that I've done and holy mother of god, it's Alice! No, really, it is Alice. There's that cinnamon kick, with the floral (carnation), yet, something is coating those two, which is what milk did for Alice. It's Alice, but a bit older and less prone to throwing tantrums. It doesn't give me the headache that Alice did. I'm thinking that's because there's less cinnamon and that floral (I'm not going to try to guess its identity). Between the ritualistic stage and the Alice stage is a scent that is still a bit comforting (only a bit for me, as I don't like cinnamon). If I liked cinnamon, I could fall asleep to the in-between scent.

I don't think I like this on my skin (ooh, in my hair!), but I'll be trying this again later.

Edit: Take all I say with a grain of salt. I was in a rush to review this, and it takes me ages to decide that I really like or dislike a scent.

Edit 2: Holy crappin hell. I put this in my hair two hours ago and this is so much like Alice, I'm starting to think this was mislabeled.... *waits for others' reviews*

Goddamn. I wish I liked this, because if I got the same reactions wearing this that everyone else has been getting (I can’t tell if I’m getting reactions, another wonderful if that isn’t happening)… Unfortunately, I don’t. The smell is what I think a red, skintight (is there any other kind?) catsuit would smell like. It’s a leather-candy smell and I don’t like the smell of leather, so there you have it. Although, wearing it, I didn’t feel like tramping up. I just thought, hmm, red leather. Which is pretty sexy, because red leather is typically only seen in sexy situations.

On initial application, ginger parties up a storm (sorta like Paris Hilton). After a long, long while, the ginger is boozed into a stupor, which lets the orange blossom come out. On a good day, Vixen turns into a not-quite-as-good version of Snake Oil. Much lighter and more powdery (a tiny bit soapy, but then, it's so light when it hits the Snake Oil doppelganger mode, I can't really tell). On a bad day, the ginger fest wakes up after a nap, and apparently having hooked up with orange blossom, parties on with orange blossom by its side.

When I was first testing the waters with BPAL, I went to the review of BPAL on one of the websites that was listed and there were the amber bottles displayed. So purtyyy...I was slightly sad that the amber bottles weren't used. Hopefully, my Blue Moon and June Gloom bottles will be amber. Does anyone know why the amber ones aren't used anymore? Maybe because of leakage (the bottles had corks in the pics)?

The first and second time I tried this, I really loved it. I thought it was going to be a favorite. Alas, this was not so.

This really didn't change much for me from the bottle to application. I get a slight hint of berries, but it's very faint. It's not so much freshly mowed grass, because that isn't quite so meadow-y and sweet as this, but grass outside of a Shakespearian forest with glistening morning dew. To me, it just seems to be like a single note. Not that I know what the sweet grass single note smells like, but it's like the scent is just concentrated and singleminded in this one area (it's not a complex scent). I really liked this at first, but then, once the novelty of sweet grass faded away, I paid more attention to this sort of artificial overtone I get. It's not like it smells like something artificial I have in mind, like air freshener or whatnot, but that it's different, yet it seems artificial to me (hard to explain...).