bellumed

To me, Katharina smells like fruit juice or cocktail mix, apricot (or peach) and orange. It smells good enough, but not really what I want in a perfume. I'll keep the imp I have, though.

I don't know what the birds smell like (or if you'd really want to smell like them!), but in terms of concept: Athena is associated with owls, so maybe Athens from Wanderlust? As for DC/LE scents, there's Screeching Parrot from the Atomic Luau Lounge, The Little Sparrow from Marchen, The Little Bird, and Pet Magah Bird. Not sure what other "critters" you have in mind, but BPAL has tons of animal-based scents.

This is incensey and sexy and delicious, but there’s something in this that I just don’t love. It smells kind of like cherry, but I’m not sure whether it’s the dragon’s blood or the black currant, seeing as it’s my first blend with either. I do want to like it otherwise, but cherry totally ruins a perfume for me. A bit frustrating, tbh. The cherry does eventually fade out, but I think I’d rather just find some other resinous blends that I enjoy. Too bad.

In imp: Oh no! How disappointing. It’s like someone took a chemical/artificial scent (I can see the Pez comparison) and tried to mask it with my beloved citrus. Do not want. On my skin: Thank God, that’s better. Lemony, still a little candy-ish, but nice now. Over time, becomes less candy-scented and more flowery. It’s frustratingly light, though. My skin ate this a little bit. I'll keep this, at least to give it another test, but Lolita could have been much better for me.

Oh! I somehow expected this to have a “sandy” feel like Bastet did, but it doesn’t. It’s actually very creamy. It has plenty of spice, and it’s not just sweet but sugary, close to the sugar I get from High-Strung Daisies, but not as strong at all. In fact, everything about Morocco is very light and close to the skin. The spice (cassia, I suppose) keeps it from getting really boring, but I’m not in love with it. Morocco is fine, not great. I've heard plenty about how much aging improves this blend (my imp is not much more than three months old, I believe), but I'm not sure I really want to bother with that. EDIT 8/25/13: Well I have held onto this, and a year later it has grown on me some. It's still a very subtle, creamy skin scent, but now lovely and well-blended.

I put off trying this for a few months because I get a big wave of grapefruit with a bite of ginger from the vial. If I smell very, very carefully I can catch some apple blossom. This is... fine, I guess, but not my favorite combo. But just because BPAL loves to prove you wrong, this was a surprise hit! As soon as it touched my skin, the apple blossom burst to front, smelling gorgeous. Grapefruit and ginger slid to the back and finally made a little room for tea. A keeper after all!

Oh, yum. Judith is just as lovely as I hoped she would be. It starts with a nice focus on the mandarin—not a bright, juicy orange; it has a spicy warmth and it’s tempered by the other notes. It reminds me of Black Death, although it’s more feminine where Black Death leans masculine. There’s also something foody that other people have described as caramel or toffee or treacle. I don’t know what it is exactly, but I definitely smell it. Final stage, all I get is a light but present musk. I'm so glad I snapped up a bottle before the Salon left, because I adore this.

Some people get books from Penny Dreadful (which, obviously, is book inspired), and it also has that dirt note you said you like. Personally, I got a somewhat library-ish feel off of No. 93 Engine, but I doubt that's the norm.

Ooh, very interesting. In the vial, No. 93 is beeswax. All beeswax. BEESWAX CENTRAL over here! On me, it's a very serious herbal blend. Not mechanical but scholarly. Like an old-timey academic gentleman poring over crumbling books in the library's basement. I think the beeswax is helping that along still, giving a kind of "reading by candlelight" vibe. I wouldn't say it's strongly masculine, just not feminine at all. Since I like my perfume to be a bit more traditionally girly (food and flowers, yay), I was torn on this one. Fortunately, once it dried I started to smell the lemon balm! I wasn't expecting it to show up, but lemon is one of my favorite notes, so that makes me happy. Lemon balm tipped the balance, and I will certainly keep my imp.

Luxuriant amber, warm Egyptian musk, fierce saffron and soft myrrh, almond, cardamom and golden lotus. Ahh, see, you guys tried to scare me off with all of that going on about "almond and cherry." Luckily it didn't work. Bastet is warm, spicy, and exotic. A surprisingly light “golden sand” moreso than the rich dark brown of my favorite sexy myrrh blend, La Petite Mort. Really the only downside is that it doesn't last too long, only a few hours. Still, Bastet is a keeper for sure.

That’s so freaking weird. In the imp and wet on my skin, I’m getting some odd, kitchen-spice-herbal scent. No, wait, I know what it is! I’m smelling chives. Chives, like used to grow in my front yard as a kid, and we’d occasionally pick a stalk to chew on while we were playing. It’s not as harsh and loud as actual chives (if you’ve ever smelled/tasted them, you know what I’m talking about), but it’s noticeable. I’m guessing sweetpea must be the culprit, but WTF? As it dries, that sharp smell becomes more subtle, but it’s still there. It’s only starting to share the stage with something else (amber?). After a couple hours, it gives over to the amber, clean and BABY POWDERY. It’s better than what it was at first, but still not great. This is easily the strangest reaction I've ever had to BPAL. I won't be holding on to MLAST.

The scent of sexual obsession, slavery to sensual pleasure, and the undercurrent of innocence defiled utterly. Amber and honey with a touch of vanilla. This is either the fifth or sixth day I've worn this scent, trying to work up a review for it and always having mixed feelings. What I can say is that O is a soft, slightly sweet (I did not get the SUPER SUGARY thing some people are reporting) honey blend. It's pretty and femme-y rather than sexy, despite its basis. On the one hand, I'm not exactly a rabid honey fan; it's always kind of "meh" to me as a smell, as much as I love it in tea. Therefore, I'm not overly excited about O. However, it is quite pretty, and it earned me the most enthusiastic response I've gotten about any BPAL I've worn, which I guess means it smells great on me, if not to me. So I think I will keep the imp of O that I have for occasional wear. It just didn't blow me out of the water with sex appeal.

Ha! My mom has declared every perfume oil I've held out for her "powdery." Embalming Fluid is the only one she's approved of. No wonder: White Tea and Ginger is her favorite B&BW. They still sell it, by the way. New request: my favorite B&BW ever is the delicious and discontinued (and now priced higher than a bottle of BPAL) Sunset Mango from the awesome Temptations collection. Mango seems to be a pretty rare note here, but is there anything from BPAL that is very mango-y?

This is where my Newbie Nose really comes out. I've mostly been testing things that were relatively food-based: I know what orange, vanilla, etc. etc. smell like. But do I know enough about flowers to pick out any of the notes in this blend? I wish I did, but I do not. So in the vial, all I can smell is (relatively generic) "bouquet," though I can say I don't get anything tropical at all from this scent. On me, though, this is very much a clean laundry smell. It's not just that Blue Morpho smells like it would make a good laundry scent (though it would); it really smells like a floral laundry detergent! I actually do like it, it's not chemical detergent, just "scrubbed clean and covered in flowers." I will certainly keep my decant.

I’ve tried to review this before, and I keep wanting to come up with more to say about it. But… I can’t. This one’s pretty simple: Bubblegum and pepper in the imp, then bubblegum, pepper, and florals on me. Not a favorite, but cute enough.

Deeply fruity with chocolate in the background, a true chocolate rather than cocoa powder. orata hit the nail on the head: are exactly what comes to mind. As soon as I put it on my skin: BAM explosion of gummy quince, pear blooming underneath. Soon it all comes together into indistinguishable but very tasty fruitiness. Any traces of chocolate are gone. I like this a lot, but not for the reasons I thought I would. I was hoping to be on a chocolate and vanilla cloud, but instead I just got a delicious fruity blend. Downsides are the throw and wear length, as UTM faded pretty quickly from my skin.

I’m getting chocolate powder and something unpleasantly sour. Those bitter notes have to struggle to get out, just buried under sourness, but eventually they get there. That’s much nicer already; not as awesome as I’d like, though. At last, hours later, it fades to a barely-there cocoa powder. I think I’ll keep my decant, but I definitely don’t need a bottle.

Sweet, fluffy marshmellows and coconut over chocolate powder. Yum! I have to be very careful because smelling coconut too much makes me feel sick, but this is quite tasty. And yes, I can smell a little bit of plasticky (googly eyes?) scent. I think I’d prefer Sue if this weren’t there, it doesn’t ruin the blend for me either. This one has a great wear length, btw: I can still clearly smell it the next morning.

Strong musk with something rather citrus-y layered over it. Pretty sharp in the vial, smooths out on the skin. Creature Feature is not at all femme, I’d say this is unisex with a touch of masculinity. This is the shortest review I’ve written so far, but I can’t pick out a lot of different notes in this.

In the vial I get dark orange and sandalwood, yummy! On my skin the orange remains prominent but the woodiness is replaced by a well-blended "spice" scent that's hard for me to pick apart. It starts off a bit sharp and cologne-ish, but fades to something more unisex over time. I'm surprised by how much I like each stage, as I usually avoid masculine scents. Maybe I'll have to experiment more with them. An unexpected favorite! This is a blend that reminds me how new I am and how little I can predict what I'll like.

Prettymuch exactly what you said! Great minds think alike? Most definitely! I love the painting Judith Victorious, and I'm intrigued by the description, but Lucretia also sounds so interesting and gets glowing reviews. Ack, what to do?! Of course my id is screaming "GET ALL THREE!" but Weenies isn't far off...

In vial: Definite baby oil and... brimstone? Is that you? I am already pretty sure this is not the scent for me, but I'm just here for the ride, not for true love on this one. Wet: Okay, now baby powder rather than oil, and as for the brimstone effect-- seriously, chalk it up to BPAL to create something I can only describe as "fruit. Evil fruit!" Not in the sense that it's rotting or dark, just evil powdery fruit. I wish I could describe it more clearly, but my nose is not that refined. Dry: The fruit is gone, and what we have left is mostly baby powder. Yet I'm still getting whiffs of some (non-fruity) sweet smell which borders on sickly. Final verdict: Definitely nothing I want to smell like on a day-to-day basis, but a fun experiment. As always, the Lab works miracles when it comes to bottling a concept.

I haven't tried any of the Salons yet, nor have I bought any bottles of BPAL at all yet, but apparently there's no time like the present as far as that's concerned. I absolutely must try The Arrival at the Sabbath and Homage to the Devil, but I think I can only afford one more. I'm hemming and hawing endlessly over whether to get Lucretia or Judith Victorious.

Morgause (Bewitching Brews) belongs in your King Arthur set! EDIT: Anubis, also, for the canine group.

In imp: Going to reiterate the consensus-- straight-up creamsicle. I was a little surprised by how dominant the cream note was, at first. But BPAL has a way of sneaking surprises like that on me. On skin: Wet, still creamsicle. As it dries, though, it transforms from that tangerine-and-cream to a very gentle, quiet lemon-and-cream. Lemon is a favorite note of mine, but this is not my favorite way for it to be presented. That’s unfortunate, because this sounded fantastic to me! It’s still a very nice blend, and I will keep the decant around.