bheansidhe

Tarry and headshoppy to the max - as if Madame Moriarty were left to char and boil down and then was smoked over an incense log fire, rolled in black silk, and sprinkled with garnets and indigo glitter. The finish is a flourish of garnet velvet ruffles.

This makes me think of a 1940s starlet's dressing table, back when makeup was infused with rosewater to mask the lightly bitter smell of the pigments. It's the olfactory equivalent of the visual perfection of a brand-new lipstick. I get zero soap and no grandmother; this is girlish, romantic, and somehow antiqued. If I liked rose, this would be a beautiful one; definitely water-infused and prettied up with the lilies and cognac.

This is, in fact, a sexy green tea musk. The star anise lends it a woodsy quality. The oakmoss tackles the green tea and wrestles it to the forest floor, then fades to the background. I don't get much throw and it stays close to my skin. Star anise can sometimes overwhelm, but this blend isn't sharp at all. I'm getting almost a pipe tobacco vibe from the anise/oakmoss combo as it dries down. The green tea floats on top. Gender neutral, foody only if you consider tea food, equally good for daytime or nighttime wear.

"Psionicist, but make it steampunk." Or, possibly, "Steampunk, but make it blue glass instead of opaque brass." Or maybe "Perfume, but not for humans; this is blended for and by sentient robots who want to smell like pretty metals and gears." This has a steampunk vibe, but in a completely new olfactory colorway. When wet I get a clear viscous motor oil, a glassine metal musk, ozone, and blue light. (This artificer makes elegant ballroom jewelry that hides clockwork spy instruments or tiny mechanical poison dart throwers.) It has a light but steady throw and doesn't seem to morph, though the oil loses its chemical edge and becomes more of a watery dew. It continues to smell blue and metallic, but never sharp or cold.

Comfort smells like buttery shortbread cookies soaked in lavender syrup. I know there's lavender in the blend because my particular bottle is about half plant material. It manages to be warming and cooling at the same time; jammy, thick, yummy, and yes, comforting.

This smells like the highest of high-end, bespoke bath unguents, sold only by a discreet proprietor in Mayfair who keeps a hand-written list of clientele and posts no shop hours. If you even know how to find the storefront (the 17th-century one, not the modern one), it's because your grandfather brought you along when he stocked up on his favorite shaving cream and pomade. It is not herbal; it is not soapy; it is not faintly resinous; it is all of those notes, swaddled in fig as dark as the fumed oak table in your grandfather's study, flecked with olive blossoms that breathe notes of the fruity oil instead of the flower. When someone smells this blend on you, they will know (without a word being spoken) that University of Oxford has at least one reading room and an endowed philosophy chair named for your direct ancestor, and also, that you are luxuriantly clean, well-read, and a touch indolent. Alas, the blend is a push-pull between two notes that never love me - orris and ambergris - against a quartet of notes that normally play very well on my skin. It loses the high-end-shading-to-masculine feel and edges into my grandmother's dusting powder. Still damn expensive dusting powder, mind, but not anything I can wear.

This is more like "Gingerbread and More Butter" when freshly applied. As it dries it becomes less baked good and more sweet candied ginger with a lemony bite. Gorgeous in both stages.

Pumpkin candyfloss, funnel cake, apple cider, a swirl of dead, dry maple leaves, greasepaint, chewing tobacco, and sawdust. I had the good fortune to test this one at Will Call. I liked it best of all the foody/gourmand Weenie atmos except Pumpkin Popcorn Balls (my other favorite). Halloween Carnival Atmosphere Spray throws together all of the best carnival smells - salty kettlecorn! spun sugar! sweet funnel cakes! fresh sawdust! autumn air! - without the overlay of animal dung, diesel fumes, and overworked porta-potty that invariably accompany a *real* carnival. It's a glorious cacaphony that hangs in the air like a handful of glittering sawdust before gently subsiding to the memory of funnel cakes.

It's always fun to run across a BPAL blend that doesn't smell like anything you've ever tested. I get the lavender when the blend is wet, but on my skin this is a billowing dusty-sweet rosin, balsam, and white sandalwood, sharpened by a bit of worn leather in the background. Whoever's wearing the leather might have just sauntered through a sun-warmed field of lavender, but it's just clinging to the background. The blend has an almost foody vanillac warmth while still coming across as a mix of rosins and resins. White sandalwood can be powdery, but the sappiness of the balsam keeps it from going to baby powder. It cuddles down warm and low on the skin. This is a great everyday scent, gender-neutral, and office-appropriate. Sadly, this rosin seems close enough to the beeswax/honey notes that inevitably doom a blend. For me it's the Alan Tudyk of notes.

Pure cedar-frankincense love. The cedar is dry and woody and sweet, and the tobacco gives a round warmth to the back end. I don't get any cognac (which is for the best honestly), but I do get a pungent black pepper sprinkled on top. It does remind me of the cedar in They Lie Thus Chambered and Cold to the Moon, which was another personal favorite.

Wet, this is a deep, austere incense over gritty musk. The cardamom-clove-pepper mix smells rich and toasty-bitter (in the way that roasted chicory coffee is bitter), not gourmand or foody. Unfortunately, black musk usually smells like scorched hair on me, so this is not a chemistry win. The drydown is a spicy incense blend with a meditative quality, like silence at dusk. I agree it starts off rather harsh and masculine (not cologny), but the finish is gender-neutral. I have other incense blends that work better for me, but this one is definitely worth trying if you play well with black musk.

This is beautifully reminiscent of the discontinued blend The Jester (Huckleberry and red currant with the incisive bite of neroli.). The vetiver isn't in the forefront; it's just present enough to keep the sharp-sweet currant and raspberry realistic and rooted on the vine, so that they don't spin off into Jolly Ranchers territory. The drydown is soft, fruity, and slightly herbal.

Thirding the idea of this being an Urban Outfitters prototype / unreleased cousin of Banshee Beat. The meat of it is that gnarly, gritty hippy patchouli, but where BB is softened by vanilla, this one is roughened at the edges - it's like comparing hot chocolate mix to pure, unsweetened Dutched cocoa. Speaking of cocoa, I can get a black cocoa husk or cocoa powder in there. I also get tiiiiny bit of vetiver pungency (but only when wet - it vanishes on drydown) and something like the "stone" or "concrete" accord - which, taken together, are giving me a "Streets of Detroit" vibe. Drydown is just that gritty patch and ethereal dry, blond wood notes (possibly cedar, possibly a light sandalwood). I finally get some vanilla in the finish - just enough to fuzz up the edges, though; it never emerges as a distinct note. So, somewhat-less-sweet patch-heavy Banshee Beat / Streets of Detroit, plus some other wood or resin binding it together. I definitely recommend seeking out a decant if that intrigues you! It smells like something that will age (or already has aged) very well.

White rose, gilded carnation, brown oakmoss, and velvet oudh. This is gender neutral and divided into three equal parts woods, oakmoss, and rose, with carnation enhancing both the heaviness of the rose and the spiciness of the oudh, but never playing a major part. This doesn't read as specifically "masculine" to my nose, but it has a definite Renaissance gentleman's vibe; it's a rose scent that reminds you why men wore rosewater as cologne for much of history. It smells smooth and brown; I don't know that I would specifically pick "rose" out of the notes after a few minutes of wear, but my skin test was iffy so I have to go with sniffing. Looking forward to seeing some actual wear test reviews! (I didn't decant this perfume, so I can't compare the formulations.)

Black rose, dried apricot, and black fig. Because I ran a decant circle, I had the chance to sniff (most) of the perfumes and compare them with (most) of the matching hair glosses. (I don't wear most rose notes or hair gloss myself, so my reviews will be more nose-test and less wear-test.) Huit-the-hair-gloss opens with the black rose in front and a woodsy-green fig note behind. It smells like a rose-toned black Gothic funeral veil. It smells like the shadows in the beautiful but evil queen's formal robe. The secondary notes stay woodsy rather than fruity. Huit-the-perfume needed time to rest after the mailbox, or maybe after the stress of its creation. On first decant it was a black and severe rose with bitter, woodsy-green fig behind and no juice at all. After the dregs sat for a week in the bottle and breathed, the fruit came to the foreground and Huit overall became more rounded, balanced between sweet, but not too sweet, apricot in the front, and black-rose-green-figwood in the back. The rose component stays a flat ROSE throughout - kind of a matte rose scent? - but definitely black and straight rose with no fruit or tea. If you love the notes but the wearing experience isn't what you wanted, you should definitely try layering the two.