Lari

Mmmm. Usually I'm skeptical about vanilla scents -- it's a little cliché, maybe? But the dragon's blood does a lot to take this out of "inexpensive scented candle" territory... it's actually really gorgeous for this snowy winter day; it's warm and comforting without being trite. Not truly spicy, but a slightly sugar-cookie scent that's very grounded.

Oh, this is nice. It goes on as a spicy floral -- peppery and spicy but not too hot. There's a nice floral sense, but it's not a very up front LOOK I AM A FLOWER floral, just something that's quietly there. I like this... it's got a nice combination of feminine and exotic and not girly. A winner!

Wow. I am impressed that the smell of this so completely fits the name. It's sweet, sunshine-y, but not hot sun. Honey and honeysuckle and sweetness. Flowers. Maybe even a little honeydew melon. As it dries it gets more floral. I think I like it but I'm not sure what to do with all of this sweetness... I may try to dilute this into a spray of some sort.

I'm finding this one just bizarre. Welch's grape juice and patchouli. Unfortunately, my skin LOVES patchouli (though I do not) and so within about ten minutes it amps that up to the point that there's nothing else there. Eek. Swap pile.

I am intrigued. This is quite blue-green, it starts dark but then lightens with wear... there's definitely salt there, and plants, and something sweet. It almost seems like what going to the aquarium should smell like in late May. I'm not sure how much I like it as a perfume, but I think it would be pretty awesome for scenting a bubble bath or an after-swim shampoo.

It starts out woody with a bit of lavender for some reason. Some very dry floral comes out as it dries, and then, extremely weirdly, celery and green pepper. I can't say it's not a Victorian scent, because it IS, but it's Victoriana crossed with a salad bowl.

So what I'm mostly getting out of this is the scent of having spent a hot September afternoon playing at the town harvest festival, when somebody fell badly and broke something and everybody had to rush to the emergency room. So you're standing in the hospital, and you still smell like sun and grass and hay, but all around you are these smells of cleanser and disinfectant. I'm not making this up. That's what I get from this scent. Wet, there's grass, and there's… ozone? Something else. It's really got an industrial-cleaning-product smell to it, something kind of metallic and vaguely hospital-y, that grass keeps wafting through. But there's a really acrid scent lurking at the back that I think is going to take this one out of keeper country.

When I applied this my thought process for the first minute went something like this: "Strange, because the amber isn't really doing much on me wet. There's floral, and there's green-ness, and WOAH the amber just jumped out. And now it's pretty much a universe of amber." If I could freeze this at the point where the amber just starts peeking out, I think I would really fall in love with it. It's very warm, and while it gets a little bit powdery it's not the sort of overwhelming Powder Puff that some oils turn me into. Not bad, but not something I'd want to run out and buy a full-sized bottle of.

Mostly lily with the green-ness and a touch of sandalwood underneeth. There's some apple-y scent in there but thankfully it's not amping up on me… just kind of lurking in the background. It's definitely a quite sweet scent. As it dries, though, something starts turning into baby powder. Within half an hour, it's entirely powder. I'd like to try this one again in a scent locket... but in a few months, because it is DEFINITELY not a midwinter scent.

(HD 2006) Oooooo, intriguing. I don't get the cherry that other people are talking about... I get licorice, especially when it's wet, and good-quality pipe tobacco. As it dries the licorice recedes and this scent more like walking into a humidor comes out. There's a tobacco store near where my parents live in New Jersey and I've gone there with the guys to get cigars and pipe tobacco and this smells like that. This scent is a bit masculine for me, which is something that I don't think I've ever commented before about an oil, but I love the smell. I think I'm going to have to test it on my husband and then find a carrier for it.

OH this is lovely. I get the citrus that other people are talking about when it's wet, but it dries down into this lovely spicy sexy tea. If tea can be sexy. There's definitely cardamom and that musk brings it to a place where Bengal and chai-type scents are afraid to go.

I liked this at first but didn't think I'd wear it regularly... but lately I've found that I keep reaching for it when I'm looking for energy and clarity. It's just a very clean, light scent... like lemon curd and ginger and tea. When it's wet there's something very sharp about it, but over time it blooms into something that's gorgeous and round and open. It's got great staying power, too, which impresses me for as light as it is.

In a side-by-side analysis, a naive sniffer could not tell the difference between The Hesperides and Green Apple Pucker. And that's what it smells like to me. In the bottle: it's heavy, heavy apple. When it's wet on me: it's heavy apple and a little bit of forest in the background. It doesn't change much as it dries... it's very very very powerful green apple candy scent, and almost nothing else there. If I were a big fan of green apple, I'm sure I'd be very appreciative.

Oh, delicious! I didn't even know WHAT I was smelling in the bottle... it was delicious and foody and like baking. Wet on me the orange comes out first, but with all the other scents behind it it smells like making a grand-marnier pastry cream to go with pumpkin bread. As it dries the orange takes a back seat, and it's just this gorgeous buttery spicy fall scent. The amber keeps it from getting too foodie. I'm going to wait a few days, and see what the husband thinks of it, but I may well pick up another bottle of this before it's gone. Mmmm.

A potent, enticing love formula, favored among Louisiana courtesans. Okay, this is the most insane scent I've tried so far. In the bottle, it's HORRIBLE. It smells to me like new sneakers and styrofoam. Just this awful plasticky smell. I put some on and wished that I hadn't. That kind of thing. Then it dried... and suddenly it turned... nice. Not a sexual nice, though, or even an adult nice. It smelled like the basket of Crabtree and Evelyn bath products that I got for my sixth birthday. Now, that was one of my favorite birthday presents ever, because it was so exciting and I felt so grown-up having bubble bath that didn't have cartoon characters on it... but I am confused as all get out as to how this oil got from point A to point B.