marilyn eyre

BPAL does all my favorite leather scents, and this one is just delicious. It's warm, broken-in, not a squeaky leather (though I do love those, too.) I love to layer it with a more femme scent to give it an edge.

I love this one. It really does feel like a stereotypical FBI G-man cologne. The cucumber in the cologne has this old-school vibe to it, and the coffee is black, no cream or sugar here. The bitterness with the freshness of the cucumber-y cologne somehow works so well, and the squeaky clean leather rounds it all out. And the paper note shows up on the skin at the end. Unisex but bordering on masculine.

Finally just gave in and blind-bottled, and I'm so glad I did. It's a cold and sweet vanilla, with a floral quality. It reminds me of the vanilla in Le Serpent Qui Danse, one of my very first BPALs, that same cold + beautiful aura. Very soft skin scent, but lingers. Wish it lingered longer, but maybe it will with age. A real winner!

These long-dead scents are back for a limited time in a slightly tweaked form! The essence of pleasure heightened by pain: the raw scent of leather. Oh, I don't want to be the first because I never smelled the original! But...wow. Just - wow. This is my Holy Grail leather scent. Not only is it gorgeously rough black leather, but smooth brown, and every other kind somehow wrapped into one. I want to roll around in sheets that smell like this. My clothes should smell like this. It's creamy, rich, and just delicious. I swoon when I smell my wrist. Strictly an at-home or date scent. Wow. I blind bottled this right away and I'm going to pick up another before they come down.

Not mincing words here - this smells like a sexbot. Buzzy, fizzy, bright and gleaming. I don't often label scents as 'humorous' but that's what this is. It's so funny. I adore this.

This is the scent that broke my "no more backup bottles" rule. Because this is my favorite strawberry scent ever. The strawberry is fresh, ripe, but like a real strawberry, more like the platonic idea of the perfect strawberry. The rose is a background note, mixing with the red musk to create a jammy-ness to the entire scent. It's so BEAUTIFUL. It lasts forever, too. Definitely worth having two bottles, it's the perfect pick-me-up scent.

This is pretty wild. I bought this one because I wanted to go outside of my comfort zone and I was really interested in the mushroom and smoked vanilla notes. I don't get much vanilla or tonka, hoping it comes out with age. I get a LOT of the lacquered bamboo and oak. It ends up creating this high-end-style androgynous cologne. It reminds me a little bit of El Dorado, even though they don't share notes. I think the lacquer and the 'gold-plated' aspects of El Dorado are similar. I think this will age beautifully, and possibly get a little mellower and sweeter, initially this one is bright and brassy! Glad I decided to go outside of my comfort zone for this one.

This might be my favorite chapter in the whole book, and I'm so glad I picked up a bottle of this. From the notes, it sounds heavy, but it's not at all. There's a sweetness from the dragon's blood, the spice and sand are wispy. It's a warm wind, not scorching at all. It's a beautiful scent that captures a beautiful romantic interlude. It needs more love!

I bought this purely because I read the notes and thought, "hmm, sounds like how NBC Hannibal would smell condensed into a bottle" so I had to have it. It's really nice! I'm not quite sure what the 'bone' note is, but there's something in here that reminds me of porcelain a little bit. I love leather notes, and this one is clean, old leather. It's worn, but someone's taken the time to clean it up all pretty. And the steel adds a nice brightness. I love this scent!

I got my bottle today, so it hasn't rested very long but I couldn't resist a test. It's a morpher! Opens with a lovely candied fresh strawberry note (a strawberry dipped in hardened sugar syrup) and the cotton candy, with lavender to support the whole blend. After a while on the skin, I'm getting the honey and bread notes, a toasty note somewhere. And if I squint? Maaaaaybe a bit of corn chip for puppy feet. There's so much in here, it's one of the few blends with ten notes where I can smell each of them at some point. I just sniffed my wrist again and got the popcorn! It's such a cherry scent, needed after the rough day I've had.

This was the day that we discovered that Lilith was likely a sharpshooter crossbowman in another life. She was startlingly accurate, even with the handicap of using a clumsy carnival weapon. Funnel cakes, baked apples, and strawberry cream. Yay! I love a good carnival scent, and this delivers! Sugary, buttery, funnel cake, a soft apple top note. And strawberry? Buried underneath all those calories. Sooooo good...I want to eat it...

Doing her work at the grotto, the International Shrine of St Jude at Our Lady of Guadelupe Chapel in New Orleans. Frankincense and myrrh with golden amber, green apple pulp, and white pear. Oh god, I'm first? Bottle: Lovely! Pale green apple is the top note, and the frankincense is a nice backdrop. I love frankincense, so I love it! On skin: oooooh. I like this. The apple fades a little, sadly, so the frankincense takes over, and the pear comes out more. Amber is usually a strong note on me even if I like it, so it's nice that this is more a base note to really nail it to the skin. I don't pick up the myrrh as much, but it usually isn't strong on me. It's a crisp scent, professional, in a sense. Classy.

I love this scent so much, I bought a full-size. My sample has aged so it's gotten even better. It's creamy, clean leather, the starchiness of paper, rounded out by some soft woods. Smells like an ideal version of a hot librarian. 10/10, would and will slather myself in it.

On December 30th, Lilith went with a gaggle of her Grownups, her plush alligator, Crocky (there’s a story there), and one of her besties, Camilla, to get their ears pierced by the wonderful people at Studio City Tattoo. When the needle went through, she didn’t scream and she didn’t cry… she growled “FFFFFFFFFffFFfffFfffFffffffffffaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh” in an attempt to repress the impulse to yell FUCK in the middle of the tattoo shop. Tom and I got new piercings in solidarity, but Crocky, Teddy, and Brian all declined. Coconut and red currant, red musk, and a pop of surgical steel. This is like someone mixed Anteros with come coconut. After a while, the steel kind of comes out, like's sun-warmed. Now, Anteros is one of my top 10 GCs, and I love a good, husky coconut. Glad I have this, but don't think a backup is necessary. All in all, a really robust red musk/currant scent, made a little lighter with the coconut and the steel. Lovely!

I got a bottle from Etsy a few years back and I never reviewed it! Since it's come back for Yules, I'm thinking of getting a backup bottle. It's a very thick scent, if that makes sense. The pom and the wine are the prominent notes, and rest kind of form an incensey note that give it a lovely backdrop. And as this scent is based on one of my favorite stories/paintings, it's a win in my book. Delicious, and good for days when you want to conquer your task at hand.

Anyone got ideas for Leverage character scents?

Pele, Pele, Pele... Such a beautiful scent. Warm, but like skin-warm, not heat warm. Light, juicy florals that make me feel like laying out on a towel on the beach. ...But it fades so fast! At the most, an hour before it's completely gone. Like a beautiful, fleeting memory. Still contemplating a bottle, it's a great pick me up.

Oh god. This smells like Hannibal Lecter forgot that he had dinner in the oven. I'm too scared to put it on my skin...

Oh, this is lovely. Powdery, light, fluffy snow. This is a perfect room spray for summer.

Fizzy strawberry bubbles! I can actually smell the fizz!

This is truly a voodoo scent! It has to be, because clove has been one of my only consistent death notes for YEARS, so how does this scent work so beautifully on my skin?! Pine is also a tricky note for me, but once again, it works so well! It's smoky and mystical, what I'd wear to a dance in the moonlight in the middle of the woods. A witchy woman scent. It is so lovely, and STRONG. Bottle!

Seconding Hell's Belle! It's one of my top ten GCs! And I'd like to add Vasilissa, a brand new favorite of mine. It's pink and creamy with a little bit of musk underneath to ground it. It's a princess scent for sure!

Vasilissa! It's a lovely pale pink scent, perfect for a princess.

I think I just found my new signature scent. First off, I have to warn you, when you smell this right out of the bottle, you will recoil, because it smells like death. Very fitting. I can't explain the way it smells out of the bottle, I'm just hit with the mental image of death. But then I put it on my skin, and I'm hit with a different scent memory. My father is a funeral director, and consequently, I spent a lot of my childhood in his office in the funeral home. This scent reminds me of standing up on the upper level, hanging around the top floor when there are no customers. Smells of musty curtains and older furniture, of the flower delivery room where I'd collect spare blooms, polished wood, and just a hint of that chemical undertone you'll know if you've ever spent time in a funeral home. And that strawberry note is turns fake on me, but I don't mind, because it reminds me of the cheap Justice (Just For Girls!) body sprays I used to buy when I was ten. This is the smell of me in fourth grade, reading ghost story books I borrowed from the library in a clean visitation room. Well done, BPAL. Well done.

Ugh, this is so lovely. Just perfect. Light, inoffensive, and so natural. A perfume for when you need to feel like you have it together.