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Poison by Dior: Venom (sadly discontinued), Spellbound

 

I felt that Shadow Witch Orchid reminded me quite a bit of Poison... but it has been many years since I last filched some from my mother's bottle.

Here I don't get the dragon's blood, even though that smell really came out and bit me in Wrath. Here, I get PATCHOULI, and, to a lesser extent, VETIVER, which are very dominant smells--I'll agree with the person that called this scent "aggressive." The cinnamon never came to the fore for me. I kept saying, "I smell like a headshop," and the people I was eating dinner with agreed--which is rare; people almost never comment on my perfume since I'm so moderate with it.

 

I kind of like it, but I definitely did not get the vibe from this one I wanted (I was really hoping for the "I want to bite someone!" vibe that someone mentioned previously), so I'm not sure I'll be buying a bottle. 3 out of 5.

The overwhelming impression something floral, almost orchid-y--is that the dragon's blood? What IS dragon's blood?--plus cinnamon. The cinnamon is most evident in the first ten minutes; and it's not a mulled cider apple pie yummy cinnamon, it's a Big Red chewing gum kind of cinnamon, as someone else pointed out. That note dies down quite a bit, though, leaving that floral note. After a while, when I sniff my wrist, I can't really detect the pepper or cloves or cinnamon, but I do get the sharp bite at the back of my throat that tells me they're there.

My big objection to this one is that the floral note acts a little weird on me... going a little sour but never quite becoming soapy. My husband liked this one more than me, but I'm not sure I'm going to make it a favorite scent. I'd give it, overall, a 2 out of 5.

I'm wearing this scent today - it was a free imp from Tess with a recent swap.

 

I see this frequently described here as "piney dirt." Well, I get the pine/juniper note, all right. "You smell like you've been..." my husband began, when I first put this on, and I hoped he would say something like, "working in the garden," but instead he finished it with "working with PineSol." Yeah. It does kind of give that vibe.

 

I definitely don't get the patchouli in this one, thank goodness. Maybe a little vetiver? Maybe that's the earthiness? It does have kind of a smell reminiscent of freshly-turned sod, even if it doesn't exactly match it, and that note comes out more and more as the oil dries.

 

It's refreshing, but at the same time, I can't shake that PINESOL feeling. I give it a 3 out of 5 - probably won't be buying a bottle, but I'll enjoy the rest of the imp.

This one started out on me as overwhelmingly rosy and floral. Smelling it in the bottle, I thought, "Yep, going to turn to soap on me," which florals, especially with jasmine, seem to do.

 

For the first hour or so that I had it on, my skin was screaming ROSE ROSE ROSE. On the good side, it reminded me of a single-note rose perfume I once had which I loved; on the bad side, it was strong enough that I began to feel a headache coming on while driving to work. There may have been something about the jasmine that amplified the smell of the rose; dunno.

 

Now it's an hour later, and the rose has settled down, and the vanilla is really coming out. There might be some other scents in there; maybe a little figginess, but they're hard to identify (I'm not sure I'd know what tonka smells like if it bit me). I like how the vanilla emerged not so much as a second smell but a mellowing of the rose scent--I didn't think those two scents would go together so well. Also, yay, no soap!

 

Seems to have medium throw once it settles down (i.e. I can smell it consistently without sticking my nose to my wrist, but nobody's telling me I smell like roses/vanilla), and I'm betting the vanilla will give it staying power. This might be a floral I'd consider buying, maybe for spring use - it seems a little too flowery for a New England winter.

This'll be my first time posting a review, but I loved this one so much I had to!

 

A note: I try not to read the description before trying something on, so that I can form impressions of it without being influenced. Later on I look at the description to see how close I was, and then say to myself, "Yeah, I can smell that," or "that doesn't really come through for me." I got this one as a gift from a friend, so it's easy for me to forget just what scents make it up.

 

In the imp: Strong! There was something acrid about it, and a scent that seemed familiar but I couldn't place. "Vanilla?" I asked my husband. "Cinnamon?" Neither of those was right on.

 

On wet (wrists and neck): Ah, that's it. "Tobacco. Pipe tobacco. That's got to be it." "Rooibos tea," he suggested and I went YES. Rooibos tea.

 

I realize the tobacco note I'm smelling is actually reminding me of when I was a kid, and my dad used to smoke this cherry-scented pipe tobacco. So it's more a sort of ashy, dry cherry smell I'm smelling.

 

As it dried down, I went to check the description. I'm way off! Buttered rum? Okay, I can kind of see where that comes in.... Almonds, definitely, in that way that almonds and cherry kind of blend together for me. Every other scent seems to be hiding.

 

I went to put more on, thinking "this may be a keeper..."

 

Drydown: Rooibos tea, yep. Specifically, it reminds me of this rooibos tea winter punch mix I got, with apples and cinnamon and cardamom and almonds and all kinds of goodies in it. Putting my nose to my wrist, I get almost a patchouli smell, but what is wafting around me is sexy and warm and complex and DELICIOUSLY ME. The smoky, butteriness of it becomes almost musky on me, in a good way.

 

Conclusion: almonds and cherries and rooibos tea and YUM. Will be buying a bottle.