Lucchesa

Tuberose is usually a hard pass for me, but this was a gift from a spectacular forumite (and I'd forgotten about the tuberose). I do like gardenia, and all the other notes are favorites, so I was curious to see how much tuberose there would be. And there is a lot. The gardenia and tuberose are all I can make out when it's wet. This is a white floral, in case you were in doubt. Too floral for me, but if you dig femme white florals, this one is complicated and lovely, with the vanilla musk and ambergris and mysterious pale incense becoming more assertive in later drydown.

Fruity scents are rarely my jam, but I was intrigued by this one because of the vetiver, which I tend to enjoy, and it was gifted to me by an exceptionally generous and all-around gorgeous forumite. It is indeed better and more interesting on me than most berry scents, which tend to turn candy-like on me. The vetiver is more of the grassy than the smoky variety, and the currant is bright and tart. The raspberry is still a little too sweet for me, not tempered enough by the vetiver for my tastes, but if you are a lover of berry scents, this will probably be delightful on you, even if you usually fear vetiver. Medium wear length.

No one has mentioned Alice! This was my very first BPAL imp and instant love. Elf is my favorite of the RPGs. Summer forest in dappled light. My tastes have become darker but both are still an instant mood boost, worn mainly spring & summer. I already mentioned Lights of Men's Lives. Fall: Sin, Chimera, Depraved Winter blends: Haunted, Sloth, Black Rider, Coyote When I gave a bunch of imps to a close friend, she bonded with Oblivion. She's on her third bottle, I think, but has no interest in trying EVERYTHING the way I do. She found her signature scent and she's happy.

I have to concur with zanzoku_zen. There is stealth oudh, of the barnyard variety, in He'd Been an Angel Once. Black oudh would be my guess. I can't wear it. If you are an oudh enthusiast, this might age into something nice, but I had to wash it off.

I'm very surprised I never reviewed Phantom Calliope because it is one of my favorites, especially in fall. It's a gorgeous sweet spicy rich cherry-cassis-cardamom-patchouli -- work appropriate, makes me smile every time I smell it. Unfortunately, the original formulation causes me a mild skin reaction, which I have gotten from a couple of older cardamom blends, but I can wear the 2015 just fine.

I was super curious about this one, and it's lovely, but my skin just ate it right up. Maybe an indigo musk, something gently herbal, and some ozone, totally gender neutral, really evocative. After 30 minutes on my middle-aged skin, it's almost imperceptible.

I don't care for mint as a perfume note, but Colder and Colder was frimped to me, so I gave it a shot. Wet, it's a lot of mint, spearmint and peppermint, so if you like mint, this would definitely be worth seeking out. As it dries down, the white musk, another iffy note on me, becomes more prominent. Eventually it's very similar to the minty version of the BPAL snow note. I can appreciate that it is a nice, clean, cool, unisex smell, but it's not me.

I've been intrigued by Stormclouds over the Midway for a long time and finally swapped for a decant. I love anise and it keeps coming up in reviews, but it didn't emerge on my skin. Instead, the wormwood/opium combo ended up more lemony and floral than anisey or tarry on me, and the one really tricky note for my chemistry, ozone, dominated over the lovely plum incense. And my skin ate it up completely within 3 hours. So I'm still looking for an anisey plum incense blend. I'm glad I got to try this, though!

Liz is very smoky on me, though not BBQ, thankfully. Smoke and leather with a hint of vanilla. The smoke note is one that usually does not stand up well to my skin chemistry, so I'm pleased that it is so forward here; in fact, this is so smoky I would hesitate to wear it to work (for the "Eww, do I smell smoke?" reaction). After a couple of hours it's intensely lovely -- all the notes have found a balance, vanilla, light perfume (I don't get anything I would call floral), leather and smoke. Really nice!

Trevor Bruttenholm belongs to a category of scents (Hellfire, The Buggre All This Bible, etc.) that my chemistry just obliterates. The old books and incense of the decant disappear immediately on my skin. Practically everything disappears, actually -- I have to hold my wrist almost touching my nose to make out anything. It settles into a very faint bay rum cologne. I want to love these scents so badly, but my skin just doesn't let them be appreciated.

2019 Smut, and apparently I never reviewed my other Smut decant either, which I think is 2013. 2019 is lighter, less voluptuous, but I suspect in six years it may smell quite like my older decant. Sweet, boozy, almost fruity musk -- one of those musks is definitely of the red persuasion, but it doesn't take over completely. Whereas the above reviewer gets root beer, I get something suggestive of rum and coke (that sounds kind of disgusting, but it's very pleasant). However, it's not so boozy or so smutty that it can't be worn to the office, especially the 2019 version which wears very close to my skin. I find Smut a fun, sexy, I-feel-and-smell-great blend to wear, not an I-will-bring-you-to-your-knees-and-you-will-worship-me kind of blend. The older one is definitely deeper with more staying power but again, that may come with age.

2019 Bright Red Dildo is all honey on me for at least the first hour, and predominantly honey on me throughout. It's a warm, dry honey under which I can eventually make out a touch of mildly musky leather. Not much throw, which is normal for me, but like most BPAL honey blends it lasts a long time. I was hoping for more leather, but this is really very nice.

I must share a skin chemistry quirk with Milo, because on me A Masked Ball of the Most Unusual Magnificence also has an unpleasant chemical smell, and I too am usually a fan of almond scents. The plastic tinge is not disappearing fast enough for my liking. Not for me.

I don't love dragon's blood, but everything else here is luscious, so I was hoping as one of thirteen ingredients it would be quiet. The dragon's blood merges with the honey and vanilla to create the fruitiness others have spoken of, but I like this better than I would have liked a 13 filled with actual fruit notes. This is definitely a deep dark fudgy chocolate, but the darkness of the cacao and the woods and incense notes keep this one dark and deep and out of the pure foodie category. Very very nice. Not a lot of throw (normal for me) but it lasts a good long time.

This was gifted to me or I would never have tried it; jasmine in particular never works on me. But I skin test it all, and sure enough, this one was all indolic jasmine at first, with some indolic oudh playing backup. I was running out the door and didn't scrub; it got progressively nicer over the afternoon and the late drydown is quite beautiful. So if jasmine, rose and oudh work on you, this might just be gorgeous.

For the first hour or so, They Shut Me Up In Prose is pretty much a bourbon vanilla single note on me, which is no bad thing. No, that's not true -- it's bourbon vanilla and mallow. Not marshmallow, but mallow flower, the same note that's in DeVos' Unicorn and other ethereal sugared florals I usually associate with Lupers. Sweet but not cloying. It's innocent enough to be worn by a girl about the age of Emily Dickinson when she was confined to the closet, but it's rich enough to be worn by a woman of any age. After an hour I'm able to appreciate the sandalwood as well, though I never get any frankincense. I wonder if it will come out with age. I hope so. This is conspicuously beautiful and I'm psyched to have a bottle, but I'm also curious to see how it would smell with frankincense giving it a bit more edge.

I bought this intending it to be a gift for my daughter who's nearly out of Daybreak, but of course I had to skin test it -- it might be the rare lavender I can wear. It starts off, as most BPAL lavenders do on my skin, with a fierce blast of lavender, strong, a little sharp. This never lasts, but with No Coward Soul Is Mine, my skin doesn't eat it up completely; instead the lavender chills down to share the floor with soft aromatic woods. I wouldn't know a rockrose if it hit me over the head, but I'm sure it's adding its own loveliness to this blend as well. OK, now I've been wearing it nearly an hour and the lavender is growing fainter and fainter. I think this is really beautiful and if my skin chemistry didn't obliterate lavender I would keep it for myself; my daughter is going to love it.

A King Pursued by a Unicorn is magnificent. Golden Priapus is one of my fave GCs, so I thought it might work well on me. In the imp it's mostly evergreen and oak and a little sharp, but as always the pine softens and sweetens on my skin, and then the amber joins in and it's like a warm beam of sunlight in a forest glade. I get more throw from this than I usually do (in fact, I got a compliment on it today) and wear length seems good so far.

Body, Remember - raw black coconut, ambergris accord, ambrette seed, champaca flower, and sugar cane

Wet, Old-Fashioned Satanists is predominantly chamomile tea on me, more bright and lemony than soporific. I don’t have many chamomile blends, so I wasn’t aware I amped it. After about 45 minutes the chamomile settles down enough for the leather and cashmere to emerge, and then I get the coziness I expected, but my skin chemistry is still making too much of the chamomile for me to fall in love with this one.

Lovely old-fashioned powdery amber and sandalwood are the dominant notes. I thought from the context (17th century bible scholarship) that it might be dusty and dry, but the oakmoss means that it’s beautifully balanced between ethereal and earthly. This was a second tier choice for me as some of the decants I wanted were sold out, but I’m enjoying it a lot.

Ghost of a Ghost's Ghost is lovely and unusual, a light, fresh lavender that becomes more masculine on my skin against a backdrop of oakmoss and patchouli. I'm not really appreciating any oudh, which is fine, as agarwood occasionally ruins a scent for me. Unfortunately, as with nearly every BPAL that has the word "Ghost" in the title, my skin eats this up in a couple of hours.

El Amor y la Muerte is nice but not outstanding on me. This decant is by now 12 years old, and any sharp edges it might once have had have worn smooth with age as its component parts have melded together. Warm woods and sweet resins with mellow clove and a little bit of rose that flirts with soap but doesn't quite go there. It stays very close to the skin.

Hi, ShleepySnorlax! Teamama's recs are great. I also thought of the Mad Tea Party for you -- the first scent that resonated for me personally was Alice. It's got the innocence you sometimes project, and it's very comforting. If carnation works well for you, Maiden is another innocent-projecting scent to try. The foodier Mad Tea Party scents (Eat Me, Drink Me, Knave of Tarts) don't work on me but might be comforting if they work on your skin. The Lion belongs right in Teamama's list of gender neutral comfort scents like Coyote. It fits with love of animals, too. Also, if you like The Lion, Bengal and Bastet (appropriate for your ancient Egypt tattoo!) would be good blends to try, and Bast from American Gods - they all have that warm amber feel. An animal and fantasy lover is probably fond of dragons, so you might like the Ars Draconis scents, many of which are gender fluid. Since you enjoy fall and winter, do you like pumpkin as a note? Jack comes to mind (same category in my head as Dwarven Ale, and Hoggle from the Labyrinth, the only other GC pumpkin blends I can think of.). And Chimera and Sin and other warm spicy blends. I would have said Miskatonic U as a warm winter scent but I looked on your profile and that showed up as a fail. Weenies and Yules are probably your best updates. Oh -- have you tried Lights of Men's Lives? It's candles, so slightly smoky beeswax. I find it warming and wonderful.

Female Nude, Three-Quarter Length is really surprisingly beautiful, besides having one of the all-time great BPAL names. I don't generally do apple scents; they tend to go fake on me. I was the beneficiary of the above reviewer's tester imp, just enough to skin test, and dabbed a bit on about 90 minutes ago. Morning plans went awry and just now I was sniffing my wrist thinking, wait, wow, what did I put on? In the imp I didn't smell apple much at all but mainly rosewood, and now the apple has bloomed but is perfectly entwined with the woods. Looking at the above reviews, I don't find this girlish at all -- of course, it's 8 years older than it was back then, and it has aged into something quite elegant. Not fruity and not rosy -- the apple has become understated, and the rosewood and mahogany are polished woods, and a lovely and grown-up combination. (Mahogany on my skin always strikes me as classy.) This is perfectly boardroom appropriate but in my opinion could go out for an intimate dinner and drinks afterwards.