LavenderCoffee

do you remember Bronze Dildo? I know that one was a bit divisive, but dang, I am always impressed by a perfume oil that smells like bronze. and this also smells like bronze!!

Statue of Freedom strikes me as much less bombastic than BD, thanks in part to the luscious amber smoothing over the edges. It's a stunning yet subtle scent.

I looooove BPAL's big, booming, bourbon cream, but I'm glad this collaboration incorporates skin musk to tone it down slightly. The outcome is incredibly accessible, wearable, and yes, layerable! Wear your DILF to the office by day and then add a dab of snake oil for a night out. 

My cards are on their merry way!

yes! a perfect windowsill pie. mostly apple pie filling foregrounded against a nice dry dead leaf scent, and I think the leaves are helping prevent it from turning into apple candle.

I am not an ube specialist, so I can't be certain if this is a good/strong/exemplary ube scent, but it is a lovely cheesecake, and one of the ones in which I am actually picking up the graham cracker crust. It's not particularly pumpkiny, but I am happy to let the cheesecake shine.

delicious diner atmospheric! for me, this is less like a hot plate and a steaming mug in front of me, and more like the woosh of smells upon walking into the pancake house. 

lots of green tea! which almost creates the impression of a pile of dead leaves and green leaves. I was not able to find much of the ginger, but it's a lovely scent regardless.

when I considered the scent notes for this one and A Recurrant Spot, I thought I'd have more success here, but it turned out to be the opposite. my skin runs entirely away with the iris in this and I'm not especially fond of iris on its own. 

 don't have much to add: it's a real gross-out at first, and it dries down into something perfectly unsettling. after it no longer turns the stomach it troubles the mind!

after the bright burst of citrus fades, this marshmallow goes all warm sticky gooey on me, like the insides of one roasted over a campfire, sans smoke. it's a marvellous scent but a bit overwhelming. 

has anyone else read Starling House by Alix E. Harrow? I had to try this scent because it reminded me of the titular wisteria-covered structure. suppose I should actually read the the Gorey tale!

the scent is dusty, wispy and lovely. I get the sturdy tea closer to the skin, but the modest sillage is all sorrowful smudged purple flowers. something to wear when you're haunting a house.

14 hours ago, Lucchesa said:

Happy almost Thanksgiving!!! Everyone should have received their list of addresses in their PMs. If they look wrong -- if I gave you more or fewer than seven, or if your own name is on your list -- please let me know. I tried to be careful but I had anesthesia this morning and may be a little wonky. (just a polyp, nothing serious) Please mail your cards by December 12 and have fun! 

ahhh I'm so excited! my list looks great, and I shake my fist at this nuisance polyp. thank you for arranging this! 💌

my local post office actually had cute stamps today when I went in!

https://store.usps.com/store/product/baby-wild-animals-stamps-S_685504

idk what took me so long to get around to Voodoo but I love it. I am testing from an imp of unspecified age but it's got me wanting to upgrade to a bottle. I'm definitely not getting cola or fizz, it's pretty straightforwardly what it says on the tin in terms of notes. big dark booming base of myrrh/patch/vetiver and then the way the lime and pine punch it up is so so good. I suppose I may have hesitated due to almond, but ultimately I'm glad to have that drop of sweetness in there with the vanilla to smooth it all over. great weartime on this, too, it just keeps going.

I have cherished the 2019 version of Mictecacihuatl and I am surprised I never reviewed it! (Copal, precious woods, warm spices, agave nectar, cigar tobacco, and roses.)

in the bottle it's quite an intoxicating potion, sweet and dark, and this stays true for the initial application of the oil on my skin. as it warms up the tobacco and copal really pop and the scent develops a rich golden quality. I feel like it used to have a bit more rose to it, but apparently I've had this six whole years now?! I do get a scattering of mature petals once the oil dries. it's as if you could take a whole altar, top to table legs, and process it into a rich paste to paint on your skin for a ceremony. I love it so much.

if you enjoy the lab's headier jasmine notes, this one is gorgeous! and as you get deeper into the weartime, jasmine graciously allows a tattered vanillic element to emerge. it's not unlike a scenario in which the Black Butterfly Moon: Vanilla and Tobacco Flower duet got papered over with jasmine, they smell like siblings to me. I really like it.

2025 version

This is a subtle stunner, I am instantly in love. I am a fan of dead leaves, first of all, but while sweater/cashmere/wool can be hit or miss, the wool note here is perfection in concert with the ambergris. It's impossibly warm and comforting. Magic!

Yaaay I like doing cards!

help I love this!! it just makes me go HNNNGGG and I WANT TO GO TO THERE, among other less useful notes for a perfume review. So instead: A cascade of dry dead leaves, a dusting of dry cacao, and then an ooozingly realistic molten cake center that mellows into a lovely chocolate cake scent in the leaf pile. I vaguely regretted not grabbing a FS of DL/Chocolate/Hazelnut from years past but at the end of the day, I just don't love hazelnut. This one may be my one true chocolate leaf!

in the vial, Plastic Rats does indeed smell a bit like plastic rats, which is to say, daunting. On my skin I can pick out the amber and pepper clearly alongside the black licorice. It's really kindof a nice scent once it settles in. Like it could have been marketed as Lord Licorice's cologne in a licensed Candyland line or something. not that it skews especially masc or evil, imo - it's delightfully mysterious and subtle, and ever so slightly murky. 

My first impression as I applied this on the skin was pumpkin spice tattoo ink! It comes on kinda dark and strong. I get the bourbon and the cranberry in the periphery but they're like accents in the mix. When the patch starts to come out as the oil dries, it really comes together nicely and the ink is way less intimidating. It's just a sweet lil fuzzy inky guy. Also remarkable that I don't think Beth saw the artwork before making the perfume and the colors match this scent really well!?

Every time I see tarantulas I am reminded of the fact that I tried to keep a tarantula as a pet when I was a kid, in order to get over my fear of spiders. It didn't work - I could not sleep with it in my room and had to return it. But Tarantula Flash seems really nice once you give it a chance! I think I can live with this one. 

It really does smell like a pretty pink sweater! I would say it seems more cashmere than wool to my nose, like maybe Ed Wood is wearing this.

BREAKING: Myrrh and Black Berries smells like ...Myrrh and Black Berries

It's so good tho. Idk if it is meant to be blackberries or unspecified berries that are super dark and mysterious but there's a big juicy plop of berry on application and then the fruit slides into the myrrh-k and it all gets very fuzzy. It almost wants to be fizzy, but it's too velvety to get all the way to forbidden soda. There's almost a friction between the simple fruit sweetness of the berry and the blackout curtain of dark myrrh. (Did they throw a pint of berries at a myrrh-scented velvet blackout curtain?) 

I have to confess up front that I dearly wanted to love this Blood Moon - to be on her side, or be her - so psychologically I set myself up to enjoy this. But I was also a bit daunted by THUNDEROUS black musk, because in many other blends where black musk is present, my skin chemistry causes it to drown out other notes in very short order. Anyway, I am happy to report that I remain standing as the credits roll and have not been slain by Blood Moon or her black musk!

My experience wearing this (a week out of the mail) is that the pomegranate seems most prominent when first applied, and then it melds into the rest of the murky gritty goodness, lending a lovely deep red stain. And then it is evident that something was most certainly scorched! It's not a super smoky scent by any means, but it does smell pleasantly like the remnants of a fire. Perhaps something was burned on an altar, or forged in flames. There's an enjoyable push-pull between black and red, softness and grit. It's also a fairly subtle scent on the skin, in case you need to sneak up on someone or something. Just beautifully blended, I'm very into it! Incidentally inspired me to paint my nails red...

This is a glorious red, and it wants two thicker coats or three thinner coats. Should probably work for any red holiday you can think of from October to February, or just for like, Thursday. The glitter bits are pretty easy to work with unless one dries right on the tip of the nail, so you can scoot them away if that happens.

I took some pictures of three coats with a clear topcoat, although I'm not great at it, just in case it helps.