Many a Fair Toy, Many a Fine Flower

[doomsday_disco]

(The Erl-King speaks.)
 
“O come and go with me, thou loveliest child;
By many a gay sport shall thy time be beguiled;
My mother keeps for thee full many a fair toy,
And many a fine flower shall she pluck for my boy.”

The promise of dew-bright meadows and sugar-spun toys, gleaming and hollow: apple peel, wild violet, meadowsweet, and candied blood-red fruits.

[Saeva]

One of the things my grandmother used to do was peel the end of apples where they're not edible or apples she intended to make into pies and then dry those peels to add to little crafts to spruce up the scent. The dried apple peel curls are a very mellow, almost apple blossom-like smell -- not nearly as strong as the juicy apple fruit scent underneath -- when they're done. And that's the apple peel in this blend. 

 

In fact, for a blend that only has one true flower in it -- the wild violet -- Many a Fair Toy, Many a Fine Flower has a distinctly floral blend going for it. The dry sweetness of the apple peel, the faintly astringent scent to the meadowsweet that is reminiscent of both wintergreen and almond blossoms, the (surprisingly) strong powdery spring scent of the wild violet all takes center stage, mostly upstaging the very gentle scent of hard fruit candies (giving the tiniest impression of pomegranate and raspberry). It's a sweet scent without reading as sugary on me, even though I tend to amp sweetness, and no one note overwhelms the other. 

 

As it drys down, it blends into this very balanced floral bouquet that gives the impression of winter blooms. I have no idea why my brain thinks that, but I'm picturing a small white winter flower specifically. Almond blossom, maybe, which never smells very almond-y to me. Or even apple blossoms, though those are flowers I associate more with April. Either way, I'm glad I have 3/4ths a bottle of Many a Fair Toy, Many a Fine Flower to play with. It's exactly the sort of floral I enjoy most. 

[Assimbya]

I was doubtful that this one would work on me, since any and all bpal red fruit notes seem to do unpleasant things on my skin, but I was determined to try all of the Erl King scents and so gave it a shot! And I'm glad I did; it's a pleasant, lovely scent which I enjoyed.

 

On me it starts strongly as apple, but a pretty soft, round-edged apple scent reminiscent to me of Sjöfn (so perhaps that the apple blossom-like apple peel @Saeva was identifying); I got some faint florals behind it, but little except the apple. As it dries, there's an almost haylike grassy floral sweetness which I think must be the meadowsweet (a new note for me! though I think I may have smelled them in the wild) and then the violet comes forward and becomes the center of the blend. There's still apple, and a more diffuse fruitiness in the background, but it neither takes over nor goes artificial as the red fruit notes historically have.

 

My partner compared it on me to Black Butterfly Moon which I didn't get at first because the floral notes strike me so differently and this one does not have the gothy exuberance of that lunacy, but I can see it if I squint; something about the purple floral of the violet mingling with the fruit, but none of them being overly sweet. There's a softness to this blend, though it isn't overly sweet, and a sense of the florals as distinctly wildflowers, unexpected flashes of color or scent in the middle of the forest rather than something cultivated and showy. Possibly I'm just being suggestible because of the inspiration, but there's something of the Northern European woods to this one, which I also felt in The Woodland So Wild. I can make sense of this in the context of the accompany lyrics, an alluring trap meant for a child made of fruits and flowers in the natural environment.

 

I liked this a lot more than I expected to, though it's not quite my style and I can't see myself wearing it often; I'll keep and probably use up my decant, but will not need a bottle. It also made me curious to try more scents with meadowsweet as a note!