Armand

[doomsday_disco]

Who am I, Louis? Am I my history I have endured? Am I the job I do not want? I do not know anymore. No one has painted me in over 400 years.

An ancient grief hidden beneath exquisite restraint. Beauty preserved in ice and amber, this scent opens luminous, weightless and angelic, composed and immaculate, but as it blooms, it is a calculated cacophony of contradictions: sacred and artificial, tender and monstrous, youthful and impossibly old. White musk, iris, and frankincense fougere unfolding like a prayer, but beneath it lies something feral and desperately starving for love, but utterly incapable of loving without consuming: resinous woods, blackened clove, and blood-tinged incense.

Edited July 2 by doomsday_disco

[Invidiana]

Born into the mortal world as Andrei, later called Amadeo by his maker and sometime lover Marius, the vampire Armand was only seventeen when he became immortal. Innocence veils his bloodlust. There is a dichotomy to his scent, which portrays the young, angelic facade of a young man in the late 15th century, embodied by pale iris petals resting on sheer white musk, tendrils of frankincense clinging to his skin after passing outside a Roman cathedral. He could pass for a fresh-facd altar boy, but no one can see what lies on the other side of his soul. The mask of teenage purity has long since been adulterated. Underneath is an incense too dark to rise to heaven, entwining with ancient woods and resins from Rome as Marius knew it in the time of Augustus, scorched with clove and stained with blood. The lest vestiges of his human form fade into a memory of mist and flowers against the hot rush of sanguine desire.

[ghoulnextdoor]

Low-pooling smoke and a warmth that feels recently abandoned: a fleecy blanket fort someone else built, the air inside already breathed. A dim flashlight glow of clean, freshly laundered light carves out a lit radius in the resinous dark; the shadows retreat to the corners, tuck themselves in for the evening. The saggy-ceilinged gloom sticky and sweet, cooked-down fruit leather [raisin / plum jam / fig] secret snacks for dear amber-eyed velveteened friends, sleepy-whisper warm and pulled close, feet all the way to your chest, after all the monsters cannot touch you if the blanket covers you completely (also this blanket fort is through the back door of the vampire club in Blade; so close you can feel the bass through the floor, but the blanket rule applies here too). Sanctuary nested inside menace? Or was the coziness compromised all along? Undetermined. But the doorway is hands-and-knees only, and nothing out there kneels.

[Joyleaf_]

Armand is one of my favorite literary characters. I just wanna put him in a jar and shake it a little bit. I knew I needed to get a bottle of him when they announced the TVL companion scents. I'm excited to say I love the way this scent morphs and lingers on me. I'm not traditionally a fan of the lighter, more chaste notes in perfumes, I stick to rooty patchouli's and incense and smoke and leather usually. So! When I say the beginning of this isn't terrible, please know I mean it in the highest compliment! The gentle, light way this scent starts out isn't immediately headache inducing for me, but when the deeper notes come out to play? *Chefs kiss* . There's about a 45 minute section of time where I smell like a very very sexy man, and then it softens into this sort of cuddly infernal skin scent that lingers for hours. 

I keep getting whiffs of myself and thinking that there's an attractive man near me. And there is! It's Armand coming to make his Armends. Hold onto your heads, everybody. Or don't, I guess. 

[LavenderCoffee]

this is not a scent I would have picked out for myself had it not been associated to Armand, but it beautifully captures his contradictions, and now that I have it I will definitely be wearing it. an elegant and slightly ominous blend that creates a gradient on the skin from pale iris to blackened clove, like "oops! all grey area" but make it art, and it's arresting. I wanna say there's an elusive dark heart of woody oud to this, but it's the shifting swirl of soft clove and incense that draw focus. 

[galahad]

In the bottle: chilled clove

 

On the skin: soft clove, something floral, the metallic aspect of blood without any warmth, and some comforting soft woods notes emerging as it dries down.  This not something for me. 

 

ETA: the extreme drydown isn't too bad when the incense emerges.

Edited August 5 by galahad

[wilhelmscream]

In the bottle: light, clean, cool, and just a bit of clove.

 

On the skin: A battle between good and evil, light and dark. The clean, deceptive facade of white musk, iris and frankincense softens the dark simmering heart of wood, clove and incense smoke.

 

Overall: Soft, pale cologne over dark, spicy incense. Subtle. Charming.

[wolf_truffles]

It opens very softly, sort of clean and a little sweet and then quite literally blooms in minutes into a very gorgeous clove and incense scent, but with a subtle cool, clean cologne element that lifts it out of being resinous. I never really sniffed something like this before- its super fascinating! I tend to love incense notes for sleep and to have one so clean and soft smelling at the same time is exciting. Can't wait to try it for bed!

[patina]

White musk and very gentle incense that reads as lemony frankincense. I know there’s clove underneath but it’s entirely background in this stage, a foil for the lighter elements. It’s surprisingly sweet on me. Imagine having a cologne based on lemon pie with frankincense instead of lemon and white musk and iris instead of whipped cream. Also wood instead of pie crust.

The blood incense and clove comes out more with more wear.

[DigitalCoyote]

The lab has this seething/barely contained under a calm demeanor thing down.

 

Pick a wrist.

 

L: On my skin, this starts a purely men's cologne I can taste (like if a freshly sprayed man just walked by) then gives way to a softer clove cologne with the gentlest floral on its edges as it dries.

 

R: Big clove and wood out the gate.  The cologne comes in as it dries as clove with a warm wood center.  No flowers at all over here. 

 

I am pleasantly surprised by this one: I fully expected the woods to go nuts on my skin.

 

Masculine, grown, and also cuddly.

[sunshinedaisybliss]

I cannot possibly come even close to the review that @Invidiana wrote – she perfectly captured the enigmatic olfactory experience of Armand. 
 

For me – it starts off with a lovely heady floral sweetness from the iris and white musk in harmony together, and if I hadn’t read the notes I might have thought there was lilac in here. There’s a gentle innocence but also a wistful melancholy about it at first, but then it starts changing into something more sinister as the incense amps up and the resinous woods and clove come into play. And finally, it arrives somewhere very dark and mysterious, like walking through a fog of dark purple smoke. I love this final stage – it reminds me of the gorgeous incensey, musky black plum and narcissus in my beloved Hellion. 
 

What a wild ride! I don’t recall any other BPAL shifting from light to dark, gentle to menacing, or innocent to corrupt in the way Armand does. 

[skyturtles]

Oh, Armand. My room without walls. I have saved this blend for last to test and review, since he is my favorite character on the show and I have high hopes. 

The blend starts off soft and almost powdery. Wet on my skin, the iris floats above the base of whispered white musk and shadowed frankincense. If this is all Armand was, I would be disappointed. However, as it dries down, something magical happens. Resinous wood and clove claw their way forward, and the holy aura of before turns to incense smoke as if a flame is extinguished. What a beautiful death.

Will definitely be holding on to this decant as I ponder a full bottle purchase or not.