The Red Queen

[Lunasariel]

In the imp: Hello, daddy, hello, mom, I'm your ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb! This is a big splash of sweet, syrupy, cherries, and that's about it. Occasionally I think I get just a hint of very perfumey rose, but I have a lot of blends that mix roses and fruit, particularly cherries, so I think that might just be my nose having certain expectations.

 

Wet: Ah, there's the mahogany! It balances the cherry bomb out wonderfully. "Lacquered" is definitely the right word for this one - it's definitely a heavy, opulent, red-velvet-drapes-and-lacquered-furniture kind of scent.

 

Dry: The mahogany becomes more and more dominant, going from 60/40 to 80/20. There's a subtle, fruity presence throughout, but now it's soft enough that I can't tell whether it's cherry, currant, or both.

 

This one has a surprisingly good throw! All throughout today, I kept getting whiffs of something elegantly fruity and elusive, and towards the end of the day, I realized it was me.  This rarely happens to me, so I learned two things today: that the throw is much fruitier than the skin level scent, and that, especially from afar, this smells AWESOME. The throw is such that I might not be able to wear it in to work, which strongly discourages perfumes or other strong smells, though.

[DigitalCoyote]

Wet: The woods in this went "Off with her [nose]!" 

 

Dry: This is sweet and fruity.  I'm enjoying that the dark fruits aren't cloying.

 

#BPALphabetAUG20

#tournamentofunderdogs

Edited August 25, 2020 by DigitalCoyote

[mymymai]

The Red Queen  is maraschino cherries (but a bit darker) and just a hint of round, deep wood with a touch of currant once it dries on my skin. It's appealing, for sure, so it gets my vote in #tournamentofunderdogs #underdogs.

[daemonkat]

The Red Queen: dry cherries and wood in the imp
On Skin: wet: dark, sweet cherries and a little bit of polished wood
dry: I feel like I got walloped in the face with a mahogany board. Cherries have tumbled to the floor.
A bit later - wood and cherry holding hands politely. There's a slight dusting of sugar over the pair, sweetening things up.

 

Overall I feel I fell asleep at a very expensive desk after eating a bowl of cherries. My fingers are a bit sticky from the fruit but most of it is overpowered by the desk's opulent polish.

 

 

 

[starbrow]

There is so much bitter-almond cherry at the onset of this, I am kind of scared, because that's my least favorite note of all time. Thankfully, it burns off within minutes, leaving the good kind of cherry behind, along with a spiced (cinnamony) mahogany that does indeed have that polished lacquery effect that the lab loves to pull out time to time, like notes of polishing wax over the woods. This might sound a little odd, but it's strangely comforting. The spiciness and the lingering black currant behind the cherry and woods is giving me some holiday vibes. I'm not mad at this at all! The Red Queen gets a solid vote from me! 

[Rane.]

I have an imp of this. Sweet, deep red cherries & currants finished off with woods. It's mouth watering.

Edited August 23, 2021 by Rane.

[Estamets]

From a fresh bottle, this is bright red cherries and sawdust. The wood is closer to cedar than mahogany. My spouse said “mmm lumber store!” 
 

Now that my bottle is aged a bit (8ish months), this has deepened and softened a lot. I get more currant than cherry; it’s an even darker, saturated red fruit with no tartness. And the wood is very much a dark polished wood with a vanillic base note. It’s that vanilla note that surprised me: it wasn’t there AT ALL when the bottle was new but it’s a strong unifying component now. 
 

It’s a completely different scent after aging. If Red Queen is screechy for you, set it aside and come back in a few months. 
 

ETA: bottle is two years old now, and she keeps getting smoother and more elegant. The vanilla note is deeper, the mahogany is darker, and the cherries are ripe black cherries straight off the tree. ADORE. 

Edited July 15, 2023 by Estamets

[spookygrrrly]

One of my favorite scents!

Bottle sniff: Just dripping in rich cherries and mahogany wood

applied: The cherry shows up very prominently at first...this fades a bit as it settles into my skin but still lots of cherry 

wet: the woody smells come on stronger over time but I still get lots of cherry. Not a huge amount of throw which I like since some scents my husband can't be around. 

Absolutely love this perfume and it's a good one for everyday use.

[MolyH]

I had to double check a couple of times to make sure that Beth hasn't changed her formula or anything, because I got something completely different than any of the reviews here. When I first opened my frimp, the blast of bitter cyanide that hit me in the face was so strong it almost knocked me off my feet. On my skin, thankfully, the wood is much more forward. It is indeed deep, and rich, and velvety. I can definitely see why people say that it almost resembles a dark chocolate note, with an undercurrent of cyanide running under it. Don't get me wrong, I love this. It's so incredibly evocative, so fitting with the name. And it's really just a sinister little trickle of nutty, bitter, almondy cyanide in a pool of thick dark chocolate.

[Weirdgirlpilled]

Hmmm. Hollywood babylon's mother. Lots of cherry and blackcurrant on me, the wood is kind of lurking sinisterly in the background. 

[Vaudenilla]

The Red Queen is another BPAL my mom adores, out of her collection it’s probably in the top three most worn slot- which place it takes, I’m unsure, but she blows through bottles of this stuff during winter. To my nose it’s just a woodsier, cherrier version of Lady Macbeth, perhaps that’s due to the currant. I don’t wear this one often, but when I do I think of her. 
 

Wear time: 6-8 hours

Sillage: Medium