Venus Libertina - Arcana Soaps

Details: 
Venus Libertina
Arcana Soaps (bought from The Rhinestone Housewife)

Notes: 
Night-blooming tuberose, pink gardenia, wax myrtle, tiare, bay rum, sandalwood, cucumber, iris and a teensy spill of champagne. 

Don't those notes sound lush? I imagined this to be a gorgeous, rich white floral with a dry down warmed by the sandalwood - pretty much my jam. And yet what I got was... lemon toilet cleaner. I don't get it. There is nothing lemony mentioned in the notes. Could it be the bay rum? I know sometimes that can be a tad limey. The wax myrtle? Wax myrtle gives us the scent bayberry. Fine and dandy except I have no idea what that smells like. Is it lemon?

Not to put too fine a point on it, this was grooosssssssss for the longest time. I really wanted to scrub it off, but I wasn't going out anywhere so I stuck it out, hoping that somewhere along the line it would morph into the amazing white floral I'd been expecting. Nope. Never happened. Instead after about an hour the toilet cleaner finally went away and I was left with a very faint, generic pot pouri floral that was completely gone within 2 hours. I considered trying it again the following day to see if there was just something weird going on with my skin chemistry, but you know what... I didn't want to.

Rating: 
1/5

Day 224!

The Golden Lilies - Twyla Perfumes

Details: 
The Golden Lilies
Maia Collection
Twyla Perfumes & Apothecary

Notes: 

This scent starts off strong on the Lily-of-the-Valley,  tiare and apricot, with a beautiful and golden, earthy base of resinous amber to anchor the sweet, almost candy-like tonka bean.  Davana is said to have the unique property of smelling differently on every person's skin. I find it to be rather woodsy, with a hint of herbal-vanilla.  The smooth, deep sandalwood and unusual, almost musky floral of the fire tree - which smells a bit like a musky lilac with a hint of apricot, round out this unique and lovely blend.  

I know I bang on endlessly about how much I hate fruit scents, but one note that can always reel me in is apricot. In the early 1990s I went through many bottles of a much adored apricot vanilla fragrance oil from my local hippie shop. In the bottle this is all apricot to me, the lily of the valley and tiare comes out wet on skin, and it’s a phenomenal combination – a sweet, lush, tropical scent. The dry down is mostly white floral with a lovely vanilla-ish sweetness from the tonka. As with most Twyla scents, the sillage is quite low and it doesn’t last long – it had more or less disappeared within 3 hours. (On that note, Twyla stated on her Facebook page recently that based on feedback regarding longevity and sillage of her otherwise gorgeous scents, she has strengthened the fragrance, so hopefully that is less of an issue now. For now I’m happy to just frequently slather this one and enjoy it immensely while it’s there.)

Rating: 
4/5 It would be a 5 if it lasted longer.  

Day 67!

Nightgown - Solstice Scents

Details: 
Nightgown
Valentine's 2012 Collection (now made permanent)
Solstice Scents

Notes: 
Vanilla, white chocolate, tuberose, tiare flowers.

Floral haters look away now! In the vial this is a pretty white floral, but doesn't smell like anything different to any number of other pretty white florals (and I have a lot of those). On the skin it comes alive. A gorgeous creamy, lush tuberose and tropical tiare flower. Oh man, I cannot stop sniffing my wrists!

Nightgown doesn't really change that much on the dry down, though the vanilla and white chocolate make the florals super creamy. Sillage is quite low for a white floral, a minor disappointment because I want everyone around to know how FABULOUS I smell in this. It did last a good few hours though, so that gave me plenty of time through the day to creepily sniff myself.

Rating:
5/5 I adore this. I will definitely be buying a full bottle, and probably whatever else I can get in this scent. If you like white florals at all this is a MUST TRY.

Day 12!