St. Emma of the Chemicals

BPAL's single note limited edition Siberian Musk is one of the most awesomely awesome scents I have ever applied to myself. For a single note, it is rich, multifaceted sex on a stick.

And unfortunately as I was applying it, the vial essentially disintegrated in my hands. I have maybe - maybe - one application left. And there is no more to be had.

It is incidents like this which are designed to teach me the folly of attachment to material things.

Thanks to the miracle of decant circles, I was able to pick up a rather sizable number of samples of Possets' Egyptian Evenings collection. When I first heard about the concept - and that it would involve a lot of resins - I was stoked. I love resins! So how good was it?

( Reviews are here! )

Some of them (Evil Eye, Bastet, Lotus of the Nile) are wonderful and not quite like anything else in my collection. Some (Kohl, Hatshepsut, Nefertiti, Serqet, The Crown of the Vulture) are from families that are well-represented in my collection, but are nevertheless awesome and fun to wear. Some (The Eye of Horus, Canopic Box, The Crown of the Serpent) are otherwise gorgeous scents that are marred on my skin by one discordant note.

I'm thinking that Evil Eye, Hatshepsut and Bastet may be big bottle worthy, although I'll have to spend a bit more time with Bastet to be sure. Possets is having a sale through September 1, so I have some time to decide.

Alas, I did not fail my will save in sufficient time to make the decant circle for BPAL's Metamorphosis series, but I did manage to pick up a few of them anyway. (Now that I have discovered the glory of decant circles, these sorts of oversights will never happen again. Muahahahaha.)

Ceanothus Silkmoth is yet another exhibit in the mounting pile of evidence indicating that I just need to get over my fear of florals and embrace them already. Orange and oudh temper the jasmine in this, making it feel soft and somehow feathery, like the antennae of a silk moth. Really. I'm not quite sure I know how Beth manages it, either.

Passion Butterfly was a bit of an impulse buy for me, since scents heavy on the citrus fruits aren't typically my thing, but this is surprisingly unfruity and deliciously creamy, and feminine without being girly. Hooray for having a body that amps copal and amber over grapefruit and mandarin.

Sphaeromachia Gaumeri is a light and fluttery white musk, enhanced by lemon, cilantro and coriander in roughly equal measure. I could see wearing this on a sunny west coast morning in early summer.

Interestingly, from the notes alone I thought I'd like Sphaeromachia Gaumeri the most and Passion Butterfly the least, but this seems to have actually been the reverse of what happened. I guess I'm still in the discovery process of what works for my body. All in all, though, these three scents make me wish I'd gotten in on decants much, much sooner. I would have loved a shot at Juniper Hairstreak.

Now that I have started down the dark path of decant circles:

a) forever will it dominate my destiny;
b) thus, you can expect to see a lot more limited and special edition scents in my collection.

My initiation to the decant circle came with the release of BPAL's Fraggle Rock collection.

( Down in Fraggle Rock! )

I initially eschewed Mokey - the fraggle with whom I most identify - because of the preponderance of flowers. I am now wondering if that might not be something I need to get over. Gobo, Red and Wembley (the scents) really represented their namesake fraggles well. Is my fear of the floral keeping me away from scents that might really be me?

As it stands, the Fraggles are definitely awesome. My least favourite fragrance (Red) is still intensely appealing, my most favourite (Doozers) fills a space in my scent collection that I didn't even realize I had, and each one definitely manages to capture the spirit of the source material.

This post's perfumes are from Alkemia, who are located in the western part of the state. Consequently, the time from order placement to "gleefully plucking the envelope of goodies from my mailbox" was two days. Two days! It's almost instant gratification!

Calaveras de Azucar is a shimmering confection of amber and sugar. Adorable.

Dalliance. An aquatically edged cooling blend of cucumber and tea that lasts forever without fading or altering its essence. I look forward to wearing this a lot as the weather heats up.

Divine Goddess Musk. A soft and perfect collaboration of musks. If you're a fan of musk - and I very much am - this is utterly necessary.

Hippie Gypsy. If you could take the essence of who I am - a sometimes soft and sometimes tough hippie chick - and distill it into a bottle, you'd have Hippie Gypsy. There are flowers here, but they're not twee, and you can weave them into your hair as you dance around your incense-perfumed room while listening to Jefferson Airplane. This is love, peace and bliss in a bottle.

Las Soladeras. This has a really interesting energy to it: light, ethereal musk with a peppery kick. My only complaint is that my skin seems to eat this one quickly.

Sandscape is the scent of skin that's been drying in the sun after a long swim in salty water, on a long stretch of sandy beach. It's very understated, wonderfully un-perfumey, and might very well be a summertime essential.

There will be more of this in the future. Oh, yes. There will be more.

I'd been searching for a scent for my RPG character, so when ZOMG Smells came out with the limited edition Lady Stabbington-Hackworth, I thought I'd give it a try. While Mina is no lady, she is all about the stabbington-hackworth. The Green Knight was a freebie that Ariel and Holly were kind enough to throw in.

( Let the battle commence! )

Possets has a series based on states. I had a few on my wish list, and Fabienne was kind enough to read my mind and throw in a few others, so now I have a few. And also a Shipman.

( Onward! )

Now that I've tried a couple of the Lovecraft-themed aquatics, I have to admit that they were nowhere near as dark as I had feared/hoped. They are, in fact, quite lovely, even if they lack, say, the ethereal evil of Nyarlathotep or the delicate sylvan menace of Arkham. I must admit that the Picnic in Arkham collection is shaping up to be a favourite, and I look forward to trying more of it in the future.

( And as for everything else... )