A round up of some of the Valentine's scents for 2011

Random picture of BPALs that have nothing to do with Valentine's Day

THE MORBID THE MERRIER

El Corazon
Like the heart, fickle and a bit deceptive. A heavy, dark, smoky scent with a taunting core of sweetness.

Hasta la Muerte
The innocence of lily and carnation, sweetened with vanilla absolute, smashed and marred by an undercurrent of heartless black spice.

Paramour
Oh, romance. Or something like it. A dozen red roses, spilled wine, a hint of blood, and gunsmoke.

Histoire des Amoureaux
A little Eden, a little de Sade. leather, juicy red apple, a serpent slither of pepper and spice, green grass, and sweat.

Histoure du Professeur
Leather arm chair, starched white cotton shirt, dusty books, a memory of sweet pipe smoke and a faint whiff of brandy kept hidden in a desk drawer.

Histoire du Secretaire
Mile-high leather pumps, skin tight wool pencil skirt, stacks of filing paper, steaming black coffee, a mahogany desk and a hint of musky perfume.

Price:          $12USD
Samples:     Yes, in sets of 3, 5 or 10 and 3ml travel size Eau de Parfum spray.

ONE HAND WASHES THE OTHER

Be Mine
It's a spicy/fruity/vanilla smell, definitely on the feminine side, but I don't see why the right male couldn't pull this off. It's got florals and greens but not a ton- just enough to move it out of the "I smell like food" category. Be Mine is the smell of a thousand heart-shaped cinnamon red-hots sprinkled liberally on buttercream-frosted cupcakes, accompanied by a bowl of punch, cups of coffee and tea; all served at an antique wooden table laden with roses, jasmine and orange blossoms; the perfect Valentine's Day afternoon teatime treat.

Or, for short, it's a spicy vanilla scent with a fruity twist.

Price:          $10.52AUD
Samples:     Yes

POSSETS

Pink Cake
A frothy piece of cake hidden under a dense crust of butter and sugar flavored with the silliest strawberries you ever tasted! Very straightforward but somehow so moist it's a bit like a custard, but not quite. Maria, the Maltese cook and housekeeper has this recipe inherited from her mother and from generations back So very Very VERY good. It is said to be an aphrodisiac.

Pretty
Sweet, pure and desirable, Pretty is just that, divinely pretty like Isabella in the springtime. A whisper of mint flies along three white flowers (a combination of a hint of gardenia, freesia, and a drop of lily), all of this girded about with some dry vanilla (very dry and not the confection you are used to). This is a surprisingly sober fragrance for such a fluffy thought, but then again beauty is a sobering thing to come face to face with.

The Girls Love Leather
Yes! The Girls have discovered the fun of leather, the smell of leather, the sensuality of leather. Leather and honey. Wow. Just Wow. This is not just any old leather, this is the superb stuff which you find in the church shops of Florence, dripping with honey from Malta. Just the apex of the apiary. Yummmmm. Not for the faint of heart, not for the pure of soul!

More Possets Valentine scents here and here.

Price:          $10USD
Samples:     No

BLACK PHOENIX ALCHEMY LAB

Parlement of Foules 2011
For this was on seynt Volantynys day
Whan euery bryd comyth there to chese his mate.

Medieval romance and courtly love. White rose and soft resins.

Red Lantern 2011
A tribute to the opium den cum bawdyhouses of Shanghai in the 1930's.
Golden amber, blonde tobacco, Sudanese black coconut, rich caramel, black currant, white opium and delphinium laced with a sensual blend of Asian spice.

Burning Vulva
Vanilla-infused amber, leather, beeswax, cyclamen, oakmoss, peru balsam, orange blossom, red ginger, tonka, opoponax, myrrh, and black pepper.

Nude Woman Reclining
Calla lily, honeysuckle, Turkish jasmine, ambrette seed, galbanum, iris, and bourbon vanilla.

Nymphia
She Who Blesses Brides
White rose, apple blossom, spun sugar, mango, cucumber, freesia, coconut, and lavender.

BPAL has a ton of Limited Edition scents released for Valentine's Day. You can find more of them here, here, here, and here. 

**And be warned - these links lead to NSFW images of nooooodity.**

Price:          $20USD
Samples:     No

HAUS OF GLOI

Come Hither
Based off of traditional herbs and roots used in Hoodoo to draw and attract a lover, or entice the one you've already ensnared! Bourbon vanilla, tonka bean, cardamon, a touch of rose oil, Queen Elizabeth root, three threads of saffron and a touch of honey to sweeten the whole deal.  

Something Hopeful
Perhaps the first stirrings of the spring to come. Warm sakura blossom green tea with the tiniest droplet of plum juice, red mandarin and crystallized jasmine essence.

Who Needs Love
A mahogany box filled with chocolaty orbs, coated in crystallized coffee - filled with a pomegranate and raspberry filling. Who needs love when you have something this decadent?

Price:          $15USD (scents also available in various bath products)
Samples:     Yes

*All descriptions are the manufacturers' own.

Haus of Gloi Yuletide Sampler

As I mentioned in my haul post the other day, I ordered the Haus of Gloi Yuletide '10 Sampler in order to try out their Christmas scents. I don't need to explain anything about HoG, do I? We all know they make fabulous scented perfumes, soaps and scrubs, they have great customer service, they ship everywhere, etc. etc. Everyone's been raving about them lately - you can't have missed it. Anyway, here are my brief thoughts on the four perfumes in the limited edition holiday sampler.

Perfumes tested this week.

I had this week off (back to work tomorrow - sad face), and I didn't do much of anything besides reading books and messing about on the internet, so I got quite a bit of perfume testing done. As I said last week, I am working through my untested perfume oils alphabetically, and I'm up to D now. Still a way to go!

Etsy roundup

This is the last of my Etsy hauls for the forseeable future. There are so many cute little things on there, it's too tempting to just keep buying a bit of this and a bit of that and it all adds up. Agh! Why must you tempt me, Etsy???? Anyway, these are my most recent purchases.

What's in here then?

Review: Haus Of Gloi (Etsy)

 I made a brief mention of my first Haus Of Gloi purchase in a post about Etsy purchases, but I feel they're worthy of their own post. I had never heard of them until someone in a youtube comment mentioned them, and now reviews and mentions of them are popping up on blogs everywhere. Isn't that always the way?

The first time I bought four samples of their perfume oils, and I talked about those a bit in the previous post. The very fruity Imp went to Noodle Arms, lover of All Things Grapefruit Scented, and she has it in her regular rotation. As I've said many times, I dislike fruit scents, but on her seem to work very well. Maybe they're just a little girl's thing and not meant for a grown woman of - uh - well, a grown woman anyway. Honey Tree is lovely but too similar to a few other perfumes I already have, and as much as I wanted to love Satyr, I just couldn't make it work on me. I think it would make a gorgeous room scent in an oil burner, but on my skin... no. My favourite of the four was the deliciously creamy Troika, and the reason for my second order was just to get a full bottle of that.

Since I was buying anyway, I picked up another couple of sample items - Vice perfume oil, and Twice Is Nice Sugar Creme scrub. This is a moisturising scrub, not a cleansing scrub, and my personal preference is for the cleansing variety (because I am lazy, and I like products that do two things). Having said that, this is a lovely product. I have actually been using it on my hands - it makes them softer and easier to absorb hand cream. The scent of Twice Is Nice is a sweet coconut cream, and doesn't last long on the skin (which for me is a good thing, because I don't like highly scented body products). I would not buy a full size of this product for two reasons - the international shipping is high due to the weight, and I wouldn't generally use it on anything other than my hands. However, I think I will definitely continue to buy sample sizes in various fragrances when I purchase other items, and add it to my regular handcare routine. 

As for the Vice perfume oil, all I can say is OM NOM NOM NOM. Chocolate and coffee, but not sweet - the coffee cuts through any sugariness you might get from the chocolate. This is just divine, and I think it would smell equally delicious on a man. I live for the day I have a man in my clutches who a) likes the smell of perfume, and b) would actually wear fragrance himself. Ah, I can dream. In the meantime, I just have to keep putting this on my wrists and sniffing myself.

That sounded a bit creepy, didn't it...

Etsy love!

I love Etsy - there's a lot of weird junk on there, but there are also tons of little gems that you just don't come across in your bog-standard department store. Noodles has become a bit of a fan too, and spent some of her birthday cash on cute little goodies such as a teacup necklace and Invader Zim pins. Today we came home to three Etsy packages (only one for me, boo!).


This was my package - gorgeous little costume items from Forevermore Creations. These are lovely, delicate little pieces and I love all of them. My favourite is the cream rose earrings. So cute!