Like Lunea Weatherstone, I'm a huge fan of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab. The amazing thing is that their scents do smell exactly as described. And I can read the descriptions all night long. Here are some lovely new ones:
THE GHASTLY GARDEN
Overgrown oleander, marshy water hemlock, the sugared nectar of carnivorous blooms, putrefying wet greenery, oozing sap, crushed rosary peas, withered climbing roses, and nightshade berries.
THE TWISTED OAK TREE
Blackened, rotted oak wood blanketed in moss and choked by a cloak of grasping ivy.
ARCHANGEL WINTER
Crystalline, glassy ice whipped by a snowstorm. Piercing ozone, winter darkness. (I really want this one!)
JÓLASVEINAR 2007
The Jólasveinar are the seventy-some offspring of Grýla and Leppalúði, an ogre couple with a taste for chomping naughty children. This impish brood delights in causing discomfort, sowing confusion, and all-out raising hell during the Yule season. Their names are indicative of their malicious intentions -- Strap Loosener, Door Slammer, Window Peeper, Sausage Snatcher, Doorway Sniffer, Icebreaker -- and their creepy natures -- Lamp Shadow, Smoke Gulper, Crevice Imp. The devillish Jólasveinar finally cease their mischief and head for home at Þrettándinn.
Their scent is a mishmash of snow, dirt, Icelandic moss, marsh felwort, and the smushed petals of buttercups and moorland spotted orchids, with the barest hint of the scent of pilfered Christmas pastries.
THE SHIVERING BOY
Cold, cold forever more. A winter storm roaring through empty stone halls, bearing echoes of despair, desolation, and death on its winds. The scent of frozen, dormant vineyards, bitter sleet, and piercing ozone, hurled through labdanum, benzoin, and olibanum.
I'm also a big fan of Elsa Peretti and am lately longing for her heavily-promoted round pendant. Something about her shapes is so modern and so organic at the same time.
And, this Spring, I want to plant about 25 of these bat plants in the woodland garden. Surely next year we'll get enough rain, right? I will, of course, always long for far more books that I have time to read.
In just a few weeks, I'll run to Whole Foods to buy this year's Beaujolais nouveau, which I'll drink all the way up to Yule. Speaking of Whole Foods, they've gotten me hooked on Brown Paper Chocolates. I especially like the dark chocolate, zapped by ancho chiles, almonds and aged tequila and the white chocolate fragrant with Lavender, Pimm's® No.1 and Chervil with a cracked pepper and lavender fleur de sel afterthought. A tiny shaving of one of these is all you need, much better than the cheap stuff.
What are you longing for?
Oh blessed Hecate! You are the one who got me hooked on BPAW!!! :) I might have to order some more, but I am still loving my stash from last year.
ReplyDeleteI long for peace across the world, but since u-no-what is in the Oval Office, that's not happening.
So, on a more personal level...
I long for someone to love me as much as I love them, not just temporary, but for real and forever. I long for a groovy little home in the Marigny area of New Orleans, w/a funky little bakery that I want to run not too far away (a brisk walk).
I long for friends that show me as much (or even just close) consideration as I show them, and that indulge my emotional excesses as I do my best to handle their honest callousness.
I long for me and I am trying to get back to her. By then, I may not want the 'someone', as I fear I am becoming rather selfish in reaction to the takers I was surrounding myself with.
Looks like from my list, I would do well to order from BPAW and call it 'good' - because I don't see any of the rest really coming around any time soon.
Blessings,
Elspeth