Your late teens, very early 20s are such a strange bit of limbo, aren’t they? Or…at least they were for me. Along with the angst of trying to figure out what you are going to do with the rest of your life, you are sometimes trying to figure out, quite literally, where you are doing these things from, where are they taking you…sometimes even trying to come to terms with where, exactly, your home is, anyway? At that time I was living with my sister and my ex-step-father in one of his longtime friend’s home, and it was an awfully peculiar arrangement.
This friend had a fairly sizable house, and I believe he was going through a divorce, so it was empty, save for him. And he needed help paying for it. In the meantime, my mother was in rehab for her addiction and my grandparents were selling the house that we had grown up in. Actually, why were they selling that house? My sister and I still needed a place to live! She was maybe 17 years old, I was about 19…we weren’t ready to move out and we didn’t have any place to go! This is really weird, now that I think on it. Well, maybe they needed to sell the house to pay for my mother’s rehab. Who knows?
So this guy needed help paying for his house and my sister and I and my ex-step-father needed a place to live, and it seemed to be a decent arrangement. There were two extra bedrooms, which my ex-step-father insisted that we take, and he turned the living room into his bedroom.
At this time I was in my second year of community college and working pretty much full time at my first job, a local fast food chain. College was tough for me–while I like to learn, classroom settings made me terribly anxious and I resented being tested on what I was taught. Often times I could not even drag myself out of bed to make it to my one or two morning classes.
I would lay under the covers, paralyzed, wondering if this is all there was to life. I couldn’t see beyond my immediate issues and neuroses to any sort of future that made any sense to me. And then I would get out of bed and take a shower and wash my hair because that, at least seemed a good first step.
This was probably 1996ish; my hair was growing out after a hair dying catastrophe wherein we had to cut it very, very short. My stylist convinced me that I needed a “Rachel” cut, and anyone who was of television watching age at that time knows precisely what that looks like. Of course my hair was coarse and puffy and frizzy and the cut looked less like Rachel and more like Rachel’s deranged cousin. I don’t have many physical photographs, but here is one with myself and that haircut, in that particular house, along with my sister who I think was trying to tickle me til I puked.
Revlon Outrageous was the drugstore brand shampoo and conditioner that I used at that time and it was the most splendid smelling thing I had encountered up until that point–sort of a sweet, musky floral? I’ve never been able to describe it accurately, but in any event, it was a very “perfumey” scent. Quite sophisticated smelling, at least for something in Walgreens that you were picking up for $3.99 a bottle. My sister once sniffed my head and delightedly told me that I smelled amazing and if she wasn’t my sister she’d want to be my girlfriend. She claims now that she has no memory of saying this, but I know what I heard!
The shampoo eventually became very difficult to find and as I grew older, I’m afraid my tastes became a bit more expensive and so I stopped purchasing it…but I never forgot about that scent.
Many years later–just last autumn, actually!–I stumbled across a tiny store in Portland that had a few offerings from Library of Flowers, whose whimsical storybook packaging I had often admired online, but the scents I had never actually sampled. And wouldn’t you know, the first one I sniffed, Willow & Water, smelled EXACTLY like my beloved Outrageous shampoo!
The notes are as follows, but don’t let them turn you off:
Top: Cut Greens Middle: Flowering Lotus Bottom: Watercress
…which doesn’t sound like it smells anything like what I’ve described, and yet it is. It captures the worldly complexity of that cheap shampoo, the existential crisis of figuring out my early twenties and tinge of sadness that goes along with remembering the last time I would ever live at “home” with one of my beautiful sisters.
Despite the uncertainty and instability of that time, Library of Flowers Willow & Water conjures such a lovely, nostalgia for me…although I suppose it is of the bittersweet sort.
Sometimes I wonder if there is really any other kind.
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Love–or a reasonable facsimile thereof–is in the air, and Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s Lupercalia collection of fragrances is back for 2016!
Inviting us to celebrate the warmth of passion in the dead of winter, the smut peddlers at BPAL again deliver narcotic, necrotic scents for the lovelorn and lustful, the depraved and the intemerate. Naturally, it is as filthy as we have come to expect from these artfully perverse indie perfumers.
Another Lupercalia blooms, and suddenly the old ways are new again. Drawing inspiration from erotic poetry by salty bards of yore, the voluptuous delights to be enjoyed via salacious works of art, and the hedonistic pleasures of chocolate-covered delicacies, this collection offers a sybaritic selection of new loves and old flames (Signior Dildo is back!) Whether you’re in the mood to “scrutinize shadowy, aberrant passions or bask in the rose-tinted warmth of new love”, there is something here to arouse and amuse both revelers and lustful onlookers alike.
(A warning to the over-enthusiastically lecherous and libidinous! The fiery loin-stoking described within is intended to be figurative, not literal–do not apply these products to your naughty bits!)
First up, a few favorites from the Shunga line, a limited edition Salon series celebrating the joy, humor, playfulness, and thrill of sexual intercourse through scent interpretations of Edo-era Japanese erotic art.
Beanman and Beanwoman Climb Genital Mountain (hazelnut smoke and leather with dark musk, white cognac, caramelized vetiver, and a drop of honeyed whiskey) is depicted by two intrepid explorers–Mr. and Mrs. Bean, one would presume–who appear to be both spelunkers and mountaineers, and are hiking their way through a carnal landscape. My first thought is that this is an aggressively nutty scent, although perhaps I’m being overly influenced by the hairy, bulbous nutsack upon which Mrs. Bean is precariously perched. It effortlessly morphs into creamy booze and soft leather, and I like to think that the Beans took a moment to toast each other with snifters of Drambuie while settling back in well-worn leather armchairs to enjoy the show.
Blossoming Vulva (golden amber and bourbon vanilla with sweet oak, blue lotus, and tea blossom) is a soft, tender scent, with a disarmingly plastic tinge to it–but somehow it works. Like, if you walked in on your friend making sweet, sweet love to a beautiful blow-up sheep (who also happened to be wearing your favorite vanilla lip gloss)…and found yourself alarmingly horned up by the whole thing. You know, like that.
Those who revel in refreshing, invigorating scents will enjoy Rendezvouz at the Bath (minted green tea and cucumber), a simple scent that at its core calls to mind the revitalizing aroma of a bracing swipe from a super-posh moist towelette. Which you probably needed after the sheep incident. In a similar vein, Geisha in a Green Kimono (gunpowder tea, yellow bergamot, white thyme, blackcurrant, red mandarin, wormwood, neroli, and green musk) evokes a fortifying restorative; a citrusy, herbal draught for flagging spirits (or, you know, your limp, spent junk.) Not quite medicinal, but with a sinister undercurrent of “is this stuff legal?” It’s probably not.
Next in this orgiastic sniff-a-thon are a handful of scents inspired by Fleurette’s Purple Snails, an amorous tale containing a fabulous assortment of gracefully lascivious illustrations from the pen of gentleman pornographer Franz Von Bayros. (As an aside, has anyone ever seen that bizarre cashmere sweater scene with Tuesday Weld in Lord Love A Duck? I am starting to feel what I imagine to be that same sense of sensual ekstasis right now, but with perfumes instead of knitwear.)
Fleurette’s Purple Snails (white sandalwood, orris root, wood violet, sugared violet blossom, and violet leaf) is all candied violet pastilles, powdered dressing tables, frothy petticoats and curious feelings/fondlings involving your roommate at parochial school. On the opposite end of the spectrum, The Initiation (red wine and vanilla pod infused with caramel, peach, tobacco flower, and coconut) is a decidedly wicked scent: a honey-spiked crystal goblet of claret and soft nibbles of ripe stone fruit from the end of a jeweled-encrusted dagger. Madame traces its cool, sharp point down the skin of your neck as the wine burns a delicate fire in your throat…
The Two Old Men (sweet brown leather, cacao absolute, coffee bean absolute, and teakwood) is the peculiar scent amongst the bunch wherein I cannot make out a single one of the notes listed. And yet–it is utterly perfect. It’s less a specific smell and more a certain person it calls to mind. A rich weirdo with strange desires. It’s a rather…Grey scent. Oh, god no. Not that Grey, don’t look at me like that. I’m talking the creepy, conflicted E. Edward Grey, James Spader’s character in the 2002 film Secretary. This is the smell of a handsome lawyer calling his girlfriend on the phone and instructing her to eat just a scoop of creamed potatoes, one slice of butter, four peas. Then he probably goes home and sobs uncontrollably.
It’s sexy as hell. I need help.
And finally in this sexual smorgasbord of tantalizing treats are the Bonbons: sweetly indulgent scents for chocolate fetishists and bacchantes who thrill in luxurious, aphrodisiac confections. The two standouts amongst this exquisite array are Dark Chocolate, Black Tobacco, and Vetiver which conjures the dreamiest leather-daddy sex demon from the nether realm and Milk Chocolate, Myrrh, and Gunpowder which smells of the unmistakable tang of post-coital musk alongside warm, cocoa-infused fondue. Sort of like a raunchy porno filmed in an overflowing chocolate fountain. Like all the best things in life are.
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As a human person who exists on this planet today, you no doubt have a love/hate relationship with that book of Faces and are logged in at all hours clicking through your friend’s feeds: avoiding spoilers, hurrying past your racist relatives and small town, small-minded high school acquaintances ignorant blather, and finally slowing your scroll to squee over the delightful antics of pandas frolicking in the season’s first snow and baby otters floating blissfully on their mother’s bellies. Give us all the animals! We’re even obsessed with that bizarro “water bear” micro-animal that resembles a friendly eight-legged butthole.
Man, humans are weird.
The vagaries of humanity’s strange predilections aside, if you’ve spent any time in a zoo or a farm or caring for animals, you are perhaps–for better or worse–acquainted with the pungent variety of scents associated with our beastly friends. But have you ever found yourself wishing to smell like one of your favorite critters? (Okay, okay, maybe we are back in weirdo territory again.)
Well, Victor Wong of Zoologist perfumes has, and is exactly the kind of weirdo and visionary that we love. A wild dreamer who has a boundless fascination with the animal kingdom and its idiosyncrasies, Victor works with award-winning perfumers to capture the manifold delights of the natural world in fragrance form, and has created a line of eau de parfums that are “unusual, beautiful, fun, and even shocking.” And, and I am thrilled to report, these scents do not even contain animal products! “We don’t want to harm animals so that we can smell good”, notes Victor. Awww!
I’ll get this one out of the way first, because I can already hear you tittering like a bunch of 13-year-olds. Beaver, heh heh heh, right? Grow up, dorks. With a base of castoreum (synthetic beaver musk) and notes of linden blossom, iris, earth, and smoke, this opens on an outdoorsy, woodland aquatic vibe that quickly becomes an acrid, animalic musk. Despite the subtly sweet powderiness that keeps it from venturing into “unpleasant” territory, it isactually a kind of funky, moist scent. It’s pretty skanky, but in a really interesting and strangely comforting way. Beaver was designed by Chris Bartlett who describes his creations as, “fragrances that some people will love, rather than perfumes everyone will like.” Fair enough!
Like its namesake, Rhinoceros is a massive fragrance which opens with an enormous blast of dry, boozy rum and tobacco. There’s leather here, as well as sage, and lavender–and it all makes for very interesting contrasts. The dark, raw, leatheriness and the lighter herbal aromatics both play off each other and then again come together to conjure the “heat shimmering on the still Savannah” as the product description suggests. The nose behind this fragrance is Paul Kiler and with Rhinoceros he has created something hugely remarkable.
Another fragrance created by Paul Kiler, Panda begins with an intense, dewy green accord and hints of peppery warmth that is soon followed by orange blossoms and lilies, and finally comes to rest at earthy roots and damp mosses. This is less the roly-poly panda himself and more a chronicle of his slow stroll as he journeys from mountain springs to bamboo groves, munching on stalks and leaves, and basically just living a very low-key, low-stress, serene Panda lifestyle. Much later there is the barest whiff of sandalwood; perhaps the last stop in his travels is a shadowy temple at sunset, to light a stick of incense and thank the gods for his good fortune.
This is a lush, vivacious offering from nose Shelley Waddington. Brimming with a kaleidoscope of opulent fruits and honeyed florals, it calls to mind a tea party in a bright spring garden; effervescent personalities flit and flirt, while poetic dalliances occur amongst the softly blooming lilac and sweetly musky honeysuckle. Delicate nectars and sweet ambrosia is served, and later that night you dream of the sunlight glimmering through the season’s fleeting apple and plum blossoms.
Designed by award-winning perfumer Dr. Ellen Covey, Bat is undeniably, the strangest, most wonderfully unique perfume you will ever smell. Opening with a nearly overwhelming note of damp, primordial earth both vegetal and mineral in execution, this immediately conjures inky caverns and pitch-black, damp limestone caves. The scent then morphs into something I can only describe as “night air and velvet darkness”; I cannot say how she has done this, I only know that it is the very essence of the vast, temperate midnight sky, the glowing moon high overhead. At this point it becomes something quite different, and–quite possibly–even more beautiful. Soft fruits, delicate musks, and resins lay at the heart of this enigmatic scent and combine to create a fragrance that lightly circles around the wearer to surprise them with a mysterious sweetness at the most surprising times. According to Dr. Covey who has spent a great deal of time researching and studying bats, with this quality the scent has succeeded pretty well in doing what she envisioned.
Full size 60ml bottles with charming illustrations by Daisy Chan can be purchased at Zoologist.com for $125, while generously sized 2.5ml spray samples can be had for $6 a piece. A sampler set, containing all five scents, is available for $25.
(This article was originally posted at Dirge; the site is no longer active.)
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My mother was a complicated piece of business. That reads more harsh than what I meant to write, and I am feeling kindly disposed this morning, so perhaps I will amend that to say that my feelings about my mother are the real complications here.
When I was eleven years old, I couldn’t fathom saying such a thing. My mother was this amazing, radiant being; she was like unto God. I don’t know what, precisely, I based this upon – perhaps nothing at all save a daughter’s faith and devotion that was as yet untested. 20 cats? That’s ok, I loved cats! My mom didn’t drive? No problem, my grandma took us everywhere that we needed to go! No money? Ah, we were happy and well-cared for, who needs money? I recall gazing at her, one evening, rapt, and exclaiming “I can’t imagine ever having a fight with you, mom!” She smiled enigmatically, knowing better.
(When I grew much older and had to divest her dilapidated beach cottage of 20 sick felines and several heartbreakingly unwell dogs; when I got my driver’s license and became my mother’s chauffeur at all hours of the night; when I loaned her money time and again which would never be repaid–that is when my feelings became irreversibly complicated).
However, by the time I was fourteen years old, they were certainly going through some complex changes. My beautiful, brilliant mother was, without a doubt, a raging alcoholic.
I think I have blocked out much of my home-life during my teenage years at this time; I recall going to school, I remember spending time with my boyfriend, I can re-live just about every single moment I ever spent at my first job…but there’s not much I remember about my mother, save surreal flashes of trauma here and there. A Thanksgiving morning when our refrigerator broke down; the kitchen flooded, she had a meltdown and subsequently entered rehab for the first time. 3am early mornings when she cornered my sister and I in a bedroom while she ranted and raged for hours about god knows what, while terrified and confused, we wondered how we would function at school the next day. My senior year of high school when she disappeared for two weeks entirely. These things.
The one thing I can unfailingly conjure up now, twenty years from now, perhaps even on my deathbed, is her scent: Perfumer’s Workshop Tea Rose.
A scent upon which my grandmother would often remark in disgust “You smell like a funeral parlour!” Tea Rose permeated the fabric of my mother’s clothes and floated around her from room to room in a fragrant cloud. My mother wore exotic, jingling belled anklets which would tinkle and announce her presence as she made her way throughout her home–but Tearose often loudly preceded those tiny chimes.
I purchased a bottle for myself recently, and a week later I am just now able to bring myself to slide the cellophane from the plain, somewhat retro looking brown box and remove the bottle. I’ve been afraid to spray it, not knowing what images and memories the perfume will invoke. Not ready for the the feelings it will inevitably stir up.
Initially somewhat sour and strange, this is an incredibly potent fragrance, that opens chilly and green and bitter. It smells less of rose petals and more, I imagine, of chilled thorns, after a frost. Prickly, biting. Slightly metallic, like the mineral tang of blood, but without the hemic crimson associations.
If it smells like roses, these are not any roses I would wish to be familiar with. These are not lush, inviting midsummer roses in full bloom, nor are they delicate, blushing buds.
This is more like …roses, plucked too young, brainwashed and warped and corrupted and distilled into something astringent and spiky and cruel. If it were a color, it would be an otherwordly emerald, facets glowing strangely, lit from within by distant, verdant starlight.
If you’re patient, though…if you wait long enough…. Let it dry. Give it time. Walk away. It then becomes just a rose. Any rose. All roses. And in it I can smell my mother’s summer cotton night gowns. I can smell the evenings she spent reading us James and the Giant Peach when we were very young. I can smell the soft, warm fur of her favorite Siamese cat.
I can smell the very best memories I have of her, and there is nothing left of the complications.
This is not to say that Tea Rose is a fragrance that I can, or want, to wear. Although I enjoy the scent of roses, I’ve never wanted to smell like one. Tea Rose is a bottle I will take off the shelf when I am having angry thoughts, hateful thoughts, or a bad day when I am blaming my mother’s failures for my own shortcomings.
Just a small spritz, with a light hand.
A reminder that my mother was only human, as am I. We can only be who we are.
And a rose is, after all, just a rose.
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Laugh all you like, but when I get cold, I get cold. My fingernails turn blue and my butt cheeks become ice cubes (even under layers!) right around this time of year, and …wait for it…it’s only about 60 degrees.
It’s true. I am a total cold weather weenie. I have no idea how I lasted as long as I did in New Jersey when there were actual winters with snow and ice and never-ending Februaries. Ugh! I don’t even like thinking about it. It’s bad enough I still dream about it– about once a month or so, even though I have been back in Florida for four years now.
So when the temperatures dip into the arctic mid-50s, I cannot wear my go-to tee shirts and flip-flips, no way, no how. I’d freeze to death! I’ve developed a winter uniform that I pretty much wear every day starting this time of year…and the bonus is that it doesn’t even have a chance to get old, since our “winter” only lasts about a week!
1. Giant cotton kettle-dyed scarf from the Scarf Shop // 2. Babooshka Boutique asymmetric shirt dress // 3. floridxfauna skull fragment necklace // 4. HUE black leggings // 5. OVATE Valhalla hoodie (I think this is sold out, but they always seem to bring it back)
The leggings are the high-waisted kind with some sort of shaping, so they’ve got a tiny bit of structure to them and it doesn’t feel like your flabby belly is flumping hither and yon under your pants. Which wouldn’t matter anyway because the tunic/tee dress is so gloriously voluminous. In any event, they are very, very comfortable and I would highly recommend this brand to people who do not find leggings abhorrent. There are no shoes pictured because well, let’s be honest. Where am I wearing shoes? I work from home and wear socks and never go anywhere. Shoes would be a lie.
Not pictured is something that should have made my 2015 best of list, but I think I was a little bit too embarrassed to mention it. I’ve been growing increasingly self-conscious about that bra-strap fat that oozes out and around my ladies’ support garments, so I’ve taken to wearing this wonderful thing. I’m not even going to type the name out. It’s too dumb. Click on the link and you will see what I mean. Despite the name though, I love it. I purchased four of them last year and they are by far–seriously– the best thing anyone has ever made, and I wear them under just about everything.
It is also winter perfume season! Time to slather myself with all of the woodsy, mysterious resins and incenses! Which most of these are, save for the Bergamoss, which is loamy and sweetly grassy and strangely enough there’s a weird bit of celery in there, too. It’s a nice break between the heavy scents I tend to wear this time of year.
1. Aftelier Bergamoss // 2. House of Matriarch Black No. 1 // 3. Terveer Incense // 4. Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab Practical Occultism (Limited Edition but rumored to return).
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Listen, I’ll level with you here. There’s no one who can shop for you like you can.
Unless you are providing your friends and loved ones with highly detailed lists which note exactly what something is and where it can be found (which I’ve come to think of as kind of tacky, but your mileage may vary!) it is unlikely you are going to receive that weird/macabre/grotesque/OH DEAR GOD WHAT IS THAT item on your list for which you have been longing intensely.
So here’s what you do. Your holiday shopping is, I assume, done and over with, correct? You can breathe a sigh of relief. Pour a glass of wine…or a shot of whiskey…or whatever your poison is – except – please, for the love of all things holy, not one of those vulgar energy drinks.
It is now time to focus on you and what you want – and no, I am fairly certain it is not that Bath and Body Works gift basket in some gross, fruity scent you’ll never wear or that gaudy hummingbird wind-chime from someone who learned 20 years ago that you liked hummingbirds and never listened when you told them gently that your tastes had changed since you graduated from high school.
(And don’t get me wrong – I love it when people think of me enough to buy me a gift, and I am grateful…I just don’t ever expect someone is going to get me that thing that I really, really, want!)
It is now time to throw a few gifts for yourself under the tree! Consider the following items and please note that they all have the mlleghoul stamp of approval, for they have been purchased solely by and for myself.
Books
If you are not already entranced by Segovia Amil’s dark, captivating beauty on instagram, you’ll be bewitched by her words in Ophelia Wears Black, her first published book of poetry. “Ophelia Wears Black is a collection of poetry and prose focusing on the shadow aspects and dark side of the human experience through the eyes of a young girl. Divided into four parts, each mirroring the cycling seasons, we follow Ophelia into her own re-imagined Underworld where she learns to make sense of and find the perfection and necessity of her own inner darkness.”
I have not been able to put down Folk Horror Revival: Field Studies since receiving it a few weeks ago, it is some of the most compelling, fascinating writing I have ever read on one of my very favorite subject. Featuring essays and interviews by many great cinematic, musical, artistic and literary talents, Folk Horror Revival: Field Studies is the most comprehensive and engaging exploration to date of the sub genre of Folk Horror and associated fields in cinema, television, music, art, culture and folklore. AND 100% of all profits from sales of the book will be charitably donated to environmental, wildlife and community projects undertaken by The Wildlife Trusts.
Music & Art & Baubles
Lost Voices: Volume 1 – Keening and The Death Wail: Lost Voices explores vocal improvisation in folk culture. Volume 1: Keening and the Death Wail considers Keening (a traditional improvised vocal lament) practised by women in ancient Ireland and worldwide. Includes a 31 page booklet exploring the history of the art of keening with a cd of audio examples.
Easeful Death labradorite coffin ring from bloodmilk (sorry for my hands, I know those pointy witch claws are en vogue right now, but I can’t knit with those nails and I’d probably put my eye out.) “Cast immortal in sterling silver, bat wing and leg bones molded from the real thing, are composed into a beautiful setting cradling a labradorite coffin cut jewel.”
Death and the Maiden art print, by artist Tenebrous Kate of Heretical Sexts: “The virginal blush of youth and the icy hand of death, Eros and Thanatos, vanity and decay. Emerging from the imagery found in Medieval depictions of the Dance of Death, the motif of Death and the Maiden is at once macabre and erotic.”
Littlest friend bat cloisonné pin from Cat Coven. Perfect for lapels – whether they’re gracing leather jackets or spooky granny cardigans!
A ghostly white resin hand pendant on recycled black leather from artist Alice Rogers of Trances and Portents.
Eau de Mort parody ad art print by the incomparably lovely Becky Munich. This one is a bit of a cheat since it was a gift, but I have several prints from Becky hanging on my walls and there is space for several more -so no doubt many purchases from this talented artist will occur in the future!
Fragrant Fripperies
There’s not a Yule that goes by wherein I am not sorely tempted by Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s seasonal winter holiday scents, and how could I resist this years offerings, which included the Icelandic Yule lads (not pictured). The answer is that I could not.
I also treated myself to a sampler set from The House of Orpheus, which is something I have been meaning to do for a while. Enodia is lovely beyond compare –
“… ancient goddess of the streets. She is the Nachtfalter, the moth, the night butterfly. Guided by the moon and associated with Artemis, Hekate and Persephone. Black Storax would have been in the incense burned in offering to this goddess of the street and so we base this perfume in Black Storax, with notes of Black Agars Wood, Moroccan Myrrh, and Vanilla. It is exalted by the alchemical oil of silver”.
Also! I’ve loved the candles from Burke and Hare for awhile now, so much so that I tend to burn through their offerings much too quickly. On a whim, during a recent sale, I picked up Dragon’s Blood: “…fragranced with the precious red resins that create the alluring scent known as Dragon’s Blood. It is a potent and earthy fragrance, infused with cedar wood and patchouli essential oils. The scent combines sweet and spicy notes to form a sophisticated complex blend. “
Lastly some Blackbird incense from CatbirdNYC, in the exclusive fragrances of Violet Hour and Russian Caravan, in addition to a small wooden tealight holder crafted by Peg & Awl for Sisters of the Black Moon.
Have you already been generous to yourself this season? Well, Merry Hexmas to you! I’d love to get a nosy peek into your loot and see what I might be missing!
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I recently had the distinct pleasure of writing a course guide for the uninitiated and those new to the splendors of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab and their myriad, wonderful fragrances. You can find it over at Haute Macabre.
And because I don’t know how to be brief and possess the uncanny (and not at all annoying!) ability to make a long story even longer, you will find it broken down into three installments, for easier reading:
It gets a little personal, I’m afraid. I find it difficult to separate a beloved thing from the experiences I’ve had while adoring that thing -so there are more than a few anecdotes and opinions. It cannot be helped!
I have loved Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab, their people, and their fragrances for a very long time now and I do hope I’ve done them justice with my words. Let me know what you think! Have I missed anything? What are your favorites scents and collections? Favorite BPAL memories over the years?
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Earlier in the year I wrote of my unfortunate experiences with a handful of cosmetics and beauty products, so that I might save you, dear friends, the misfortune of spending your money on them, or perhaps worse – applying them to your person.
As it turns out, there are quite a lot of really awful products out there! And as you can imagine, I like to ramble on extensively about such things, so I shall be featuring a quasi-regular Stinkers & Duds column to share with you these products that range from Mildly Offensive to Relatively Useless to Really Fucking Gross, Kill It With Fire.
On today’s list:
1. Caudalie Lip Conditioner $12: this has the consistency of a 1000 year old crayon – nay, a fossilized million year old crayon. Perhaps carbon dating methods cannot even determine the exact age of the waxy substance which comprises this product. Combine this with all the healing properties of spiked lizard skin and scraping sandpaper and then imagine scouring this rough specimen across your poor, tender lips. Wonder at the bleeding mess you have made of your mouth because you have done this ill-advised thing. Think about demanding your money back from Sephora but then never actually do it because you find the act of returning things to the store and dealing with customer service repugnant. Stew fretfully for the rest of your life about it.
2. Nature Republic Bee Venom Cleansing Foam $12.98: I had read several good reviews about this product, the bee venom is supposedly good for neutralizing redness, and I have this problem on my cheeks and chin every now and then. I don’t quite understand what it is – i am not naturally ruddy-cheeked (I am actually rather sallow) and it’s not acne or blemishes. Just sort of an…inflamed irritation? I don’t know. Anyway, this did not help at all. Not only did it do nothing – I am still as red as a tomato most days – it smells a bit like hand cream that you’ve left in your pocketbook too long and which has gone off, and it was terribly drying. Nope.
3. Viktor & Rolf Flowerbomb $50: I hate Victor and Rolf’s Flowerbomb so much that I nearly fly into a rage. It smells petty and mean spirited and small-minded. Like bigoted small town pageant moms and the shitty popular girls in 80s movies. It simultaneously makes me want to cringe and cry. It’s all the Heathers. Also: it’s an enormous lie. It smells nothing like any flower. As to what it does smell like, precisely, I cannot pinpoint. A shallow dish of sugar water with some sneezy, sweetish powder mixed in. Like Koolaid, I guess. It smells like a celebutaunte-inspired Koolaid. Or perhaps flower extrait that smells like Bongo jeans and hair-sprayed bangs and the wretched duo of Jennifer W. and Amanda P. in the 7th and 8th grade. How’s it feel to be the inspiration for the world’s worst fragrance, you dumb, hateful bitches?
4. Redken Color Extend Magnetics Sulfate Free Shampoo and Conditioner $26.50 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sulfates are bad, I get it. Whatever – I LIKE sulfates! They actually lather up and clean my hair and get the dang job done. However, my stylist talked me into trying this stuff, and to be honest I only used it once. T
Me: nearly waist length, color treated hair. Slightly coarse, wavy. Frizzes up in the right conditions (ie 100% in Florida). I have a lot of hair and you can tell.
Me on Redken Color Extend Magnetics: Hair is lank, limp, greasy. I look like Samara, crawling out of the well and off of your teevee set to kill you. Guess you shouldn’t have watched that video when you knew your friends were dying one by one a week later. I now officially resemble a Japanese murder ghost and obviously someone has to pay.
Also when my sweet, thoughtful, always complimentary dude wrinkled up his nose as he sniffed my freshly washed head and remarked with a grimace “ugh, you smell like dog ears” – which, WTF does that even mean? – I threw it out with out a backward glance. Life’s too short to smell like dog’s ears, folks.
What’s had you wrinkling your nose lately? Tell me all about your own stinkers and duds! I’m all ears, as always.
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It’s a long shot, but maybe you’ve heard about a little film released recently by that guy – you know. He does the scary stuff… Guillermo …what’s his name? Yeah, it wasn’t very big, not a lot of hype. Really flew under the radar, you know? Scarlet Summit? No, hm. Ruby Pinnacle? This is gonna drive me nuts.
Ha! Just kidding, you weirdos. I reckon Crimson Peak has been on our collective horror-nerd radar for the last three years, and we’ve anxiously been counting down the days until its release earlier this month whilst working ourselves into a feverish delirium awaiting its myriad charms.
A lush, lavish gothic romance in high, bloody style – and a dizzying exercise in glorious excess – Guillermo del Toro’s Crimson Peak delivered on a grand scale. A tale to delight the senses on every level, brimming with terrible, tragic beauty and darkly dreamy imagery, both elegant and savage – the only thing missing from this gorgeous experience is the fragrance of those dark secrets and monstrous revelations.
The mad geniuses over at Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab anticipated this, and October 31, 2015, marks the release of their Crimson Peak-inspired line of fragrances, nail polish, jewelry, and statuary.
As to the scents themselves, the lab has outdone themselves. I’ve been wearing their fragrances for years and although they consistently provide marvelous olfactory experiences, never had they made as strong a showing as they have with this singular collection. Among the oils I sampled, each was beautifully nuanced, deliciously complex and perfectly – uncannily – captured the essence of the character or the theme conveyed.
In short, I think I loved them all. My wallet weeps at this pronouncement.
Some standouts include:
Edith Cushing (Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind: pearlescent vanilla musk with white sandalwood, grey amber, white patchouli, ambrette seed and oudh. ) smells of wholesome beauty, youthful innocence and somehow…of butterflies and ruffled nightgowns. The airy warmth of delicate musk and sweetly powdered limbs.
Both Sir Thomas Sharpe (Give in to temptation: black amber darkens a pale fougere.) and Lady Lucille Sharpe (Love makes monsters of us all; faded red roses and a glimmer of garnet with black lily, yang slang, smoky plum musk and black amber. ) share the same melancholy amber base. Sir Thomas is a close to the skin scent – slightly sweet, with a hint of light musk and tinge of tears – it is a somewhat sad smelling thing. Lady Lucille, on the other hand, is plummy with dark roses and the tang of something deliciously unhinged. “Love makes monsters of us all,” she mused, and you can smell that cruel, desperate sentiment in this bottle.
Dr. Alan McMichael (My deeper concern has always been for you. If you are happy, I am happy.
Bay rum and sandalwood) is a deceptively simple, comfortable scent. A feeling of safety, of familiarity, of leaning into a warm neck and breathing in skin and a hint of luxurious aftershave. Also…of horses. I have never actually seen a horse in real life, mind you -I only know them from books, but I am fairly certain that story-horses share this smell.
Crimson Peak [EPONYMOUS] (A house that breathes, that bleeds, and remembers. A house like this, in time can become a living thing with timber for bones and windows for eyes: snow marbled with blood-red clay frozen over the scent of decayed wood) conjures a bleak, chilled incense. Not an entirely welcoming fragrance at first, but as it sinks into the skin, becomes a part of you, you detect a very slight woody warmth and its peculiar charms become a thing to crave.
The Manuscript (A ghost story – Your father didn’t tell me it was a ghost story.
It’s not, Sir, it’s – more like a story…with a ghost in it.
A leather-bound manuscript, ink barely dry. A Gothic ghost tale, personified. The pages are permeated with a preternatural otherworldly quality – but only slightly, as the ghost is a counterpoint; leather and paper and splotches of ink, with a hint of ghostly chill.) Rich, buttery leather, parchment dried with age and subtle, acrid scent of something you can’t quite place -something from the corner of your eye or a mostly forgotten childhood memory. This smells of déjà-vu to me; a book I’ve not yet read and yet have somehow have committed the tale to heart.
Black Moths (Back home we only have black moths. Formidable creatures. They thrive on the dark and cold.
What do they feed on?
Butterflies, I’m afraid.
A flutter in the darkness: wild plum and black currant with aged black patchouli, vetiver, red rose petal, tonka absolute, and opoponax) Brittle, papery, musty darkness that becomes lighter in the wearing never but quite loses that tinge of unease, of quiet menace.
Perhaps you’d rather scent your rooms than your person?
Young Edith’s Bedroom (beeswax, leather-bound paper, white gardenias) hints at porcelain and wood, lace and shadow but becomes the most incredible, bombastic honey scent I have ever encountered.
Lucille’s Room (lilac water, fossilized black amber, lily of the valley, violet leaf, oakmoss) is a lighter, more subdued fragrance, recalling the play of shadow and light and the flutter of moth wings in between.
The Workshop (sawdust and gear lubricant, metal rods shining in golden afternoon light) –is it possible to smell the imagery of dust particles floating lazily in a patch of dim afternoon sunlight on a cold, clear afternoon in late winter ? I believe have.
Allerdale Hall (A grand house brooding against the horizon, a silhouette of jutting chimneys and sharp angles silhouetted against the grey sky) Allerdale Hall is a challenging scent to pin down. Dark oiled woods and the scent of the sky before a snow.
A sensory masterwork, these 30 individual, original scents expand upon the vivid world of the film’s characters and story points and are available in 5ml apothecary bottles exclusively via the Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab website.
And of course, it’s imperative to know how one might wear this collection, is it not?
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Though popular media (or, you know, your friends on Instagram) might lead you to believe that autumn’s return is heralded by Halloween décor at Home Goods or the the-much-reviled-by-a-certain-idiot-food activist (and therefore much beloved by me) Pumpkin Spice Latte from Starbucks – well, no. You are all wrong. Those in the know have come to recognize that with the arrival of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s annual limited edition Halloween scents, or “weenies” as they have affectionately been called, we can now officially welcome the start of the fall season.
For the uninitiated: Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab specializes in formulating darkly compelling fragrance blends and “masterfully molded scent environments that capture legends and folklore, poetry, and the stuff of dreams and nightmares.” By utilizing their knowledge of homeopathy and aromatherapy, the conceptual theories of hermetic alchemy, and the aesthetic artistry of perfumery, they have “mastered the art of encapsulating allegorical ideas into singular olfactory experiences.” In short, they make things that smell good for weirdos like us.
“The skies have darkened, and summer’s last bright green leaf has turned”; thus begins the introduction to the 2015 Halloween collection on their website, and my melancholic poetry loving, fragrance fanatic fangirl heart is already ensnared and dreaming of darkened myrrh and icy funeral lilies – but they’ve got something for all Halloween children, I assure you! Whether you’ve a hankering for ALL PUMPKIN EVERYTHING, candied fruit and sugar skulls, or piles upon piles of sweetly rotting, desiccated leaves, you will without a doubt find your holy grail for All Hallow’s Eve in this deliciously haunting line up.
This year’s offerings include several favorites from ‘weenies past, including the aforementioned Sugar Skull, All Souls (incense mingled with the soft, sugared currant soul cakes) and Samhain (damp woods, fir needle and black patchouli, pumpkin, spices, and sweet red apple) – just to name a few.
Or perhaps you’d prefer bobbing for apples (razors here? Pffft!) Try Apple I (apple with oats, honey, sweet cream), Apple II (green apple with pink pepper, juniper, lemon) or Apple III (Appalachian black apple with tobacco, patchouli, orange blossom).
Do your tastes run to less complex scents? BPAL offers Halloween “single notes”, their cheeky interpretations of iconic autumnal scents. Less treat and more trick, here: Clown White, Stage Blood, and Polyester Spiderweb certainly sound like they could layer together and create some interesting olfactory imagery!
Most intriguing to me was this year’s Pickman Gallery scents: Hecate’s Inheritance, inspired by thirteen exquisite depictions of witches and their craft, and Sympathy for The Devil, an interpretation of seven visions of He Who Shuns the Light. Some of my favorite BPAL ‘weenies include:
The Sorceress by Jean van der Velde II: An evocation incense of frankincense, styrax, lavender buds, mastic, and white sandalwood mingled with moonflower, violet absolute, tuberose, and dark musk. Truly the dark floral to end all dark florals, people.
La Femme de Satan by Nikolai Kalmakoff. Red musk and cacao with clove, caramelized tobacco, aged patchouli, red currant, black leather, and vanilla-infused amber. This is the scent of a party girl possessed by a demon and she will fuck your shit up.
And lastly, Witches’ Kitchen by Frans Francken. Belladonna accord, sprigs of rue, crushed hyssop, white sage, beeswax, mandrake leaf, bay rum, black honey, hemp, and myrrh. Sweet herbs steeped in dark honey and the delicate scent of infernal hexes wafting on the breeze.
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