TokyoMilk

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Marine Sel

Glass pot of solid perfume with a gold lid (I dropped and cracked the pretty crested lid, sadly) and box illustrated with 1920’s drawing of swimming gentlemen.

TokyoMilk #54

Margot Elena lists notes of mineral salts, fresh water, turned earth, and white woods–which adds up somehow to sweet seaweed.

Opens with an aquatic fruity green note that stays wet for an hour before sinking into the skin with a faint wave of salty driftwood.
The solid is sheer, without much projection, but this is one I wouldn’t want to douse myself with–I think it could easily turn brackish and swampy.

Simple, amiable and unisex.
Good for reminiscing about seaside vacations, but collectors’ prices seem high for those memories.

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Destiny

TokyoMilk rollerball and magenta capped black packaging, on chunks of crystalized ginger.

TokyoMilk #79

Destiny is that marvelous obnoxious friend who’s a blast to hang with, but would wear you out if it were an everyday thing.

Rolls on in with sugary ginger and wild berries, in a heavy-handed but good way, then develops some nice nasty indolic tendencies.
A pleasant bitter-sweetness that might be the davana paired with honeysuckle interrupts for a few hours at arm’s length, then slowly settles down to creamy cuddly jasmine for the rest of the day.

Lots of fun, but for occasional use only.
(Can be hard to find. Snag a bottle if you see it at a price you can afford–I’ve see them as low as $12 used and $60 new.)

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I would totally hang out with Lizzo EVERY day.

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Bulletproof

TokyoMilk black mini bottle with white pistol illustration, and a marching line of .45 caliber bullets.

Fierce out of the bottle, smoked black tea with two sugars and burning cedar shavings, loud in personal space, soft outside.
Lasts three hours before sliding into nutty vanilla and dark woods on the skin for three more.

Aggressive but interesting, with enough sweetness to be inviting.
Recommended for corporate mercenaries and apocalypse vigilantes.

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DAG: Angharad used to call them anti-seed.
CHEEDO: Plant one and watch something die.
~ Mad Max: Fury Road

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Song in D Minor

Margot Elena’s packaging is hard not to fall for–Victwardian collage with gold details and raised crests on the bottles–this one features a domed birdcage and sheet music.

TokyoMilk No. 13 opens with big white flowers, in a packed hot church kind of way–and even gets a bit sweaty a few minutes in.
The gardenia takes up a lot of elbow room, then slowly settles to a foot off the body with sticky amber that smells like the soap in the bathroom of a mortuary.

Lasts through the burial and the wake, and haunts your clothes for a week after.

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Sky–the super-group that you’ve never heard of–included the classical guitarist John Williams, the bassist Herbie Flowers and percussionist Tristan Fry, (who both did session work with everyone from the Beatles to Lou Reed to Elton John.)
Bach’s Toccata and Fugue is easily the most famous song in D minor ever.

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Everything & Nothing

Black TokyoMilk Dark bottle with white feather motif, and a few lost black boa feathers to make my photo pretty.

Sugary orange gummy candy on top, cheeky and loud, that projects for 2 hours at arms length before slowly drifting down to floral oak-y tea leaves, left to stew in the bottom of the pot. The finish is quite nice, smoky and mysterious, and long lasting on fabric.

Also, this one matures well in the bottle.
I’ve an older rollerball as well–five years at least, the juice has turned dark and thick–that opens with a whiff of boozy plum wine before hitting the Brach’s Orange Slices, and has a slightly richer dry-down. I like both equally.

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Love this sweet and mysterious song from one of my favorite duos.

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Le Petit

Full sized (almost empty) Tokyomilk bottle with two sided label of a nest with speckled egg floating above.

TokyoMilk #02

Proceed with caution–
One light spritz gets you powder and cute plastic toys and baby hair–sweet with innocent violets and melting ice cream–all day long.
Two full sprays gets you a spanking by sticky artificial vanillin, itchy rubber pants, and a bath.

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I adore this sweet little tune, off a children’s album by the same guy who did Lump and Peaches–

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Paper & Cotton

Silver capped bottle with label of vintage fashion illustration on brown tissue paper sewing pattern.

It does! New muslin and patterns!
Cue fitting deadline anxiety in 3…2…1…oh, fuck.

Edit – 2/22/23

I bought this ages ago in a fit of collector’s mania, and then put of trying it for years, because I was too close to the inspirational source material.
I’ve worked with vintage paper sewing patterns for ermty decades, and they have a very specific smell–and I was so afraid this wouldn’t hold up to the real thing.

Paper & Cotton lists Coriander, White Sage, Birch Wood, Tundra Moss, and manages to make a very good representation of the title.
Opens with aqvavit spiked with herbs, and laundry soap for ten minutes, then softens to sweet woods, and there it is–that delicate ecru cross between newsprint and the sheerest parchment stamped with ink, that almost smells like root beer–and hot ironing starch on plant fibers.

Dry but not powdery, long lasting, and even after 5 years years since my last show, still manages to bring on surges of dread and creativity.

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Gorgeous song.
(I too have made a dress from a table cloth.)

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Pretty Rotten

pretty rotten edgyTokyoMilk No. 33 opens with poisoned alcohol, that metallic knife edge of distillation fumes called “the angels’ share.”
Dusty bruised apples roll in fast, brown sugar and rose–nice, but on me soon get lost in the forest green notes–and end in bittersweet musk.

A fairy-tale step-mother perfume.

Movie soundtrack videos are usually kind of meh, but this one is fun.

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20,000 Flowers Under the Sea

20,000 Flowers under the sea
A gold capped bottle with an ocean flora and a marvelous blue octopus label–on a giant scallop shell.

TokyoMilk #31

Another well named scent from Margot Elena.

A crashing wave of flowers and seashells, but somehow sadly watery–
Then the coral blooms with terrific ylang-ylang flowers, for hours, and slowly settles on the bottom with sweet salt.

Good for mer-folk types and surfer sweethearts.

This one has a snorkeling kind of ambiance-