This one comes across as timid to me–like it wants to be Enchanted Forest when it grows up, or maybe Euphoria, but it’s afraid of the trees.
Citrus and macerated fruit, dark purple jam that turns into green tea with a hit of spice and slowly fades to a musky aquatic note with a whisper-wish of woods.
It’s nice, but needs something to give it more backbone, more identity.
Maybe Indigo just needs more mood.
TokyoMilk #15
Clementines and waxy white flowers and vetiver–but sadly dry, not a tongue-crazy kiss on the Eiffel Tower at all.
I’d love this as a linen spray on chaste nights, a goodnight sweetness rather than un baiser amoureux.
A cute little song sung by the former first lady of France–
There’s a high-end bridal shop dressing room vibe from this one–jasmine and chrome with infinite good taste.
Airy white flowers, with enough sandalwood on the bottom to make it shiny smooth.
The wet violet note (water violet is actually a type of aquatic primrose0 on the bottom lingers longest, into the late afternoon.
Mirror Lover is kind of shiny and smooth, too.
There’s a pun here, because it opens with a breath of incense, like a burning vanilla bean–
Then it settles to the skin with a sheer dry cedar-y vanilla warmed by amber, and slowly fades to nothing.
I wish it had better performance–I’d love it on the artist with rough hands who eats from bowls they’ve made and has a houseful of rescue dogs.
Here’s more Vanille, with Follow the Sun.
I keep trying Euphoria, because it’s made with so many things I love–pomegranate, passionfruit, patchouli and violet, mahogany–but they’re all swallowed up by the amber and musk in a way that sours my throat.
I liked the candle in the store, but at home it haunted my house and made me edgy.
Sweet Euphoria is the one song on Chris Cornell’s solo album Euphoria Morning (Mourning) that I’ve never really enjoyed. Pillow of Your Bones is better:
A fabulous alpha femme scent.
Starts out with the crazy-complicated burst of smoky-tomato-leaf-lemon-sweet-spice that is geranium, then blows up into wild roses.
An hour later it settles into stiletto heel thorns, sharp with vetiver, and stays close to the skin all afternoon.
Boss woman in a bottle.
(Yes, ma’am.)
I love this cover of Nirvana–she wields her voice like a blade.
This one missed the mark on me.
There’s a weird rough plastic note that swallows up the fruit–like the mesh bag holding the Halos is consuming them–then some vague pine arrives and immediately soaks into the skin.
The ad copy talks about spices and herbs but I get nothing fun like that. Maybe I’ll give it another try when the weather is less January.
A more fun California.
Fun, but would make a better ice cream flavor.
Maybe by Ben & Jerry’s, with some sprinkles of head shop funk and first crush blueberry sweetness.
Goes on cheap, dutch-date artificial giggles, but slowly gets comfortable and sexy–sugary incense ash a breath off the skin–for several hours.
Perfect for ditching class and finding your chakras, the clitoris, or lay-lines.
Love this dreamy tune by Jay Som. (Check out her NPR Tiny Desk Concert.)
This is what Santa wears when he’s visiting a naughty house, because they’re a little nice, too, aren’t they?
Manly gingerbread cookies left under the tree.
Bright fir, fresh cut, leaking sticky pine pitch, and spice–baked ginger, ground cloves–with a syrupy base of resinous vanilla musk.
Long lasting in personal space, balsam trails with with brown sugar rubbed into the skin. Unisex, but should be worn by St. Nick types with big beards and twinkling eyes.
I like the candle even better. The pine takes center stage with a fruity note of cranberry, backed up by some smoky rose infused tea.
My house smells like a present–I’ve been a good girl this year.
Merry, merry.
The opening of this one smells exactly like the Jewish bakery on Montague Street on Hanukkah, the windows fogged with the scent of chocolate and poppyseed hamantaschen, and red jelly donuts–
–but then the sequoia note pulls it out of feminine gourmand territory and gives it nice depth.
Good sillage, and the dry down is amazing–a masculine woody cocoa powder that lasts forever on clothes.
My new favorite of the Nest line.
L’Chaim!
kira a. gold 