Holy Stick

My goodness, this is stunning! Holy Stick is supposed to smell like Palo Santo wood, I suppose, with all its facets enhanced. Palo Santo is a unique wood that smells very soft and creamy, almost like coconut cream, and it also has a citrus like brightness and an aromatic edge that is reminiscent of mint or pine. This is a rich, soft, creamy and woody fragrance with lots of natural sweetness from resins and balsams. In the opening (it actually lingers quite a long time) it has the most amazingly beautiful cardamom note. It pairs so well with the sweet creaminess and creates a scent that reminds me slightly of a cardamom infused vanilla pudding. There is a faint green, aromatic woodiness in the background that keeps the scent from being totally gourmand. And it gives the scent this lovely incensy vibe. It's not really a smoky fragrance. It feels more like unlit incense, like raw resins and fresh Palo Santo wood, untouched by fire. This scent feels like a warm, enveloping, shamanic hug from Mother Earth. It's like the smell of an ancient ritual dedicated to the nurture and care for all living things. It's an intensely comforting and calming scent. A scent that makes you feel like you belong, like all good things are within reach, like Mother Earth will take care of you. The scent lasts over 9 hours on my skin and the sillage is medium. This is a beautiul scent. It makes me feel good. It makes me sense balance and flow. It gives a deep feeling that everything is fine, that we all are cared for and loved deeply. How can I not fall in love with such a fragrance? It gives us exactely what we all need after a year like 2020. Holy Stick is soul medicine in the form of a fragrance. <3

Holy Stick, Holy hell, this perfume is stunning. I received a sample and within 5 minutes of it being on my skin I knew I needed a FB. I definitely get the bubblegum-esque feel that others have mentioned in the opening but after a while that fades out completely and you're left with this deep herbal incense that fills your nose and makes you want to huff it again and again. This perfume reminds me spending time at one of my best friends houses as a teenager where her mum who was very into her natural remedies definitely had a smell in the house frequently that triggers this for me. Wearing this perfume all year round as well would be perfectly acceptable as the fragrance doesn't feel warm or cold but welcoming and like a hug from someone you know is there for you always. Definitely give this a try if you can because this one is special.

Probably the most adequate perfume name in the business - holy stick indeed! Beautiful and serene rather than loud and crowd pleasing. Imagine a wealthy person in a luxurious boutique spa hotel on meditation vacation in Bali...Quality of the ingredients comes through for sure. It’s a linear scent opening and dry down stay pretty much the same. I can detect delicate cherry scent throughout, palo santo, cardamom, cloves and some ambery notes, woody notes too for sure. This scent is creamy yet fresh if that makes sense. To me it is very very calming positive vibes inducing and I’d wear it all year round day/night. Good staying power and some projection, depends how much you spray people will smell you. Full bottle worthy if you don’t have a similar one in your collection. (Holy Stick does remind me of REHAB by Initio)

Lovely light scent that fits in well with my Tucson, Arizona surroundings during the winter months, particularly with that unburned Palo Santo heart. Not smoky, not resin-thick; just that creamy, airy wood note that feels more like polished sticks and desert shrines than smoldering embers. It reads as spiritual without being heavy, meditative without being dusty. When layered on Tucson’s winter backdrop of cholla silhouettes, cold mornings, and sharp blue sky, it becomes almost seamless. The fragrance itself is linear and stays light and translucent. The dry-down is smooth and the skin scent is very pleasant. I'm in a health care adjacent field and this perfume is perfect to wear in a clinical environmental. Very much full bottle worthy at that 100ml retail price.

I've revised my original review to a more positive one. Recalling Maria Candida Gentille's wonderful perfumes, Holy Stick presents a subtle blend of clean, resinous and woody fragrances which promote a sense of calm and well-being. It has the most delightful dry down: like entering a temple antechamber (or a health spa!) and anticipating a time of soothing calm. I was so pleased to rediscover this fragrance that I ordered a full bottle!

I love this one so much, it's my favorite out of all the Chapel Factory scents! It gives off the vibes of a sacred ritual of sorts. The clove, cardamom, incense and palo santo especially give a fresh but mysterious scent. I've never smelled anything like it! Will repurchase until the day I die, or when it no longer gets made.

this one is really great. Hands down the best incense perfume I've smelled so far (admittedly one of like. 3 lol) smells like a sexy nun yet remains very gender neutral and I could definitely see myself wearing this a lot of I got my hands on a full bottle, the cardamom note here is super nice.

This is 100% a spring and summer fragrance to my nose. It reminds me so strongly of this handmade tisane (herbal/fruit tea) shop I visited on the outskirts of the Black Forest - the cardamom and pettigrain shine through, with more than a faint whiff of dried berries. I really love this

i have a love hate with this fragrance. the main notes i get from it is clove and spice. its rich warm and almost sickly sweet.

I actually really liked this. I tried heresy before this, so I'm comparing this sample to that. This fragrance is a unique blend of spices that i never thought would work, but I was pleasantly surprised. First and foremost, this is a patchouli-heavy fragrance. The opening was like a cool, crisp morning in a church cemetery. I could smell this dry cardamom and colves mixed with patchouli. Then, at the base of the note, you start to smell incense, amber, palo santo, and benzoin. It was surprisingly sweet, but not like sugar or vanilla; rather, the spice mixed with warm wood tricked my brain into thinking it was sweeter than it was. It's so cool yet comforting. I would have never expected these notes to be mixed like this, but it works so well. The overall vibe is walking out of church with that heavy, dense spice of incense and cardamom past the cemetery that has the faint smell of patchouli; it's so uniquely beautiful. I would give this a 9/10 because I feel like you could wear it out and no one would complain about it; it is not too strong, and it does last a bit.

This one is beautiful . sweetnes from the balsams and incensy in a soft way . no harshnes here to me , The guiac wood is prominent together with the palo santo`s creamyness too. There is a slight lack of warmth for me .some amber or some more dark vanilla perhaps to pull it down abit or even patchoulie . it does have some similaritys to Velvet teddy ,but this is more woody incensy and brighter ,almost a feel of euchalyptus or camphore .Velvet teddy and also Vanilla tobacco has a warmer cosynes to it wich this somehow lack abit. This freshens you up abit more then the velvet teddy who wants to cuddle and cosy up in the sofa . I cant say that i think this smells like stick incense ,at least not the ones i know . But i did get asked by my husbond if i have just light a scented candle in the house .he he .So its one of those things you dont know if its good or bad . (Not that strange realy he knows me more for my floral scents )

Interesting! Opens very intense, sharp, almost astringent. Can definitely smell the aromatic Palo Santo smokiness. Immediately transforms on the skin, melting into a warm woody smell. Friends that smelled it said they'd love to try it on their partners - it's a unisex scent but I agree that it complements male skin chemistry a little more. We'll enjoy the sample we bought but I don't think would spring for more.

spicy sweet bubblegum, mother's witchy supplies closet, clove-heavy sarsaparilla soda. spicy enough for fall, sweet enough for summer. shouldn't work, but it does. earthy neutral. wouldn't wear this to a corporate office, this is an after-work cozy hug for me.

Creamy, warm, and comforting. Beautiful composed scent. The performance is shameful. It this made it through at least half a work day, it would be worth having. As it stands, I will not give it another thought.

The inside of an Orthodox Church. Clean and pure incense. Deep but not heavy on my skin.

Holy Stick has a biting opening that smells a lot like eucalyptus in my opinion. That sharp, green quality in combination with the patchouli and incense is overwhelming at first. However, the green notes in this fragrance gradually dissipate as you wear it. Holy stick evolves into a very subtly sweet, spiced scent after letting it settle. The dry down is delightfully subdued. People are right to compare this fragrance to tea. This is like sipping a cup of chai in the pew of an old church.

I wish the palo santo came through more for me! The scent is nice, but each time I have worn this I have smelled mostly amber. The overall vibe is sweet & spicy with a little incense, which is fine but not as much what I was after. I think the mood Chapel Factory sets out to create is interesting, but I am getting more "candy shop next to a smoke shop" rather than anything church-y.

This is so unbelievably unique! In my opinion, it smells like a bowl of Vietnamese Pho with basil, jalapeño, and bean sprouts on top. It's a cold scent, very clove-y and basil-y. Not smoky, a little resinous. Slightly powdery. While I don't want to smell like it, this is one of those scents that I consider an art piece worth sampling to experience it yourself!

A cooling, spicy smoky meditative scent. It's not super warm or cheerful.

Very disappointing but I did not like - much too sweet for me. Smells licorice-y, overpowering at application and continues to dominate the scent after that.

Save your money. The scent is very light and no one note stands out, it's just a mass of nothing special. It is fleeting and a disappointment.

Literally Tom Ford Tobacco vanilla. 14 years later. Nope.

Watered down Big Red chewing gum with some cardamom

A présent je sent le pot-au-feu, et je ne sais pas si je dois m'en réjouir. Rien de mystique..Rien d'agréable non plus alors peut être qu'il plaira à ceux qui aiment souffrir et endurer la vie. Peut être que certains d'entre vous aimerez sentir le ragoût, le navet et le bouillon de poulet..Chacuns ses fantasmes après tout. Alors amusez vous bien, moi je vais continuer à m'éloigner encore un peu, pas après pas, de cette odeur nauséabonde.

Like candyfloss and ashes of cheap insence. Sickly sweet, burning smoke, a bit synthetic too. Also, the insence DNA of this brand turns into a fish note in humid weather.

I cannot smell anything other than dubble bubble bubble gum :(

comforting spicy-sweet incense! i saw someone on tumblr talking about being in love with this fragrance and i immediately went to get my hands on a sample lol. i get what people are saying when they say they smell mostly amber, but i find that the cardamom and clove really shine on my skin personally in a way that reminds me a little bit of blood spider orchids from RdF. the notes are kind of deceiving though because i absolutely love palo santo but i don't smell it at all when i wear this. overall it's nice but not mind blowing. i'm enjoying having a sample but that's about it.

Smells both like a hippie spirituality store and a castle. There is something green in this that surprised me. It’s very soft... velvet... blurry.. I kinda like it kinda don’t. Idk. Feels like every time I smell it it takes me somewhere else or I notice another part of it. It does smell like death of a ladies man as someone added, but then it also sometimes smells like slow dance from byredo. A little vintage smelling. Bubblegum however I do not detect

This does smell like stick incense, as stated, but in a weirdly cheap-wood stick way. I had to retry it to see if that was as fluke. Second round, it did better: the spices are clear but smooth and mild, in a sweet resinous base. The wood is pretty plain, so yes, the thin wood stick of incense is there, with the powder wrapped around it. Fun, but realistic enough that I don’t want to smell like I have a pocket full of stick incense.

It's surprisingly spicy for a perfume with a name that suggests something rather smoky and balsamic. I wouldn't say clove specifically, but rather spices like the potpourri used in Asian cuisine, "5 perfumes." The base of the composition is a classic and quite sweet amber, while the heart has a hint of incense and fresh woods.I don't usually talk about how long perfumes last, but it's true that this one disappears in a flash

Palo Santo Unburned I guess it's the petit grain, but something in this keeps it fresher and greener than I was expecting. Not so much the spicy wood as advertised, but very wearable, especially in warmer weather. Wish it had more depth, or more overt reference to the Palo Santo it highlights, in this composition it feels more like a second thought.

Harsh opening, lovely middle and a pretty boring dry down. The opening is a cacophony of notes, good thing it settles into an incensy scent in minutes. The middle reminds me of the incense mix used in catholic churches - really lovely. The dry down is quite boring, sweet-spicy. I don't detect palo santo at all.

bubblegum with incense. It’s sweet but not cloying, airy. The bubble gum fades pretty quickly but doesn’t go away completely. It’s strangely likable, simple and cute. I imagine this is what Etat libre d’orange - incense et bubblegum smells like

Not what I was expecting. I was hoping for something dry, woody, ecclesiastical, smoky, etc. but all I get is amber sweetness. It smells just like something from the Dior Poison line, lol. Not necessarily bad, just not what I was looking for.

Deliciously cozy! Warm sweet amber and Palo Santo incense, i feel like I get cinnamon too. Perfect winter work frag that is woody and incensey but in a subtle enough way. Doesn't pull hippy nor super religious.

I don't know what exactly I'm smelling on me but it smells sour? its both gross and intriguing at the same time. bummed that another chapel factory scent doesn't work with my skin 💔

This has a harsh, minty patchouli opening. After a few minutes, however, this changes completely into a beautiful sweet herbal incense, as mentioned in other comments.

There is so much rose in this, I’m startled the notes don’t mention it. It is a very lovely, special fragrance though

genuinely sickened by this. probably what I get for venturing outside of my candy-sweet comfort zone.

a hippie’s bonfire by a church in the swamps deep south.