Figure 1: Noir

This is absolutely not something you can wear to school or to work, to an interview, or to the grocery store, to the mall, to the gym, to your parents' house, to the house of your partner's parents, to a bar or to a nightclub, at a restaurant, to the park, or to church (especially not to church). In fact this fragrance has no place in the modern world, by modern, I mean since the Renaissance. And it certainly had no place in the middle ages either (few fragrances had). This is exactly the kind of scent a Roman emperor would have liked, like Heliogabalus. The Emperor would have liked this fragrance exactly because it would have reminded him of something that was considered ancient even then. The occasion to wear such a thing would be one of his dinners: "From panels in the ceiling such masses of flowers fell that guests were smothered before they could escape. Those that survived has set before them glass game and sweets of crystal. The menu was embroidered on the table cloth- not the mere list of the dishes, but pictures drawn with the needle, of the dishes themselves, And presently after the little jest in glass has been enjoyed you were served with camel's heels; combs torn from living cocks; platters of Nightingale tongues; ostrich brains, prepared with that garum sauce which the Sybarites invented, and which the secret is lost; there with the peas and grains of gold; beans and amber; quail peppered with pearl dust; lentils and rubies; spiders in jelly; lion's lung, served in pastry. The guests that wine overcame were carried to bedrooms. When they awoke, there starring at them were tigers and leopards- tame of course but some of the guests were stupid enough not to know it, and died of fright." (Edgar Saltus, Imperial Purple). The fragrance fits in somewhere between the lentils with rubies and the spiders in jelly (fortunately you will not be smothered by flowers). Therefore it's perfect for Halloween. With all this talk of ostrich brains and lion's lung served in pastry, you might get the impression that this is an unpleasant fragrance. It is not unpleasant but it is definitely "primordial". It smells like earth and leaves and bark, incense, wet fur, wet leather, patchouli, mushrooms, amulets made from things found in the woods; feathers, bones, little wooden statuettes carved with obsidian, tied together with the wearer's own hair, little cords of black ending in small tassels, held together with turquoise beads. It isn't that strangers in the grocery store will smell you; mystical, ancient, beastly, coming towards them and run from you, fearing you will attempt to scalp them. The silage isn't strong enough for that, it's that you will feel like all the modern garish colors, and the hideous blaring sounds are offensive, while wearing this. You, yourself, will offend no one. from theliethatstrue.blogspot.com

This is a deep, dark and complicated patchouli fragrance. For the first two hours, I experienced a minty kind of tingling in my nose. I'm not familiar with many of the notes in this perfume but I'm guessing the davana or the buchu leaf. After that it was dark patchouli until near the last thirty minutes when sweet sandalwood appeared just before it faded away completely at the seven hour mark. This was tested on skin with a tiny amount of solid perfume Very nice for patchouli fans.

I was prepared to fall in love with this fragrance; it sounds so fascinating! Alas, I was disappointed; not with the fragrance, but with the fact that I could just barely smell it. The hint of scent did smell nice, there just wasn't enough of it. Perhaps the liquid is stronger? I bought the solid sample. I did contact Roxana and she said that because it is a botanical, it doesn't have the screeching intensity of modern synthetics. (My words.) I also asked if she received a lot of puzzled responses like mine and she said no, that most of her customers were looking for that subtle natural quality? I would be willing to try the perfume version, if I received a free sample, but it is expensive enough that I would prefer to spend my money on something I can actually smell. My experience is so different from the first review that I wonder if we are writing about the same fragrance.