Guerlain Orchidee Imperiale Toner

Back when I had ordered my bottle of L'Heure de Nuit, I wasn't expecting a sampler of Guerlain's facial care stuff. Most of the stuff I knew wouldn't be a great fit for my skin and gave it to my mother but the toner looked like it would be a great fit for me. My skin care regimen is pretty basic and I don't use a lot of products. I normally use SkynIceland's glacial face wash and the cloud cream and that's it. I do use an astringent once in a while. What I mean by once in a while is when I have to be at work at 5 in the morning and I am not lazy enough not to brush my teeth but too lazy to wash my face or when it's really hot out. Since I have been out of the Burt's Bees rose toner, I decided to give the Guerlain toner a go.

Most toners/astringents tend to dry out my already dry skin (except my nose, which is oily and prone to pimples) but the Orchidee Imperiale toner didn't. Looking at the bottle, is was a moisturizing toner. Many have claimed that theirs is moisturizing but are not. This one is but I noticed that what ever moisturizer they use kind of doesn't absorb all that well into my skin. But my face didn't feel greasy for the rest of the day. What I noticed is that it does get a lot of dirt, grime and oil off of my face. Yes toners and astringents are kind of like a mini face wash for when you don't have quite the time to wash your face. The good news is that my face didn't break out nor did it develop any kind of irritation to this one.

In spite of it's flaws, I was looking at buying a bottle of this. When I looked online for this one, I got some sticker shock. For a 4 ounce bottle of this stuff, it was $140 dollars. I know that I have spent that and much more on a bottle of perfume but perfume lasts longer. I think at this point, I am going to stick to the Burt's Bees rose toner.

Jewelry and Cleaning

I'm typing this post and posting this from my Kindle, so forgive formatting issues and questionable spelling. Since I have been on a no buy of anything with perfume, I have been going through some of my stuff. You know, throwing things out, consigning things. I'm making some headway with my closet but cleaned out and thrown out a ratty T.V. stand and sold a nightstand that I didn't need. The last perfume I was able to buy was a bottle of L'Heure de Nuit in either February or March. I'm leaning more to the middle of February. It boils down to making sure that food is on the table and there is a roof over my head. It was fun while it lasted, when I had more means to spend on perfume. But I still have my collection to enjoy and quite a bit to test and review. But that's not exactly why I am posting.

I started to work my way through my jewelry box. I was looking at so much that I don't wear so much anymore. For the past 4 years, I have seem to have gotten into the habit of wearing the same 5 or 6 pieces of jewelry without thinking about it. Working food service, you don't have many options on what you can wear. Would they rather have you not wear any? Yep but companies know that it can't be totally stopped. No bracelets, no rings with stones, very small hooped earrings is about it. After gazing at the stuff I don't wear, most of my jewelry is not from the big box stores but from artisans that work from themselves. So my collection is not really what you are going to find on the market. Some of them are one of a kind. I would rather support those jewelry makers that don't work for the big box stores. Prices may be a little more expensive but I am getting something unusual and catches people's eye.

Serge Lutens Bois de Violette Review and Other Stuff

It's been really difficult to blog lately and I mean really difficult to blog about anything, let alone perfume. My dad had surgery almost a week and a half ago due to colon cancer and we are waiting for the biopsy results to come in. Having my dad home means less time to blog (not like I do a whole lot of it) and work leaves almost no time to write about perfume. I do still wear perfume but I haven't really attempted to wear anything new. Financial troubles have also taken their toll on me but I am starting to see some marginal progress. With financial troubles makes me hesitant to reach into my unworn bag of decants. I just can't afford to buy anymore perfume right now and buying decants is almost out of the question right now.

With finances being very out of wack, it is making me appreciate my perfume collection a whole lot more. I am being forced to be content with the collection that I do have and I am hoping that I can drain a few bottles and sell off the ones that I don't wear. I haven't gotten around to seeing if Goodwill will accept perfume. Maybe a consignment shop would work a little better.

I was craving something new to wear, my hand picked out Serge Lutens Bois de Violette. I've always had somewhat of a rocky road with Serge Lutens offerings. Some don't smell good to my nose or too fleeting. It doesn't help that his exclusive line is sold at Barney's for an Amouage price. A Serge Lutens perfume works better for me if I spray, not dab. Dabbing just doesn't work all that well for me considering. I can't fathom why Serge Lutens refuses to include spray tops with his bell jars just like he does with the export line. With his export line, you have the option of spraying or dabbing. I'm too lazy as well to decant my own perfumes.

In the review, there will be a lot of comparisons between Bois de Violette and it's eldest sister, Feminite du Bois. Feminite du Bois is actually the mother ship for the whole Bois line, so there will be tons of comparisons between the two. The whole structure of Violette is almost identical to FdB from top to bottom. I'm not kidding, in a blind test, I probably wouldn't be able to differentiate between the two. Not at first sniff at least but then the violet comes out to play. It's not a shrinking violet but not an aggressive violet either, the violet is more of the assertive type. Then the whole FdB thing kind of quiets down and hums along. The sad thing is that Violette doesn't last long on me with a spray decant. I maybe get 3 and a half hours worth of wear out of this. I don't know when Serge moved Violette from the export line to the non export line but it must have been in the past 3 or 4 years. Most export sprays that I have last me at least 8 hours. Will I ever get a bottle of this? Probably not because I already have a bottle of FdB in my arsenal. I wouldn't turn my nose up if someone gifted me with a bottle of it either. My wallet is thanking me right now.

Chanel no 5 L'Eau Review

It took me quite a while to love and enjoy the original no 5 in all of it's current forms. Since I now love the original no 5, I own the EDP, EDT, and some of the extrait and some of the extrait is the vintage version. I do wear no 5 on a regular basis. But when I learned to love Chanel no 5, I wasn't wearing it as I could have, which is quite a bit. Then Eau Premiere came out. I had bought a bottle within the first two months and wore it at least three times a week. I loved Eau Premiere in the beginning and I'm not sure what had changed to make me dislike it but now I do. This leads me to no 5 L'Eau.

When I had heard that Chanel was doing a new flanker of no 5, a little bit of me was horrified. I wasn't amused that they were messing around with their flagship perfume. Let's think about it, no 5 is their most famous perfume and most classic perfume. Mademoiselle gets a lot of press but it's not really a classic yet but probably one of their best sellers. Chanel had already played the flanker game with Coco and their Chance line and I am wondering why they need to mess around with no 5 by needing 2 flankers. So off I went to get my paws on a decant.

Every time that I try a new perfume, I always half hope that the clouds will part and the angels will start singing. That didn't happen with L'Eau. All I had got was something really generic with hints of the no 5 structure. I think that the massive citrus note and how it was presented did me in. The floral component was incredibly generic and the aldehydes were pretty faint in this. I could smell a relation to the original no 5. If Eau Premiere was the daughter of no 5, then L'Eau is the grand daughter. This could have been a blatant ripoff of no 5 by another company if I wasn't really into perfume. For an EDT, I do get some longevity with this one. I get about 7 hours of wear before it fades a way into nothing. Yes, I dislike it, and won't be getting a bottle.

Tauerville Vanilla Flash Review

Yes, I actually did go ahead and test something new and now I have to review it. For the longest time, I thought I hated vanilla in perfume, especially if it was the dominant note. Vanilla had to be buried under a bunch of other notes before I would even try it out, Then came Havana Vanille (traumatically discontinued) and Guerlain SDV and to a lesser degree Tobacco Vanille. I figured out why I didn't care for vanilla too much. Most of what I have been smelling was the edible vanilla and I didn't like smelling like I just baked a batch of cupcakes. My vanillas must be inedible to be worn. This leads me to trying out Andy Tauer's Vanilla Flash.

For a while, I have been debating about exploring the Tauerville line for some reason. I love Andy Tauer's work even though I don't care for some of his offerings. That's OK though, there are plenty of Andy Tauer offerings to go around. When STC was offering a 15% or 20% off sale, I figured why not try it out? I might actually enjoy a couple out of this line.

First up was Vanilla Flash. Vanilla is the dominant note of this one (obviously) but it's not the cupcake variety. It's a slightly burnt vanilla with maybe a little hint of booze. Even after a few hours of wearing it, I thought that there might be a hint of tobacco in there lending the slightest leaning to Havana Vanille. There probably is a hint of tobacco in there. From start to finish, I did smell the Tauer base. The Tauer base isn't in your face like some of Andy Tauer's offerings and Vanilla Flash does need something to make it as something recognizable to be Mr. Tauer's work. A whopping dose of Tauerade would have rendered this as kind of bad. I was really impressed with the lasting power of Vanilla Flash. I had applied this one at 11am and by 10pm, the last of Vanilla Flash disappeared.

If you find that SDV is too burnt, boozy and expensive or Havana Vanille to be too hard to find and expensive, this is for you. What make this perfume even better, for a niche perfume, this is practically free. Luckyscent is selling the largest bottle available (30ml) for $63 and that it free for niche perfume. This is going on my wish list because it might be quite a while before I can get a bottle. Unless it gets discontinued like Ingrid did.

Not Often Worn but Not Forgotten About

I can't believe that I went almost a month without posting a thing. It's been a wacky month for me and blogging kept slipping my mind. Mostly because I had nothing to blog about. Not wanting really to wear and review, nothing that I haven't blogged about at one point or another.

I think that everyone has a handful of perfumes that they haven't exactly forgotten about but haven't been wearing them either. It's more than you "forgot" about them. You just are not wearing them. The larger the full bottle collection and the bigger the decant pile, the harder it is to keep track of things. I might have to really force myself to wear and review a minimum of one or two perfumes a week to get the ball rolling.

I'm not talking about just vintage perfume. I'm talking about the current formulations of some perfumes. I do have a couple vintages that I am hoarding because I have so little of the vintage formulation. L'Heure Bleue is one of those vintages that I do tend to hoard. I do own a fairly current version of L'Heure Bleue but it's such a powder bomb and kind of a sad scent that doesn't get worn often. Yes, I don't find LHB to be a cheerful perfume to wear.

When I go to pick out my scent of the day, I gaze at my collection and tend to wear the same thing over and over again. But when I do wear something a little different, I wear it for days. Take Amouage Epic for example. Even though I somewhat wear it regularly, I will wear it for days on end. But it always seems to be the same ones that I will wear day after day.

Some that are not quite forgotten about are the ones that are more of a seasonal thing than the ones that can be worn year round. Many of the classic Amouages do seem to wear much better in the winter than any other time of year. Can you tell that I haven't been enthused by the latest released that I have tried with Amouage? Some of them I have worn but haven't reviewed.

Coty Chypre Vintage EDT

For the longest while, I've had a small spray decant of Coty's Chypre in my unworn pile. And when I was trying to make a decision on what I should wear, I noticed that my decant was almost empty due to evaporation. So I had to finish it and review it.

There are many chypres out there still in production today but I think that Chypre may have been the first modern chypre. Chypre is slightly brutal with a few rough edges in it but it is wonderful. I find that it's more akin to Chanel no 19 or maybe a little like Chamade. The version of no 19 that Chypre is akin to is the EDT and not the EDP. No 19 in EDP form is a little smoother and a lot more rosy but there is no way that Chypre is like no 19 in extrait form.

While I did find Chypre enjoyable, I'm not so sure that I will be seeking out a bottle but maybe a small decant for reference. I am starting to prefer stuff that is in current circulation.