Le labo Jasmin 17 Review

I don't exactly know what's up with Blogger and the formatting for the pic but it's going to have to do for this post because I am not fooling with it right now. Why am I not fooling around with it? I'm lazy right now. 

You know how for the longest time that the Serge Lutens bell jars were only sold in Paris, then Barney's New York? Well, Luckyscent is selling some of the bell jars. The thing is that I have never, ever been thrilled with the price of the bell jars. For $300, you get 2.5 ounces and no spray mechanism. Yes, I can decant the perfume but it's a little bit of a hassle. I find the price for a bell jar to be a little steep though. I can hop on over to Beauty Encounter or FragranceNet and get 2 1.7 ounce bottles of Amouage for the price and Amouage isn't cheap either. The reason why I am mentioning the bell jars is my love of Sarrasins. The deep purple color of the perfume is highly unusual but more importantly, Sarrasins is how I like my jasmine. Dark and dirty. A la Nuit was too loud, dense and green for my liking a not something I'd wear that often. I like jasmine but it's difficult to find a jasmine that I actually really like to actually go out and buy. I was lucky enough to find an 80% full bottle of Sarrasins on E-bay.

For quite a while, I have been ignoring the Le Labo line. I've tried Labdanum 18 and Aldehyde 44 and did like them but didn't find them exciting enough. Well, Aldehyde 44 did make me swoon a little bit because I was having a tough time with Chanel no 22. Labdanum 18 was a stripped down version of Shalimar with a cola like note. I have a decant of Jasmin 17 and hoped that wearing it would change my mind with the whole Le Labo line. It didn't.

Jasmin 17 started off with waxy citrus that strongly reminded me of Lemon Pledge wood polish. I couldn't think of anything but, what the hell. I couldn't smell the jasmine part for a good ass while. Then and hour in, I could smell the jasmine. The jasmine wasn't very prominent but the jasmine was pretty strange. It had a Jasmine Full kind of feel to it, a strange hard candy like vibe. No skank, let alone any kind of depth, just a hot mess on my skin. The lasting power is about 5 hours on my skin. Jasmin 17 will not be joining my collection due to price and how it smells on my skin.

At this point, I don't think that Le Labo is edgy. I think that they are offering stripped down versions of other perfumes, so I can't call them a perfume house with that price point and aestetic.

The Second Look and Le Labo

What perfume warrants a second look? Is it a couple days? A couple months? Or a few years? I was looking through my Amouage sampler that I had bought a couple months ago for no good reason and I am sort of thinking of retrying Honour and Reflection to see if my opinions have changed on them. I know that I have said that they are similar or almost identical to each other. But fast forward a few years and I think that I need to take a fresh look at the both of them. Ubar wasn't in the sampler set and I still have yet to muster up any courage to order a decant to give Ubar another go.

Every year, Le Labo decides to release their city exclusives to the general public. I liked the idea of being able to buy the city exclusives without having to travel to another city to get a bottle. Then Aldehyde 44 was discontinued and then I kind of liked the idea. Now that it's that time of year, I was curious as to pricing and if there would be something I would be interested in. Once in a while, I am not adverse to spending $250 on a bottle of perfume. If I were, I wouldn't have any full bottles of Amouage sitting on my dresser. I do have limitations of some of this. I almost fell out of my chair when I saw the prices for a 1.7 ounce bottle. Almost $300 for a 50ml bottle. Serge Lutens sells his bell jars at Barney's for $300 and I would get 75mls. I haven't bought a Serge Lutens bell jar yet from Barney's but I'm thinking about it. Everyone knows that they have limitations and I have mine that I rarely cross. If I do cross a limitation, I must really want something. This time, I'm not crossing it.

Le Labo Aldehyde 44 Review

This is gonna be a really short review because Aldehyde 44 smells like another perfume. I tried Aldehyde 44 for the first time yesterday and kept doing a double take all day. Reason being, Aldehyde 44 is mainly a toned down Chanel no. 22 but it's less harsh than no. 22. While no. 22 and no. 5 are sisters, Aldehyde 44 is more like a very young cousin trying to mimic those two.

I'm not exactly thrilled with Aldehyde 44 for the reason that it smells too much like no. 22 and that leads me to believe that someone was blatantly trying to do a rip off of no. 22. Even though I found no. 22's aldehydes to be harsh at first (still do at times), I did grow to love it. Another reason I'm not really rocking this one is that Le Labo may have wanted to create something that smelled a whole lot like no. 22 but it was exclusive to only Dallas so it was really niche. But Aldehyde 44's rose is much more prevalent than the rose in no. 22.

At this point, I don't like Aldehyde 44 nor Le Labo in general. I've reexamined Le Labo's Labdanum 18 and found Labdanum 18 to be Labdanum 18 to be a toned down Shalimar. It's one thing to nod to the perfume classics but when company is doing rip offs, I get riled. Riled in that fact that it makes me think that the perfumers can't think up new ideas or an interpretation of a note or two.

Many people who have smelled Amouage Gold for women compare it to Chanel no. 5 but they are two different perfumes. They might share some DNA but it never was meant to be a rip off. Amouage Dia for women is different though. It's the idea of Gold but with a whole lot less heft and it was made known that that was the case.

La Labo Labdanum 18 Review

For the past week or so, it has finally cooled off enough for me to start breaking out the oriental perfumes. This summer has been torture on me where there were only a few perfumes that I could stand wearing. For the past couple days, I have been wearing Le Labo Labdanum 18. I'm note sure why I had taken so long with testing this out before the perpetual, massive heatwave.

After poking around the internet, a few bloggers have made the comparison to Shalimar. I must agree with them especially in the beginning stages. In the beginning, Labdanum 18 is straight up Shalimar without the citrus top note. After a few minutes, a get a distinct cola note, which did take me by surprise. The cola note is not bad but I can't see it adding anything to the whole composition of Labdanum 18. The dry down was interesting though due to the fact that I did get reminded of MKK, slightly animalic. Lasting power and sillage are about average for this. I find Labdanum 18 to be nice but not quite bottle worthy, just decant worthy. If one owns a bottle of Shalimar and MKK, you won't be missing that much by not trying out Labdanum 18.