BPAL duets and trios

[devon]

.
I was chatting with someone about BPAL perfume oils and how their complex blends never end up smelling that complex. I think their duets and trios (menage à trois) hold up very well and smell like the listed notes. This is a comment I wrote that I thought would be relevant here.

I've had good luck with their "limited edition" duets and trios, just 2-3 ingredients. They tend to be very accurate to what they say. They usually run for several months, so there's time to get a sample from someone's decant circle and also a bottle later, but I have blind bought a few of them.

here are some I like for reference, even though they're not all in current production.
Milk, Burnt Honey & Ambrette seed **nice for its genre**
Cacao & Oud **nice**
Honeysuckle & Wisteria
Elderberry Flower & Sandhill Plum (not as interesting)

There are a lot that I find intriguing, but I've been trying to buy less BPAL over the last year. A few I'm pretty interested in now. (they are on their way out this month to make room for new ones.)
https://blackphoenixalchemylab.com/product-category/a-little-lunacy-limited-edition/menage-a-trois-a-little-lunacy-limited-edition/

Caramel, Teakwood, and Vetiver
Almond Blossoms, Patchouli, and Sea Salt
Coffee Bean, Oak Bark, and Patchouli
Oakmoss, White Sage, and Woodland Fern
Sandalwood, Lime, and Tahitian Ginger
I have a lot of florals, so I'm not as interested in those offerings rn.

Looks like Duets are not live, but this is their page:
https://blackphoenixalchemylab.com/product-category/in-memoriam/a-little-lunacy/duets/

Comments

[ravengown]

I don't think they're doing duets anymore - those duets you linked are from two years ago.

It definitely is easiest to look up the current "simple" blends through the Lunacy page though. I agree that the series has been really nice - I've had some success with the more "complex" BPAL blends but I've definitely been buying less BPAL overall. A lot of their seasonals will have a collection like that too (like Cranberry Bog or Chocolate Box) and I've mostly found myself going for those over something with 6+ notes listed.

[devon]

Yeah, I have a great one called Brood X for the cicadas - it's mostly cacao, patchouli, and dirt. but it *says* it has:
"moist roots, sugarcane, hay absolute, a summer-scorched golden amber, upturned soil, dew-dappled leaves, nootka, hazelnut husk, moss-touched tree bark, and a dribble of 17-year aged patchouli"

I think I smell nootka, but I'm not sure what it is exactly.

[ravengown]

Oh, yeah, that sounds really good! I have that issue with indie oil a lot honestly, where the descriptions are really verbose but it's hard to figure out what's really in it or what it should smell like. Unless your nose is super sensitive/sharp I suppose.

[kore]

I love that one! I got two bottles.

[kore]

I actually really like the more complex BPAL scents, lol, which used to be more thematic and storytelling -- for example Persephone went from rose and sandalwood to pomegranate. I think she's reformulated a lot of old favourites, though, and some people are now suspicious that she's bringing out a lot of simpler LE scents so quickly. She just brought back Dorian after I think five years, reformulated, and it'll be interesting to see what people think of that, since it's a really signature scent along with Snake Oil (which was also gone for a long time).

I haven't tried hardly any of the duets or trios because there's usually one note in there that's a real dealbreaker for me, and if there's only several notes that really stands out.

You can see what's new on the BPAL site by going here: https://us4.campaign-archive.com/home/?u=50266fc02a3b75767125e0ed2&id=384a8bbdf4

and that's also a newsletter you can sign up for.

You can see where the latest trios are in the Lunacy update: https://us4.campaign-archive.com/?u=50266fc02a3b75767125e0ed2&id=3ddc4db5f0

++ MÉNAGE À TROIS
Simple, three-note perfumes!

🥉 LEMON PEEL, GARDENIA, AND CARNATION

🥉 MUGUET, TEA ROSE, AND YLANG YLANG

🥉 OSMANTHUS, BENZOIN, AND BOURBON VANILLA

🥉 MANDARIN, BLACK VANILLA, AND PATCHOULI

🥉GHOST LILY, WHITE SANDALWOOD, AND AMBERGRIS ACCORD

[full_metal_ox]

One that I loved was, I suppose, technically a duet based on the ingredient description: the late Saturnalia:

Unrestrained revelry, unchained licentiousness! Violet deepened with vetiver.

(Disclaimer: I'm severely hyposmic and synaesthetic, meaning that my perceptions may not reflect common experience.)

Saturnalia may not have bottled Shriekback’s concept of a Roman orgy,
but it distilled a wild, dark, and numinous place, most commonly defaulting to brooding rain-damp forest earth: suitable not only for the season implied in its name but for hot weather, as the expression of a cool green vegetal shade (as distinct from an icy air-conditioned cyan.) My periods would bring out a really fascinating effect: the ingredients would separate out into a changeable taffeta of dark funky chthonic olive-green vetiver and sweet girly periwinkle-blue violet: “Some Velvet Morning”(the original song by Lee Greenwood and Nancy Sinatra) in a bottle, or animus and anima fissioned out as in Arthur Machen’s “The Novel of the White Powder.”