Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab Stinky

Stinky is the scent whose name invokes the spirit of dogs everywhere. At one point in almost every dog’s life he or she has been stinky but Stinky by Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab smells like everything but dogs. Stinky

In Bottle: Sweet and stinky honey layered over soap and powder. Smells a lot better than I make it sound. For one thing, the honey is a well blended matter as if it’s a honeyed bar of soap resting next to a pot of fluffy white powder.

Applied: The honey is the first thing that I smell, it gets a bit sharp on the initial application before it mellows out a little as the scent ages on me. But for the first hour or so, it smells like warm, sticky honey with a clean background. As Stinky ages, the clean background of soap and powder comes up a bit more and the honey takes a few steps back. It will remain present as the fragrance continues to age and starts to fade with the soapy smell going away the quickest, leaving a powdered, warm and sticky honey type of scent lingering until it all dissolves into nothing. Think honey-scented powder and you’ve got Stinky.

Extra: Stinky was released in 2009 in and around the summer months as a celebration of mud-covered and mischievous dogs. In particular, the dog featured on the label.

Design: Stinky is bottled in much the same way as other Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab fragrances. Held in an amber apothecary bottle, Stinky sports a cute Limited Edition label with a photograph of the dog which inspired this scent.

Fragrance Family: Clean Gourmand

Notes: milk, white honey, baby powder.

Leave it to Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab to come up with a fragrance that pretty much defies any sort of fragrance family.

Reviewed in This Post: Stinky, 2009, 5ml Bottle.


BPAL: Butter Rum Cookie

There’s people who can you hook you up at Sephora with a fragrance that smells a little bit like a cookie. And then there’s Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab who can hook you up with a fragrance that smells exactly like a cookie. And what a specific cookie! Butter Rum Cookie

In Bottle: Butter rum cookie smells exactly like its name. It’s not pulling any stops on you, it’s not pretending its something it isn’t, it’s just boozy, sweet cookies.

Applied: First thing’s first, the butter rum cookie you smell in the bottle will be what you smell on your skin when you put this on. It’s a really nice, very well done blend of sweet, pastry, and rum. I smell the rum first on application but the note is so fleeting that it’s gone on me in a few minutes. The rest of the time is occupied by a lightly toasted, very rich cookie note. There’s a very subtle spiciness to this that lingers in the background but for the most part, you’ll get the full deal in the first few minutes with a drop off on the rum and hours and hours of cookie-smelling fun until it all fades into what I can only describe as a lightly floured pan scent.

Extra: This fragrance was released in 2008 as a part of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s Yule season releases.

Design: Butter Rum Cookie is a limited edition fragrance bottled in the standard amber tinted 5ml glass bottle. It has a special label with its name written on it.

Fragrance Family: Gourmand

Notes: Rum, butter note, cookie note, sugar, almond, orange rind.

Butter Rum Cookie was one of my first stepping stones to BPAL. I had a small decant of it in a 1ml vial and after a series of disappointing scents, I was happy to have discovered this. Remember that I came from a background where perfumes were heady and oriental. It shocked me to smell something that was so literal. While the novelty of it has worn off because I’ve since smelled so many other cookie-based fragrances that smell extremely similar to this, I’ll always have that one moment when I said, “Whoa! This smells exactly like a butter rum cookie!”

Reviewed in This Post: Butter Rum Cookie, 2008, 5ml.


BPAL: Dark Chocolate Keylime Truffle

Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s chocolate scents are hit and miss for me. The white chocolates are always misses, as the white chocolate note tends to veer toward milk and heavy cream territory with a faint waft of plastic. Milk chocolate is a rich, sweet, buttery note that can get to be a bit too much. But dark chocolate is the magical medium where sweetness and cocoa mix to form a fantastic balance. Truffle Key Lime

In Bottle: Keylimes! There is a very slight difference between a keylime and a regular lime. Keylimes, to me, are sweeter smelling and have a cleaner, crisper citrus kick to them. In Dark Chocolate Keylime Truffle, the first and only thing I can smell in the bottle are the keylimes and I am okay with that.

Applied: Smelling keylimes always makes me happy. It reminds me of the tropics, most notably, Florida. BPAL did a good job with this note but I’m wondering where the dark chocolate is. A few more minutes in and I finally get faint wafts of cocoa, a hint of sweetness, and a pleasant creamy texture that lends well with Dark Chocolate Keylime Truffle’s gourmand profile. The dark chocolate is a bit fleeting though as it disappears in under an hour and takes the keylime with it leaving me smelling a bit like sweetened milk.

Extra: Dark Chocolate Keylime Truffle was a part of the 2010 chocolate collection from BPAL. The other chocolates in this collection include, Milk Chocolate and Matcha Green Tea Ganache Truffle, White Chocolate Black Raspberry and Apricot Cordial Truffle, Dark Chocolate Whiskey and Cognac Truffle, and Milk Chocolate Coconut Cardamom Rum and Ginger Truffle.

Design: Dark Chocolate Keylime Truffle is contained in a 5ml amber glass bottle with a plastic top. It has a limited edition label with the house name and fragrance name on it.

Fragrance Family: Gourmand

Notes: Cocoa, keylime, sugar, cream.

Reviewed in This Post: Dark Chocolate Keylime Truffle 2010, 5ml.