Karma’s Fragrance Rambles

Welcome to Karma’s fragrance journey! I’m just a fan of fragrances and have a bunch of scents and want to go through and review them. And maybe have some fun along the way.

[scentedkarma]

👀

Yo. I might restart this.

I've fallen behind on my tiktok filming (yeah, I pivoted to the evil place to scream about my hyperfixation) and idk. I feel the need to just be lowkey for a little maybe.

[scentedkarma]

Donna Born In Roma Intense

I was recommended this fragrance by someone in the Reddit Fragrance discord and let me tell you, it does not disappoint.

Sprayed it on ~5 minutes ago so it's still developing but oooh boy.

It opens with a strong blast of vanilla that's rich and creamy before sliding into this beautiful jasmine. It's like my very favorite type of jasmine too--delicate and creamy and the very best of a white floral. The vanilla is still there to add a bit of sweetness and the amber is adding a hint of powder-y-ness to the whole thing that just smooths it out but the jasmine is the star here. It shines like the vanilla does in Extradose. Even waiting just gives the jasmine more time to unfurl and do it's thing.

And I'm such a sucker for jasmine. This was a super well done slam dunk.

I'll be interested to see if it has the same staying power as Extradose where I got 8+ hours. 🤔 Though I do have to take a shower at some point today and will probably end up testing a bunch of new fragrances...so. Maybe today is not a wear test day after all. But this is still an excellent scent all around.

[scentedkarma]

House of Bō

I got some free samples (only pay for shipping) from House of Bō this summer. They might still be running the campaign, actually. Check here (looks like the site is still up so it might work).

The scents sent were Casa Blanca, Ave María, and La Mar. Which is cool because I wanted to try 2 of the 3 and the 3rd sounded interesting anyway. Shall we try them out?

Ave María

The bottles are goooorgeous but not gonna lie, the note of leather has me a little concerned.

I'm getting a really amazing jasmine and I think the sweetness is the pear? Something really reminds me of Paradoxe Intense which has pear so I'm going to call it the pear. This is really nice. The jasmine and pear play nicely together, which is something we already knew, thanks to Paradoxe Intense.

It smells super sweet on me. I think the neroli is contributing to the sweetness and it's making everything come out sweet but not like...artificially sweet or bubblegum sweet? It's floral sweet. It's a good floral sweet. It reminds me a lot of Paradoxe Intense, actually. I'm not mad at it but I probably won't keep it because I already have this scent profile.

Casa Blanca

Again with notes that make me nervous lol

Oh. 😮‍💨 This is definitely a suede-forward scent. I can smell "minerals" and I wish I could explain what that smells like aside from like. General grittiness? But there's also the freshness of the tea. And then we have the suede. And, I mean, it's not an awful scent? It's a little fresh and a little spicy, like Parfumo lays out. It's more masculine than I would normally wear. Which, well. I'm basically not going to wear this. This is definitely not a scent for me. Hopefully someone else will enjoy it.

La Mar

Okay, so... Now I'm a little scared. But the notes look a little more accessible?

I get a decent amount of jasmine in the open and some lactonic/coconut notes. I think the tuberose and gardenia are adding to the coconut-ish scent. Creamy and full of white floral. Floral and sweet from that but also creamy from the coconut and milk for sure.

I can't decide if I like it or not. I'll have to keep using it to decide. It's different, for sure. I love white florals but the coconut makes me hesitant. Who knows?

Anyway. In terms of pricing, House of Bō is not shy in their pricing. A 40mL bottle is $175, a 75mL is $365. So.... Yeah, kind of glad I'm not in love with anything

[scentedkarma]

Glossier You & Doux & Fleur

I've tried You and Fleur at Sephora a lot of times and either I haven't been able to smell it or it smells actually repulsive. But I do remember that I couldn't smell Missing Person or Father Figure at all when I was in Sephora either so I figured I'd buy Fleur first and try it and if it was awful then I'd just return it.

Shocking, I did actually love Fleur and was immediately recommended Doux. And I threw in the original just to test them all. So let's go through them!

You

This how a great atomizer, for the record. First thing I noticed. I'm picking up a lot of orris, right off the bat. That makes this very powder-y. Maybe getting a little pepper through the orris. Once it settles, the orris really has taken over. This is a straight up powder bomb.

I'm not impressed by this one, to be honest. If there's not something to balance orris out int he fragrance than it really just smells like powder on me but not like...clean powder or bright powder or anything. It's just flat powder. Almost like unscented baby powder that you might use to powder down your body in the summer. Which is really not flattering.

You Doux

I love these atomizers, jeez.

So, violet and me are usually not friends. Violet goes super old lady on me really fast. That is not the case here, thankfully. Violet is basically non-existent in this one.

I get a lot of frankincense on the open, mixed in with the woody scent of the palo santo. It's woody and spicy and warm and sticks really close to the skin. There's maybe a touch of sweetness from I thunk the amber but this is just over all a really nice scent. You can definitely wear this anywhere and any when. I love it. Reddit server knows what they're talking about.

You Fleur

This is the one that repulsed me in Sephora lol and smelled like just an awful pepper bomb and the one I think I love the most now.

I get a nose full of amazing, creamy ylang-ylang and the warmth of the cashmeran. The last time I tried this I got a lot of apricot but I'm not pulling that today. I am pulling just warm, amazing creamy florals. The salt might be spiking the cashmeran and making it more warm and woody. But it's really amazing.

Oooh, now the apricot is kind of coming through the more it settles. It's balancing out the ylang-ylang's creaminess. This is just a really nice skins cent and adds a bit of complexity to your natural scent. Unfortunately, potentially not a winter/fall scent but I'm planning on trying all my skin scents in the fall and winter to like...confirm? If these will or won't work.

So, there's Glossier. They're super affordable, holy shit. A travel (8mL) is $32, which isn't greeeat but meh. A bottle (50mL) is $78, which is honestly really amazing. I probably will get the bottle (eventually) for Fleur and Doux. You the OG is gonna get returned. But these have definitely surpassed my expectations.

[scentedkarma]

Very Good Girl Glam, Very Good Girl, Good Girl Blush Elixir, Good Girl

Here are more samples!

Caroline Herrera Very Good Girl Glam

Holy black cherry on the opening. This one is actually a little weird. Like, I'm getting cherry but then I'm getting florals on top of that and they're kind of fighting with each other. The florals (maybe it's the lily?) is trying to kill the cherry and it's just not working very well. They is a bad scent, wow. It is not working with my skin chemistry. The scents are clash-y. I don't think I've ever had a scent do this before but wow. Definitely a declutter. Maybe someone else will be able to enjoy this scent.

Carolina Herrera Very Good Girl

The lychee starts out pretty nicely and then the black currant takes over but it's not a good black currant. Which is odd because black currant is usually really jammy on my skin?? Oh, nope, that's the rose. The black currant is gone. Wow, the rose is super strong. I get some lychee along with the rose because the rose is just a little bit (just a tad bit) jammy.

I'm waiting a little longer to see how the rose and lychee mesh, to see if the lychee comes out more or if the rose overpowers. Not really. They kind of mesh really well, actually? The jamminess kind of goes away and it's kind a subtle rose at this point. It's not bad but not something I think I would use so away it goes.

Carolina Herrera Good Girl Blush Elixir

This is kind of nice. This opens (on me) with the sweetness of ylang-ylang (kind of honeyed custard?). Not cloying or too sweet, just kind of creamy and the right amount of sweetness. No bergamot, maybe a touch of mandarin? But definitely ylang-ylang. It's really all I can smell. Not getting any rose. It's really ylang-ylang and vanilla. This is nice. I'll probably keep this. This is unique to my collection, I believe. But this is a very interesting ylang-ylang but also not a bad basic scent. I'm not mad at it.

Hilariously, I like the Blush line over any of the other Good Girl lines.

Carolina Herrera Good Girl

This one is just a mishmash of scents. I don't mind it but. It's hard to describe. I do get coffee but I also get some sweetness from the orange blossom. I think I get more coffee than anything else.

I let it sit for a little bit and now I'm getting a liiiiittle it of jasmine and some tonka bean/cocoa. This isn't a bad scent. It's sweet. Not cloying. It's a little confusing to me? i think I like the Blush line a lot better. The OG Good Girl is a bit of a let down, actually. I was hoping for more of a jasmine/orange blossom forward scent with the addition of coffee and tonka bean. But it is what it is. It's not awful. I don't think I would wear it, though.

[scentedkarma]

Paradoxe Virtual Flower, Clémentine California, Moss+

I'm still sampling and figured I'd continue doing my first impressions here. All of these are tested on skin versus on strip so I can figure out which should stay in my collection. These are all sample sizes (1.2mL, 2mL, 4mL, etc). I have so many samples and I need to get rid of what doesn't work for me.

Let the rambles begin:

Prada Paradoxe Virtual Flower

The jasmine in this is very nice, very kind of delicate?? It's the most prominent note that I get. Not really getting bergamot but getting a very sweet (neroli?) jasmine.

I'm not sure how it compares to the other Paradoxe scents. It's nice, inoffensive. A little sweeter somehow than I prefer my jasmine. Which is very odd. Maybe it's just the way my skin is reacting to the fragrance right now.

Atelier Cologne Clémentine California

This opens with a bright burst of citrus and then goes very herb-y on me. It's not a bad herb-y. I like juniper and cypress, so I'm not mad at it. But, wow, I wish the clementine had stuck around longer than 5 seconds. Jeez. I'm mad about that citrus, goddamn.

The cypress and juniper is amazing, don't get me wrong, and I'm going to keep this. But wow. I'm betrayed.

Commodity Moss+

The juniper comes out really nicely on the opening, super strong, but along with the bergamot to kind of balance the sharpness of the juniper. So it's a nice balance of citrus and earthy & aromatic. The oakmoss starts to come out after a couple of minutes and adds even more of an earthy scent. The scent because very forest-y and earth-y. It's so nice and rich.

Commodity hasn't super impressed me before but I like this a lot. I may have to give Commodity another shot after this.

[scentedkarma]

Awake, Haze, Infuse

I figured I would live blog the scents I'm trying from the Akro Discovery Set. Just like, the first impressions of the scents. Mostly so I can track them but also because it's kind of fun? And, I don't know, in case anyone reads this and wants to go buy the set.

Awake

Awake (on me) opens with a strong, warm coffee note with a touch of cardamom. NO LEMON!!! This is amazing and wonderful news. Anything with lemon historically goes cleaning product on me and I was terrified of that happening here. But it hasn't! (Yet)

It goes a tad sweet (potentially the vetiver?) but it has settled into such a nice coffee scent. It reminds me so strongly of my morning cup of coffee. Coffee with a touch of sweet creamer. I love it. I think I've finally found my perfect coffee scent. 😌

(Edit: turns super gourmand-y. .....i will have to think on this and try some more)

Haze

Holy shit this is green. This is immediately like the best parts of You Or Someone Like You (ELDO) and Sh**ty Day (Noyz). The mint is so well balanced against the sage. It reminds me of walking through an herb garden in full bloom, of fresh cut herbs, of mint tea, of just this refreshing and invigorating scent that is calming and comforting.

Goddammit. I need a bottle.

Infuse

Infuse is Akro's tea scent. Which is why I also immediately needed to try it. 😅

Okay so this opens very gently. I'm getting notes of bergamot (citrus) and then notes of maté (iykyk). But there's a floral note to it that I'm not sure I'm a fan of. I think it's the freesia. I tried a freesia scent from Jo Malone and was not a fan of it.

Sadness. I think this one is a pass for me. I'm gonna let it sit and bloom a little more but so far, the freesia is making this a pass for me.

Annnnd it's gone soapy. Yeah, pass.

[scentedkarma]

Smile

I have wanted to try Akro for a while, and I have been dying specifically to try Smile. I saw Perfumerism try Smile like, mooooonths ago when she reviewed a couple of AKro fragrances and it just stuck with me. I don't know why. Anyway, I found a discovery set very gently used for dirt cheap on Mercari and I had "free" Mercari money (aka, I sold stuff and hadn't transferred it out of my account yet) so I bought it. And it just got here. Annnd you can bet your ass the first one I tried was Smile.

This smells amazing. Like, hands down need a bottle amazing.

It opened with a bright burst of bergamot and sage, just this crisp, clean scent that slowly brought out this juicy raspberry scent. It started so refreshing and joyous and just amazing?? Just so clean with the sage and bergamot. Absolutely wonderful. The raspberry took a backseat but was still there, the juiciness just feeding into the brightness of the citrus and cleanness of the sage.

It's been sitting and developing about 20 minutes now and the raspberry has definitely taken center stage. It's sweet and ripe but not cloying (you know how much I hate cloying and sugar-sweet) but it still has that citrus and sage bite to mellow it out.

This is everything I hoped it would be and more. I'm so happy. It's definitely made me smile. 😊

[scentedkarma]

Apple Love

Good morning, my doves. I am back with another fragrance that I haven't spoken about yet.

When I was just starting out with fragrances, I annoyed my best friend (probably a lot, actually) by saying I wanted to find a photorealistic apple fragrance. My perfect apple. The type of fragrance where it smelled like you'd just bitten into a nice, juicy, crisp apple.

For various reasons, that doesn't exist. But! This gets about as close to that as possible.

This is a sweet, juicy apple scent but not in a completely photo-realistic scent, but not in Bath&Body Works way either. This is a little more grown up than BBW. It's sweet but not in that too sweet, cloying, choke you out manner. This is sweet in a fruity forward way with florals singing backup.

It opens with the juiciness of the orange but tamed with the peach and apple. The apple starts to come out to play a little further on in the opener after like 10-15 minutes and continues to blossom. The floral notes add to it, instead of taking away from the apple. I'll keep going with how it ends up throughout the day.

I used to have Kayali's Juicy Eden Apple and... well. I don't have it anymore. Where Apple Love smells like apple on my skin, if a tad more gourmand than I would prefer, Juicy Eden Apple smelt nothing like apples and was actually very raspberry forward on me. It's a great scent, if you can leave your expectations at the door. (I couldn't.)

This is incredibly wearable and just generally an all around lovely fragrance. It's one of those true powerhouse fragrances that I think works well all year round and in pretty much all settings, depending on the vibe you wanna set.

[scentedkarma]

Very Good Girl Elixir

So Goddess wore off maybe around noon-ish because by 1pm I couldn't smell anything. So around ~2ish I went through my samples and pulled out a few Carolina Herrera samples. I asked my bestie to pick one and she picked this one as the least offensive to her (lol).

The bottle is awful looking, if you ask me. I'm really not a fan of the high heel bottle. But the scent is actually quite nice.

It opens with a strong cherry and smells a little boozy. It's still cherry but it goes a little bitter after a couple of minutes and then smooths down into being just generally a sweat cherry. Not like medicinal or cough syrup or candy sweet, but more just like... I'm not sure. I know it's artificial cherry because that's all I'm familiar with. I don't eat actually cherries. No thanks. Not a fan. Maybe I'd say it's close to cherry juice cocktail? It's a sweet cherry scent but it's not overwhelmingly cloying. Anyway, after a few hours it has faded into a nice vanilla with this additional scent that I can't really put my finger one. It's not really floral. It might be the almond since I'm not familiar with almond as a scent.

But I enjoy it. It's a good fragrance.

[scentedkarma]

Goddess

I haven’t written stuff up in a hot minute. Sorry about that. I should actually get around to typing up my notes and all that. I’ve been altering how I rate/review stuff too and…just kind of improving on my current approach, I think. It’s something I need to let y’all know about. I think it’s a much better approach, anyway.

I chose Burberry Goddess this morning since it’s an office day and I needed something polite. It’s a 7/10 for sillage, according to Parfumo, which is on the top end of acceptable but it’s also very understated so I figure it’s worth a shot.

I’m writing this in the bus and I can’t smell myself through my mask so I’m going to take it as a sign that I’m not going to choke anyone out.

For clocking longevity, I sprayed this on at ~6:50am. Yeah, super late, I know. I’m having A Morning already. Over slept and having a fibro flare and had to scamper to catch the bus. But at least my makeup and scent are on point. (Makeup, for those curious, is eyeliner by Kaledios. One of their multichrome liners, very awesome, highly recommend.)

Scent is absolutely lovely. It opens (on me) with a hit of that spicy ginger that fades away to the background to let the lavender and vanilla come out to play. The lavender lends a calming, herbal-y approach to the scent but not in a bad way. It’s a good herbal-y scent. It’s hard to describe? I can’t huff my wrist or elbow right now but that’s what I wrote down lol The vanilla is super creamy and not sharp or cloying at all. It’s done just right despite the multiple types. It’s not overly gourmand which is fantastic. I hate smelling sweet or like a cake. This is like, the perfect blend.

Eau Duelle I think is still my favorite like, sophisticated vanilla but Goddess I think is my perfect office vanilla. And then Vanilla Skin and Dulce are my daily bangers. Although I love both Vanilla Skin and Dulce for night time. They’re just so cozy.

Anyway, as always, I’ll be back with a full review at a later point. And I’ll get around to typing up my other notes. At some point. Hopefully. Jeez I’ve been slacking so much. 😅🤣

[scentedkarma]

Bracket Game

I'm prrrrrobably not going to be going back to the bracket game.

I just decluttered like. 10 travels and bottles and I'm being vicious with my samples right now. So it's going to throw off the bracket anyway based on that alone. And I don't really feel like starting over from scratch. I might do a mega bracket with everything against each other. But we'll see if I can figure out a way to do that. 😅

Anyway. Stay tuned, I suppose?

[scentedkarma]

I Am Trash - Les Fluers du Déchet

Hello my dears. I'm back with more perfume rambles.

I love this fragrance?? So much. I first smelled it in Merz Apothecary and just, adored it. Their bottle made the perfume blossom with such a juicy, beautiful strawberry. It was lovely.

So I'm laughing and so intrigued that when MY bottle came that it smells so strongly of apple on my skin. I sprayed it about 10-ish minutes ago. It's a beautiful, almost photorealistic juicy apple. Not like Apple Love (Ellis Brooklyn) which is a little sweeter but still a really pretty apple which is just, ugh. Apple Love is my perfect apple fragrance. But I Am Trash was supposed to be my perfect strawberry, so I'm laughing so much.

I'll have to be patient with it and see if the strawberry develops. It's still a beautiful, wonderful fragrance, don't get me wrong, and I'm so glad I bought it. But I'm still like, well fuck. But! We will see!!

[scentedkarma]

I’ve been doing speed testing of my collection to try to make sure I actually want what I have.

I can drop the speed reviews here if anyone is interested. They’re just dash notes. There’s … 63 scents. I didn’t add in any samples so these are my bottles and travel sizes. I’ll probably go through those at a later date.

But yeah. I’m trying to get rid of stuff I don’t want/wont wear.

[scentedkarma]

Skin

Another non-bracket fragrance because I’m heading to the office and I need a non-offensive scent. I’d redo the bracket but I like we’re getting to round 2 on things. Very exciting.

Anyway. I sprayed Skin about 30 mins ago (~6:30a CST) because I was getting ready for work (and was congested as hell; I think I’m allergic to something in the apartment). So I’m on the bus and doing this.

Skin smells a little sweet on me (probably the praline tbh and a little bit the orange blossom?). Actually there’s a lot of reasons for Skin to read as sweet. But it’s very like. Hm… A personal sweetness? I’m not sure how to describe it. It’s a very close scent, your skin but better, you just stepped out of the shower and maybe this is your body wash? Idk. Something like that. It’s not gourmand (thank fuck) and it’s very pleasing. I’m just crap at explaining it right now. Sorry.

Clean is also a pretty affordable brand. There’s a bundle on Sephora where you can get a 5mL and 30mL bottle of Skin for $50. And their usual bottles run about $110 for 100mL. Which is actually quite nice. The only downside is they offer travel size OR 100mL. But most niche brands do that. I’m not sure what to classify Clean as.

Technically a niche house is a house that only creates fragrances and nothing else. Maybe candles. Anything else is just a fragrance house. So, idk. I haven’t looked. Meh.

[scentedkarma]

My Way / Turkish Rose

So I'm tired and want to move onto bracket round 2 for florals (because soooo many florals rn) so I decided to do a speed round on the last round 1 bracket.

My Way

I actually love this? I got this as a free sample. And wow, I actually really really like this. I think I sprayed this at 9:50am CST so about 10mins ago. The alcohol is still burning off.

The orange blossom is blooming nicely and mixing wonderfully with the tuberose and jasmine. These are like, my favorite trio of scents. This is a great blend right here. Very well done. There's a hint of zest from the bergamot. That will probably burn off in the next half hour to hour. I'm not getting much of the vanilla or the musk but the musk will probably help keep it close to the skin. The orange blossom is just so creamy and wonderful and prominent.

Turkish Rose

This.....smells flat. It doesn't actually smells like anything. Ew. Nope, wiped it off. This is just...scentless.

And we have an immediate winner - My Way! I'll do an analysis later.

[scentedkarma]

I skipped an analysis of Turkish Rose because there's really nothing to look at there. Nope. Nothing. So, here's My Way:

Longevity - 7.3/10 nets My Way 4.5 points

Sillage - 7.1/10 gets 3.5 points

Versatility - Potentially office safe. Probably not, but very slightly maybe. More WFH, etc etc etc. Definitely spring, summer, fall. Potentially winter. 4 points

Cost Breakdown - 2.5 points $36 10mL ($3.60/mL) $95 30mL ($3.16/mL) $130 50mL ($2.60/mL) $160 90mL ($1.77/mL)

Accessibility - Designer house, designer price. Short term investment isn't as bad as some others. The 10mL and 30mL aren't horrible up front but long term is ouchie; the long term is good for 50mL & 90mL but the short term is not great. Trade offs on everything.

Rebuyability - Not limited edition. Designer/mainstream house. I may buy this. I got a 1.2mL sample so I never really bought this. lol I would need to compare this to Libre Intense and Paradoxe. It has a great scent profile but it could also have a very similar scent as the other wise. Otherwise, this is a great option. A potential buy. 3 points

My Way coming in with 17.5 points

[scentedkarma]

So I went on a bit of a boutique spree. Mostly I went to Sephora and then a local boutique (and had plans to go to another one but the first had the scents I wanted to check out at the SECOND on so no need). I am wearing…. 3 scents right now. So let’s go through them.

Replica - Never Ending Summer

Strong bitter orange scent on the opening

Settles into a cedar and citrus scent

A bit herby too but not overwhelmingly so

Very lovely, I’m weak for cedars and citruses

Bought a travel size since it smelled nice on card for two days AND it’s not bad on my skin

ELDO - I Am Trash

Amazingly strong juicy strawberry opening

Potential apple mixed in with the strawberry (can’t tell, a little congested)

Sweet but not artificially sweet; a fresh kind of sweet

Very lovely; bought the ELDO discovery set of 20 samples (their whole line?)

Diptyque - Ilio

BEAUTIFUL

Gorgeous powdery scent that’s just so bright and airy

Underlying citrus scent

Makes me smile when I smell it

Just really lovely all around. I’m standing waiting for the train huffing my wrist

I may be buying this later today

I got other recommendations from the sales associate and I’m so excited for all the scents I smelled. Just everything is so beautiful. Will definitely be going back to that boutique in the future.