Hello everyone – today I’m back with three more scents pulled from the Credo Beauty sample bag a friend gave me a few weeks ago, selected at random for perusal. I found a couple I really liked last time; what will happen on this round?
Ellis Brooklyn Myth – the card inside (which I didn’t read before sampling) says “clean sheets, bare skin … an intimate, stunning fragrance that invites you to lean in a little closer.” Huh. That’s interesting, because this made me lean as far away from my arm as I could without detaching it from my body. Notes: white musk, jasmine, cassis, cedarwood.
Look, this is 100% not designed for me. I dislike that predominant “clean laundry” smell in perfumery, home scents, body products, and/or in the actual laundry product aisle in the grocery store, which smells oddly acrid/sour to me and which I avoid like the plague. Also, while I’m being a pill, these seem like a waste of time and money. If you want to smell like this, fine – buy a similarly-scented laundry detergent, or some dryer sheets, and have at it. If it’s more of that white musk aspect you’re after, go to the drugstore (or the internet) and get some Jovan White Musk or, if you’re feeling saucy, some Coty Wild Musk. The nicest thing I can say about Myth is it wasn’t persistent enough to be a scrubber.
Next!
Heretic Parfum Dirty Vanilla – I snickered like a preteen boy at the text on the card, which reads like a bodice-ripper, here’s a sample (“both male and female organs nestled deep in the throat of the bloom … from first shy blossom to aromatic climax…”) To be fair, what they’re going on about in this purple-prose way is how (fun fact!) natural vanilla comes from the seed pods of a particular orchid, Vanilla planifolia. “Warm, rich, centering, sensual.”
The opening’s weird … almost barnyard on top of vanilla? In a good way, nice and dirty. Great start! Unfortunately that delightful foreplay doesn’t last long enough, the climax is premature and I’m left unsatisfied while this scent rolls over and goes immediately to sleep, so to speak. A little rasp, a little spice (sandalwood, coriander) but mostly a clean, tame vanilla amber with a woodsy musk remnant after several hours. I mean, I didn’t hate it, but I won’t be using up my sample.
Next!
Ceremonia Perfume de la Tierra – I was hoping this was going to be an incense fragrance, but it turns out I had the name of the brand and the fragrance reversed – Ceremonia is the company’s name, a “clean hair care brand on a mission…” Oh honey, aren’t we all?!?
Boiling the text on the sample card down: woody notes, lemon zest, tonka, violet, black tea, vetiver, brown sugar. “Enjoy the woodiness of a vibrant, humid rainforest,” which … isn’t what those notes conjure up, at least for me, but let’s get on with it.
We started off poorly because the atomizer doesn’t work so I had to pry it apart, but the effort was worth it. Oooh, this is nice! Lots of zesty lemon in the opening, then what smells more like herbal tea (maybe the earthiness of the vetiver?), a bit peppery, drying down to a sort of woodsy cologne-level intensity – a subtle skin scent, but it sticks around. I’m not going to run out and buy it, but I’d wear it if it fell in my lap, especially during summer which seems like more its season.
Honestly, even when I don’t love them, I wasn’t bored — which is a win. Have you tried any of these?
images via Pexels
I’ve tried all of these and own Myth. It’s a nice scent for close quarters at work or on travel.
I always worry when I’m snarky that I’m hurting someone’s feelings … perceptions are so different. I think I both magnify that “clean” thing and perceive it differently than a lot of folks. A good skin scent is nice to have.
If everybody thought like me, they’d have a collection of almost universally gourmands and clean scents! Snark away! 🙂
Haven’t tried any of those, March, but I’m glad you tried them for us. Tierra sounds the most interesting to me. I’m not a white musk laundry scent lover nor a vanilla craver, so a lemony woodsy thing sounds nice. Right now the DC metro area is covered in a blanket of cold and snow. It’s pretty.
Ooooh, I have to check in with my DC kid! She’s been complaining you haven’t had any snow this winter.
I get the laundry musk craze March, though I don’t think I own any. Do you remember during the early 2000s when the CLEAN line was released and there were a few really big actors who were wearing them to auditions. They were talking about wearing perfume and how it was something a director or casting agent might have a negative memory of. Wearing CLEAN perfumes meant that they would not smell of history, just clean. I thought it was a vey interesting take on perfume and what makes people tick.
Portia xx
I TOTALLY remember that time, I think I even found it an interesting concept. The actor/casting thing makes sense too. I think I’m over-sensitive to that smell, maybe — even walking the dog outside, I can smell people’s laundry (vented dryers) from a fair distance.
My next door neighbour never seem to dry clothes outside. Every single evening the whole end of the cul de sac stinks of laundry musks & fake florals
Ugh, I’d hate that..
I do.
I don’t use softener, a mix of 90% white vinegar and 10% disinfectant. Living in an apartment it’s a much less overpowering scent when drying and the clothes come out smelling of nothing.
We can always tell when others are using their dryers, the whole internal stairs smell of it.
Fortunately I don’t hate it like you Alityke, Tom and March
Portia x
I MUCH prefer the smell of vinegar to the smell of regular laundry detergent! I throw some in the wash and also use it all over the house to clean in various ways.
You’re the one who got me into using vinegar, Portia! Love it!!!
Per alityke, the Ellis Brooklyns can be found here but I’m not sure about samples. Will have to look more carefully. Available in 10ml travel sizes. So, that’s a plus. Sigh about laundry musks. What’s the point?
That is a plus, I think several of these come in smaller sizes, which of course I wish all brands did.
Over the water in the UK 2 of these brands don’t look to be available. The Ellis Brooklyn line are but have never taken my fancy, not even when I’ve been emotional blind buying. Not sure I’m missing much anyway
I guess I’m not shocked about the lack of availability given that they’re stocked by some bougie “clean” beauty boutique here lol. I don’t think you are missing much, no.
Nothing much interests me here, though Heretic Parfum Dirty Vanilla is one that I was curious about and was considering trying. Not anymore. I loved your description of this perfume but it’s not my kind of sex! Lol. 😉
Not my kind of sex either! I wish Heretic Dirty Vanilla had lived up to its name more.
“Unfortunately that delightful foreplay doesn’t last long enough. The climax is premature and the scent rolls over and goes immediately to sleep, so to speak” Whaaat? You mean
no sandwich first?
Nope. No shower, no checking the phone, just straight to sleep 😀
I knew I was old, but didn’t think I was THAT old. I still remember when one had a cigarette after…
Oh ya! I always enjoyed that cigarette! Glad you mentioned it. 🙂
LOL! Yes! That was always the BEST tasting cigarette, wasn’t it?
Yes it was!!!
Ha! Those were the days!
None of these really do it for me.
If I want to smell clean laundry I just do laundry.
I don’t even want to smell it when I do laundry — I use one of those Mrs. Meyers (lemon verbena) that is delightfully free of that laundry musk.
I hear you! I use nothing but unscented liquid detergent in the wash and wool dryer balls. That “clean laundry” synthetic musk literally makes it hard for me to breathe.
I work in healthcare admin. About a decade ago, my assistant would come to work reeking of Snuggle or Downy. We shared an office which was located at the rear of a large imaging facility. No kidding I could smell her when she walked in the front door. She was a large person and was always sweating. When she was in the office with me, the smell of that stuff was horribly suffocating. It felt like someone stuck my face into a bottle of Downy and I was drowning. I talked to her about it, asked her to stop using it and even bought her unscented fabric softener.
Reader-I finally fired her.
Oh nooooooo! That smell up in my face all the time would absolutely trigger a migraine.
I use plain old unscented laundry soap. No dryer sheets, so “softeners”, no nothing. I pay enough for perfume, thanks ever so, I don’t need my underpants competing against my Uncle Serge.
Now of the made Mitsouko dyer balls, maybe..
Hehe! No dryer sheets or softeners here either. I will add it’s much easier line-drying things here, they dry so fast!
I’m in the Northeast and during the wickedly hot summers here, nearly every piece of laundry gets line dried. Now THAT is a smell I wish someone would bottle-line dried cotton. I remember that Luca Turin raved about what I considered a real mainstream scent-it was White T-Shirt or something like that by Calvin Klein or Tommy Hilfiger. Sorry to be vague; this was aeons ago. Like a hopeful fool, I bought it. And immediately donated it to the local charity thrift shop.
I have Dirty Jasmine and Dirty Violet, which are nice but nothing earth-shattering. Haven’t tried anything from the other two brands. I’m not a fan of laundry musks either, especially at today’s perfume prices. Guerlain’s Musc Outreblanc is a particularly egregious example.
Oh, yeah — Guerlain, are you KIDDING me? I mean, if you love that kind of smell, there are dozens at cheap price points.
I have tried several of the Heretic scents and have a travel spray of dirty Mango (a lark because I didn’t have any mango in my collection). I tried the Ellis Brooklyn line and was not impressed. The best I can say about both is the price point is reasonable!
That’s true, and I should have noted that — these aren’t at crazy prices if something appeals. I think I have exactly one mango scent, which is a room spray.
Petuniacake of Love:
All 3 of these look like they’d make my skin itch – then again, right now breathing is making my skin itch.
The Ceremonia does sound like a try-er – maybe. Yeah – going back to the notes, I think this might really work – I love the idea of lemon and brown sugar – a riff on Fresh Lemon Sugar, with more interesting notes.
Oh, I loved Lemon Sugar back in the day! You’re right, I’d like a slightly … less synthetic? version of that right now.
FLSugar was my first Gumps purchase. Lawd… I miss that store.