BDKs and a Birthday Fail

I swear – why do I feel like I am perpetually the kid that cries about the dog eating their blog post. It’s just been a crazy busy time, and this is the last week of it before we get the holiday slowdown – yeah!  But I was going to talk about the BDKs.  In more detail than this, but all we are getting is some bare bones.

I really love BKD Gris Charnel?  It’s an addictive, soft, smooth as butter thing, and I kept sniffing my sample for two months, trying to decide if it was enough different from other smooth, buttery fragrances I have. Then I decided I didn’t care, I really loved it and I was going to need it when it got thrown into an online sale for 20% off!

Now I’m trying to decide on Rouge Smoking. It is reaaaallly nice and getting dangerously close to that “I don’t care” spot too.

Do we think there are others that would work? I’ve got a bunch of them as samples when it was a freebie at Luckyscent, and I’m slowly going through them. Some I think are okay, but I only sprayed them once and haven’t gone back to that well. There are like 3-4 of them that I keep noodling around with.  They are just hard to wrap my head around because they don’t beat you over the head, they are much more subtle.  I think I’ve decided that isn’t a bad thing in perfumes, it’s just not as easy to know if you love it.

Thanks for all the birthday wishes! I had a pretty laid back birthday – worked (duh!), but not too much, and I’ve got cheesecake and clam chowder coming in from back east tomorrow.  I ordered too late to get it here today. That’s my favorite meal.  Perfume I wore for my birthday was that BDK Rouge Smoking that I’m still trying to sort out in my head. I’ve almost gone through the sample, I really am hoping for some sale somewhere or another after Christmas to push me over the edge.

Then the other thing I’m determined to try out are those Gucci Alchemist things.  Anyone else tried them? I don’t have access here to perfume counters – not like I’d go out sniffing if I could – and those are tough to come by since I don’t have any suction with perfume salespeople these days.

Worth it or no? I found the Iris one reasonable ($330 for 100 mls is tooo much, got it for far less than that!) and I can never turn down a good iris, and I’m hoping Gucci will redeem itself and head back to the days when they made my still favorite perfume, 2003 Gucci EDP.  So fill me in, those of you that have smelled them –  on the regular ones, the oils and that Nymph thing that is pretty new.

  • Portia says:

    Hey Patty,
    I like the BDKs and have a bottle of Creme de Cuir, which is exactly as the name suggests and smooth as silk.
    The new Gucci are nice but you’re right, spendy, at half the price I’d definitely be owning some.
    Portia xx

  • SpringPansy says:

    Hi Patty, I hope your birthday was wonderful! Gris Charnel sounds pretty great for cold weather. I just reread your BeautyCounter post from a few years ago – are you still feeling the love for their products? I may venture forth to try them. Thanks.

  • Dina C. says:

    I love iris, too, and have several (a long list of) favorites. I haven’t been out to the malls or shops to sniff anything new in eons sadly. But I really like reading about the new things. Love New England Clam Chowder, too. My daughter wants me to make a NY style cheesecake for Christmas this year since her friend gave us a beautiful springform pan recently. I’ve never made one before.

  • Cinnamon says:

    I first read the name as Gris Chanel — wondered why one perfume house would name a scent after another and had to go look at Lucky Scent to be put on the right path. Clam chowder… Manhattan or New England? I am partial to New England and years ago had a really great version at the Grand Central Oyster Bar.

  • Zazie says:

    About the dog eating the blog post…
    You’ve reminded me of two lovely peanuts strips…
    One where the teacher asks Charlie Brown if the dog chewed his homework and he answers “actually, he wrote it!”…
    The other one where snoopy, aka the WWI flying ace, is running away with secret papers, aka Sally’s homework…

    Yes I am a bit naif…I know… don’t mind me…

  • KimB says:

    I bought a full bottle of the BDK French Bouquet, a marvellous old school chypre. Not in your face like the original Lancôme Magie Noire or Paloma Picasso, softer yet still with that chypre bitterness if you know what I mean. Still working my way through the rest of BDK.
    As for the Gucci Alchemist line, nothing tempting. Didn’t like the oils. The Virgin Violet was nice but not enough to tempt me. Same with the iris – I still prefer Chanel’s La Pausa.

    • Patty says:

      Now i need to dig out the French Bouquet sample I have here, IF I have it. That sounds really nice. I’ve liked most of the BDK. Some of them just aren’t me, but I get what they were doing. Well, I’ll skip the oils. Their price point was aspirational for a line that hadn’t been doing that at all. It feels like they should have aimed for a midway point – higher than the mainstream stuff they had been doing. Well, I’m anxious to try the iris anyway, I love iris. 🙂

  • Musette says:

    I was curious as to the name, thinking “Carnal Grey’ sounds…weird. Then, digging through my Collins, I found that gris also can mean ‘intoxicated’ as well as ‘slatternly’ (the last person to use that word in my hearing was my mother!)…. Luckyscent’s scoop references ‘sheets giv(ing)off a scent’ (wink) … so… I’m thinking this one is a bit of a hotchamama?

    • Patty says:

      I mean, maybe? I don’t think of it as being a little naughty at all, not like, say, that Byredo Tobacco Mandarin that you’re not expecting armpit hair in. It’s more seductive than outwardly chest heaving.

      • Musette says:

        yeah – I wouldn’t know either – but if you read the LS ‘scoop’ they really push the ‘wriggling around in the sheets’ notion 😉 xoxo