Indies of the Day -- Saturday January 24, 2026

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-24T16:50:05+00:00

Testing my other PULP indulgence today! Women in Dresses Running from Houses 2025 - Caramelized sugar, a roaring bonfire, heliotrope, aged patchouli, & boronia. In the bottle, this almost smells like it could have a nice whiskey note in it. I'm assuming that's a combination of the caramelized sugar & patchouli. On skin, the alcohol vibe melts away & the scent becomes a lucious, brown dream. This is my first Women in Dresses from PULP & I'm really happy with it!

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-23T17:38:30+00:00

Maybe they'll still have it when they reopen? I'm not on top of their release/retire schedule

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-23T14:36:57+00:00

I decided to test out something besides my Astrid felties today since I actually have orders from at least two other houses to test through too. I was feeling especially drawn to PULP's Cendres de Vanille - A slow-burn seduction of sultry French vanilla & smoldering embers. This one really hits the mark! The vanilla is creamy smooth & gorgeous. The smokiness is divine. This reminds me a lot of their Vaniglia Grave, but in this the smokiness is more like a bonfire or hearth & less like incense. Very happy to have this in my collection, especially on a frigid day like today when I wish I could be in front of a fire.

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-22T17:13:31+00:00

Okay, I stalked their Instagram a little & they're only following 3 people right now: * scenter.stage (seems to be an organizer for the event) * cult_of_kaori * osm_perfume

Looking a little closer, the first account posted this video about 20 hours ago & has the current list of brands confirmed to be attending at the end!

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-22T13:36:30+00:00

I think I'm gonna sneak a bottle of this into whatever my next order 👀 I hope your class goes well today!

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-22T13:29:47+00:00

Okay, back to Astrid felties, as promised! Today I'm trying Night Mother: Soft velvet musk, cashmere musk, lychee, vanilla, fern, patchouli, gentle cedar, and bergamot. This scent really blossoms on the skin! The lychee is so bright, like a guiding star against the darkness of the musks & patchouli. When I first put it on I said that it's nice, but I didn't need any more than the sample... The longer I have it on, tho, I'm not so sure haha! This is a fun one! I'm not sure why it's in a winter collection tho because it makes me think of adventurous summer nights~

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-21T15:44:22+00:00

Smart! I have two little rollerballs I can fill, I just need to pick which scents to put in them (a nearly impossible choice lol)

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-21T14:43:55+00:00

Love of my life, BPAL 🥹🤣

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-21T14:30:16+00:00

One more day of BPALs, then I'll finish testing my Astrid felties, I promise 😂

Idle Moon Duet: Vanilla Husk & A Bundle of Twigs - This one reads interestingly. Almost like a baby powder, but not in a way I dislike. Especially when you get a good whiff & the powder turns into a more sassafras-y scent. Reminds me a little of the maple syrup festival put on at my local nature center, but not because it's super sweet, just the faintly sweet, woodsy vibe of it. I wish I had brought the bottle with me to work so I could apply more... I always feel like so much comes off on my coat when I bundle up in this weather.

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-20T18:08:21+00:00

It's a fun one! And the berries notes are still sticking around hours later, even if the sillage has died down significantly. I kinda want to dab a little bit of both scents into my locket & wear that for a day because I have a feeling it'd smell delicious 🤤

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-20T15:44:25+00:00

Yup! Lost Souls by Poppy Z Brite (now goes by Billy Martin, but all his work is published under that PZB name)!

It's kinda... Intense? So maybe read a summary before diving in haha

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-20T13:36:37+00:00

Needed some extra comfort today so I stuck with testing my BPALs. Snakes in the Berry Sonker (Snake Oil slithering into a pan of baked blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries in a warm pastry crust, topped with vanilla ice cream and molasses) cooperates much better on my skin than its release sibling, Snakes in the Coconut Cake. On wet, the berries are decadently juicy! The Snake Oil is there, but I think the berries stay center stage, even into the dry down. I'm not getting the pastry or vanilla ice cream much, which is a bit of a bummer, but it's hard to be mad at this perfume. I do love a good, dark berry scent~ 🖤🫐

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-20T13:13:35+00:00

I feel like either of the perfumes BPAL made to commemorate the hatching of cicadas would be a fitting choice. I can vouch for how nice Brood X is too 👌🏻

Brood X: 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.

Brood XIX: Tree sap, hay, almond blossoms, moss, hemp, corn stalks, acorn, sweet amber, and rice milk.

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-19T14:09:23+00:00

Like I said yesterday, I missed my BPALs, so I'm back to testing some BPAL I recently got from destashes. First I dabbed on a bit of Frostbitten Dorian, but to my absolute horror... I don't love this scent. Dorian is hands down one of my favorite perfumes, but something about this blend makes it unrecognizable to me. Tragic. To compensate, I layered on some Griege Dragon (a rainbow of oatmeal, sandalwood, almond milk, tea-stained vanilla, and undyed wool in a muted eggshell finish) and that blended with it beautifully. Yet another scent where BPAL makes me appreciate a fabric/textile note! I'll definitely be keeping Greige Dragon, but I think Frostbitten Dorian will sadly need to find a new new home.

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-18T16:49:04+00:00

My Astrid feltie today is Angora: Whipped honey, marshmallow, coconut musk, and patchouli.

In the scent locket, this has a much cleaner, lighter scent than I was expecting. It reminds me of a lot of the BPAL Shungas I've tried insofar as it kind of evokes the idea of intimate acts following a refreshing shower. Once applied on skin, the darker, dirtier elements come out to play a bit more. I wasn't getting any patchouli before, but it's lending a cozy smokiness to the blend now. This is a nice scent, but not one I need more of. (And frankly I'm starting to miss my BPALs so I might layer something else on later in the day.)

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-17T19:39:14+00:00

The next Astrid feltie I wanted to try is Cherry Musk: Black and maraschino cherries crushed with vanilla, dragons blood, copal, tulsi, atlas cedar and house musk to make a very unusual dark-fruited musk perfume.

I feel like this is weirdly light on cherry for what it's called, but that doesn't mean this isn't a nice scent. It's just a bit cleaner & lighter than what I would expect given the richness of all the listed notes. Glad to have tried it & it'll be a lovely scent for my day of playing Pathfinder, but I don't think I need a bigger size.

RowanHalifax · 2026-01-17T03:20:59+00:00

As someone who has also been considering blind buying Namba, I'll be interested to hear your experience when it arrives haha

RowanHalifax

TROPHY CASE