Byrehoe

A beige aesthetic sandalmusk polished with plastic-toned saffron. I have a type and that type is fake wood!! As a Santal 33 Big Bottle owner, I love this genre. This is the scent of a Lincoln log McMansion, more plywood and laminate than actual tree. It’s sweet, it’s clean, it’s got central heating. Takes me back to the B&BW “Sensual Amber” line of the 2000s (be still my heart). Feels like the sawdust static counterpart to the white noise of Fugazzi’s Angel Dust. Unfortunately didn’t last more than two hours on my skin, but I will go out of my way to spritz whenever I pass through Sephora.

Mental Snapshot: It’s 2005. You’re at your friend’s Tuscan-style house in the bougie subdivision. (They have an island in their kitchen!). Everything’s mahogany, granite, and wrought iron. And a whole lot of biscuit, buff, and beige. They have a home theatre. You sink into a brown pleather sectional. It smells like this.

tl;dr: model home musk

Don’t come for me, but this smells like that Pepto Bismol pink public bathroom soap. (I promise I mean that as a compliment!) Though I could never figure out what that scent was supposed to be. Cherry blossom? Sugar almond? Yum pistachio gelato? Regardless, I get a candy vanilla, clean and sweet. The nuttiness is lovely and tempers the overall sweetness. On the cosy end of the sweater-to-sequins continuum. My favourite Kayali thus far, though still much sweeter than I like for regular wear. Would have preferred to catch pistachio gelato, but yum enough.

Mental Snapshot: For some reason I can’t help but read “Yum Pistachio Gelato” in a Kardashian voice. (Specifically the Soda Drama Youtube vid, for my fellow chronically online). It's a beautiful Santa Monica day and the girls are on a shopping spree. Kim pauses to use the ladies' room. When she returns Kourtney surprises her with a treat from Eataly. “Yum pistachio gelato!” She exclaims, then wonders why none of her sisters are eating any.

tl;dr: Yummers Bathroom Soap 33

A cartoon marshmallow-berry mushroom cloud. Caps lock MARSHMALLOW, subscript berry. And then a muscly bubblegum. I want to say it’s like a roll of Hubba Bubba, coated in that dry, powdery gum starch. Surprised there’s no tuberose listed. Unfortunately gave me a kneejerk dental fluoride vibe. Ori is sweet and clean, but has that strident saccharinity that evokes cleaning products more so than anything edible. Scent sisters could be Loewe’s Pink Magnolia (more floral) or Vilhelm’s Moon Carnival (more tropical). Doesn’t have the sillage of Ex-Delina, but has the same tenacious longevity. Sidenote: I wonder if a fragrance enthusiast has ever named their twins Delina and Oriana.

Mental Snapshot: Astral projecting onto the Lisa Frank plane. It’s a hot pink Hades. Cerberus is a prismatic poodle, the Styx a cascade of syrup. Barbie Girl plays on eternal repeat and Trisha Paytas is your Dante.

tl;dr: hot pink

Incongruously… normie for a Bowie-inspired piece. Basically a lemon-blueberry vanilla, the edges a little frayed with secondhand smoke. Safe bet if you love a good ‘ol sweet n’ fruity. I couldn’t do Floraiku’s One Umbrella For Two (way too Otis Spunkmeyer), but I can vibe with the candy blueberry here. Solid performance, but I didn’t desire more than three hours of it. That said, I still ran my sampler dry within a month and am on my second one. Sometimes a girl just wants to smell girly. It smells like high school, but in the most complimentary way.

Mental Snapshot: You skived off yearbook club to hang with the Cool Kids after school. They try to get you to smoke a cigarette (you take one timid puff). Afterwards, you blast yourself with every body spray in your locker so mom won’t know.

tl;dr: innocently punky

Book matches cover. THE princess perfume. Historically inaccurate rococo rose, with syrup-soaked lychee and soupçon of vanilla. Imagine rosewater lokum dusted in powdered sugar. My favourite part is the lychee, which really ignites on my skin (stays rosier on fabric). So succulent. Evokes the same feelings I got from the OG Juicy Couture, as a gourmand-toeing rose, but this is more floaty and fruity. Longevity is wild. Think cupid with a six-pack. Went to bed in day-old Delina on my t-shirt and woke up still in a baby pink cloud. Would consider splurging but I already have Gumamina’s Odette, which does the same Turkish delight and baby powder thing, only with grapefruit.

Mental Snapshot: A rave for cherubs. Royal Wedding fascinators. A first kiss in a Laudrée. The Swing by Jean-Honore Fragonard, only she’s kicking off an acrylic-platformed Pleaser. This week a hot new bombshell enters Versailles.

tl;dr: attractif