Gourmandgrl

UPDATE: reserve judgment on this until the dry-down (45 minutes) - that's where it really shines!

Allure Homme Sport Eau Extrême stirred my chili, fanned my flames... whatever you want to call it, this made me feel "some type of way"! While it's not something I'd personally wear, I would LOVE to smell this on a significant other.

The citrus is only present in the opening. The mint, cypress, and clary sage were also very subtle background players to my nose. Catching a hint of the mint was lovely and brought in a barely-chilly nuance, and the clary sage (most present for the first 45 minutes-1 hour) served for a softly-earthy/dry-wood touch (almost like cedar).

But the most dominant notes to me in dry-down were the creamy tonka, soft pepper, and musky-woody notes - and they blended together like a warm, creamy, masculine, slightly-earthy/woodsy, subtly-spiced cinnamon hug. Just like a fall rendezvous with your dream man in his chunkiest sweater, get ready to melt... because this is irresistible in every way!!

Powerful; I had the tester strip on my coffee table several feet away and could smell it without any movement or airflow - not too loudly to be obnoxious, but plenty enough to entice

Impressive; there was definitely an alluring trail wherever the tester strip moved - so @Mohashim's review is on-point (when he said "the magic truly lies in the scent trail – it's the kind that will turn heads")

Exceptional; while its peak performance was probably in the first 10-12 hours, it continued to give lower mid-range strength even at 24 - and is still present on the tester strip a few days later

Best for cooler weather, given the cozy/spiced/gourmand/woodsy vibe; would be perfect for fall or winter

I've been searching for a creamy-honey fragrance for a while - not pure wildflower honey, but a true honey-milk blend... without much else to detract from those main notes. Seeing Nº23 Honey Milk Eau de Parfum and Nº23 Honey Milk Hair & Body Mist , I was excited to test them. Comparing the two:

Nº23 Honey Milk Hair & Body Mist
- Opens with a fluffy cloud of sweet, ambery honey
(deeper than wildflower honey, and nothing "cat urine" about it like some honey notes are)
- The honey is then joined by a a bit of sweet whiskey
(boozy/smokey heat, but not overpowering; it's a background player)
- Subtle vanilla then comes in
(I didn't get anise, coffee liqueuer, or oat milk, as the notes suggest)
- Remains mostly linear (with all of these notes) for the remainder of the wear, sweetening and softening in dry-down
- The projection is a bit quieter than the EDP; stays closer to the skin and is warmer

Nº23 Honey Milk Eau de Parfum
Similar to the breakdown above, however:
- It also has a slightly-synthetic "transparent musk" background
- This musk feels like something in the base used to help improve projection of the EDP
- The EDP projection is definitely stronger than the mist, but this transparent musk took away from my enjoyment and made the blend "cooler"/not quite as warm
- The difference is small, but I'm really sensitive to these types of musks; you might not notice it, if you keep your nose away from your wrist or are not sensitive to them
- The musk does soften after several hours, so the EDP warms up more the longer you wear it

Longevity:
Nº23 Honey Milk Hair & Body Mist : strongest wear on skin was 2-3 hours, dropped off steeply at this point... but surprisingly went to 14-15 hours (super faint then - had to get your nose close to the skin to find it)
Nº23 Honey Milk Eau de Parfum : strongest wear on skin was 8-10 hours, but went to 20 hours (very faint by that point)

In the end, I still preferred the mist - but both are beautiful. It's primarily a resinous ambery-honey blend - with subtle boozy-smokey warmth, a hint of vanilla, excellent longevity, and just gorgeous overall. I can't wait to (hopefully) wear this one in the fall/winter!

I've been on a fragrance no-buy since the beginning of this year. But when my no-buy lifts, I'm running to buy this - because I instantly fell in love, and could see this being signature-scent worthy.

ON PAPER:
The tonka and cotton candy seemed to dominate. But on my skin, the other notes really blossomed - and I have been huffing my arm ever since testing, because of how beautiful this blend is.

ON SKIN:
After spraying it on my skin, it opened with a cushy-feeling tonka (almost like a plush marshmallow). This moved quickly into the bulk of the fragrance: soapy-fresh jasmine tea, made cozy by smooth woods + soft spun sugar. I never would have put these together, but they complement each other beautifully - and I love every single part of this fragrance!

NOTES:
[50%] soapy-fresh jasmine
[20%] clean tea
[10%] velvety woods/vetiver blend
[20%] soft spun sugar
(plus this note is not sticky-sweet or synthetic at all - like some cotton candy notes are)

I've been pleasantly surprised that it has remained linear while wearing, with the above notes all present throughout (minus the tonka, but I'm okay with that). It's all blended extremely well, actually difficult to pick apart anything - and somehow feels clean, sexy, comforting, and cozy all at once.

PERFORMANCE:
Excellent projection + sillage + longevity: just one spray on my skin and caught strong wafts 7 hours later. Dropped off around the 8-10 hour mark, becoming faint. For how strong it was for as long as it was (no tapering on my skin for 7 solid hours), it has excellent performance for a cheapie.

*UPDATE:
- I love this far more than its compared counterparts, Bal d'Afrique Eau de Parfum or Find Comfort (Body & Hair Fragrance Mist) .
- If you hate it when testing, try testing a different bottle of this in another store. Not sure if there are batch issues - but I'm also in a warmer climate, and some of the beauty stores display their fragrances in windows/direct sunlight along with warmer interior temps... possibly contributing to earlier spoiling? Either way, I've HATED it when testing on my skin at some stores and LOVED it at other locations.

I'm a citrus snob. Growing up around citrus trees raises the bar for citrus fragrance expectations - sometimes making it difficult to find accurate portrayals of citrus. Luckily, "Bombshell Amalfi | Victoria's Secret" is a very realistic citrus - but there's more to it than that.

It opens with a true-to-life tangerine, but not just the juice: you get the whole fruit - with sun-kissed, slightly-bitter rind intact. It's very refreshing, and I imagine picking a ripe tangerine straight off the tree - with freshly-juiced/zested tangerines nearby.

Very quickly, a sweet musk moves in. Based on testing/comparing the notes from the other flankers in this line ( "Bombshell Santorini | Victoria's Secret" and "Bombshell St. Tropez | Victoria's Secret" ), I'm guessing this is meant to be a creative interpretation of peony. But it's not the typical peony note Victoria's Secret is famous for, as it lacks the watery/aquatic quality like previous note iterations. It's more sweet than floral, and the touch of musk seems to be a new addition. Interestingly, the musk does make it feel more "beachy": something that feels sandy, and a bit like sunbaked skin.

This last element was drastically different between the tester strip and my skin, so "your mileage may vary". On a tester strip: a subtle driftwood became present in the dry-down; very dry and quiet. On my skin: the woody note felt more like subtle driftwood, paired with a very loud and heavily-animalic sandalwood. This blend was so animalic that it skirted the line of feeling like body odor, and dominated the citrus (to me it was a breakdown of 60% animalic sandalwood/20% tangerine/10% sweet musk).

One spray on my wrist, and the sillage + projection were both very powerful. Even covering my wrist up with a long sleeve jacket, I could smell it through the fabric strongly - and couldn't seem to escape that animalic accord. When it was finally time for me to shower, I ended up needing to scrub my wrist multiple times with Dawn dish soap afterwards to fully remove the fragrance - and could still smell faint hints of it. The next day (a full 24 hours later), it was still strongly present on my jacket sleeve - despite only spraying on my wrist, and not the fabric.

So if you're looking for a "skanky"/animalic citrus blend for summer with performance, this might be a great choice! But if you're like me and generally avoid animalic notes, I'd strongly recommend testing this in store like I did - to prevent any skin chemistry surprises.

P.S. If you're looking for more refreshing citrus scents for summer, I wrote a blog post about this:
https://www.parfumo.com/Users/Gourmandgrl/Blog/Article/sweet-citrus-scents-for-summer

Don't be fooled - despite being a shimmer mist, this is actually really lovely; plus it's a truly-new scent from VS (I haven't tried anything else similar from them).

While this starts out with a brief coconut nectar opening, it quickly moves into the bulk of the fragrance: a Tahitian vanilla "fresh laundry" blend. The note breakdown for me is:

[70% coconut nectar] much more present in the beginning, this is slightly indolic and sweet; a nectar-like take on traditional coconut (I picture honeysuckle combined with creamy coconut)
[30% Tahitian vanilla] more subtle at this point, see below for more detail

[10% coconut nectar] faint background player to me at this point, only noticeable if focusing hard
[50% Tahitian vanilla] an almost "fruity"-like tropical-feeling vanilla, with a "vanilla yogurt" type of quality to it
[40% "fresh laundry"] I believe this is the "sea breeze" note mentioned; it does feel like laundry that was line-dried by the ocean - a quiet hint of salty sea breeze, but mostly feels like a solar cotton/fresh linens that are "neutral" (not overly sweet, floral, musky, etc.)

A fresh, clean, tropical vanilla choice for summer!

- Smells the same on my skin as it does on paper
- Mild projection: not a "beast" performer, but a bit softer; perfect for the office or sensitive noses
- Decent sillage: was nice to catch wafts of myself when moving my arms
- Good longevity (for a mist): up to 4 hours for stronger wear, then much weaker after

If you've smelled any of these, I'd say it smells like a combination of:
Fresh Vanilla Blossoms (the "fresh vanilla" part)
Beachfront Blanket (the "solar linens" component)
Coconut (2024) (the warm coconut), and
Sea Island Shore (the sea-infused fresh laundry/linens)
So if you like any of the above, you might also enjoy Coconut Sol Shimmer !

There are a variety of shimmer/glitter mists out there, and Coconut Sol Shimmer is definitely more of a "shimmer" rather than a "glitter" mist. Meaning it's a "fine" or small-piece shimmer, rather than chunky or larger pieces of glitter. The amount of shimmer was also small on my skin, in comparison to the concentration/amount you see when looking at the bottle. After I applied it on my skin, the shimmer was present but not particularly noticeable. It also didn't rub off to other objects/clothing/etc. - but it might be that I wasn't particularly heavy-handed in application, and I also waited for it to dry (especially because this is more "runny"/prone to dripping than the non-shimmer mists) before having any contact with other fabrics/things.