Mlleghoul

The potpourri of a keepsakes box, dried flowers, brittle bouquets and boutonnieres, precious posies pressed between the pages of diaries and photo albums, sachets tucked among stored remnants...

The sleazy, dangerous-divine charm of an Anne Rice mummy. Bandages steeped in sullen honey, infused with bitter, bracing cardamom and burnished amber incense, the aromatic pique of peppercorns tucked in various orifices and cavities for an afterlife...

John Willie fetish illustration. Chained boots, exaggerated heels, high-contrast drama. Patchouli leading, dark earthy command, resinous weight. Cedar following, clean wood, crisp structure. Musk as polished...

Cor Serpentis is pallid astral berries translated through the cellular mimicry of a creature from beyond the stars, who's only ever known the pale juice of celery. Gellid minerals, wibbly, rocky aspic. Acid rain-forest-ozone melting, morphing,...

Frozen smoke, ghost trails, crystallized vapor, memory of fire. Cedar's bare branches, skeletal wood, stripped trees, winter forests. Lemon peel frozen mid-curl, preserved brightness, acid blade on ice, bone-white, moonlit. Amber trapped sap frilled...

This is an intensely sugared cinnamon and autumn fruit compote, with a bit of brooding, jasmine-y burlesque sultriness. Big Titty Goth Girlfriend harvest spice simmer pot. Too va-va-voom to be cozy, too cozy to be moody,...

Mooncake smells different every time I wear it, sometimes an approximation of golden syrup, sometimes a vaguely eggy center, sometimes honey's thick, golden musk. I can't speak to whether it's accurate because I might just not like mooncakes?...

When I first sampled Nightchild months ago, I thought it smelled like an epic ballad by a Finnish heavy metal band, all Nightwish operatic drama and intensity, soaring vocals over crushing walls of reverb and distortion, cathedral-sized forests...

I talk a lot about grey overcast skies and thunderstorms and fog and mist and loving the glooms, but even I can appreciate an objectively beautiful day. Quercia is that day...clear clear air, clean clear water, when people say fresh...

The wild goddess of the hunt peeling citrus in a mossy starlit clearing, an unlit Baies candle wafting blackcurrant and dewy rose from her pocket. In another pocket (cargo pants, lots of pockets): crushed mint, pale green sparks, cold...

There's a particular kind of gothic imagery that Black Death calls to mind: baroque church architecture in shadow, where stone angels tucked into dusty alcoves have awakened hungry, wings once outspread in reverence now twisted inward in sacrilege,...

Sometimes a perfume surprises you by being something completely different from what you expected, and Heretic’s Häxan, rather than the poison gardens and shadow work that many reviewers experience, is, for me, pure romantic magic. Not exactly...