Cheap Thrills and Nostalgia: Villainess’ Jai Mahal and The Girls Love

By Linda Recently I discovered Villainess “Whipped” – a richly emollient, veganesque body cream that I will never be without again. (Veganesque? Well, there is some bugsploitation – peace silk and some honey based fragrances.) You can find them at villainess.net if you want to try them. Two of the three fragrances I tried are heavenly. The fragrances stay on the skin for hours. First, there is Jai Mahal. It’s supposed to be exotic, palatial spices and luxurious vanilla. I must confess that what I get is this: Christmas ribbon candy and buttercream frosting. It is a sweet vanilla spice fragrance that is so seamlessly blended that I cannot really make out individual notes… just feel-good, lighthearted gorgeousness. It’s like a time machine back to childhood, but is elegant enough that you can wear it wherever. I wear it almost every day and it layers well with many of my favorite scents. The other Whipped that I particularly liked was The Girls Love Vanilla – a scent borrowed from Possets, perfumer Fabienne Christenson’s line of fragrances. The “girls” in question are bees, and this is a honey-saturated, vanilla-besotted scent capable of inspiring a diabetic coma. The foody notes are married by a robust and boozy whiff of tobacco. It reminds me of my grandfather’s cherry vanilla pipe tobacco. This lotion smells comforting enough to wear to bed, like footy-pajamas. (My partner is not impressed, so in a way, it’s very much like footy-pajamas. He doesn’t like honey.) I so liked Villainess’ The Girls Love Vanilla Whipped lotion that I went poking around the Possets website itself looking for other tidbits: http://possets.com/ There, I found lots to tempt me. I am a spice and candy lover in my scents, and if you are, too, you will be richly rewarded by a stroll through their scents. Not all of them are sweet, but there are plenty of “toothache perfumes” to play with. The descriptions can be maddeningly brief and vague, but will rarely steer you wrong. And there, I found Gingerbread Whorehouse. I’m a sucker for things that make me giggle. The goofy name managed to wheedle my credit card right out of my purse and into my hand, lickety-split. Everything at Possets’ beautiful site (use the search function if you get lost) is blissfully inexpensive, which was a relief. Fortunately, this was one of those customer experiences that completely rewarded me. Not only did I get my little 6 ml. vial of perfume oil (for $10) and the sample 6-pack I had ordered: I was also sent a few other Possets scent samples. Score! My favorite really is Gingerbread Whorehouse. It smells exactly, and Iam not kidding you, exactly like homemade gingerbread – not the house kind, the soft cake kind! I can smell the ginger, the allspice, the molasses, the butter, the cake, the vanilla… even the raisins, for heaven’s sake! This, too, is a footy-pajama of a perfume: only sexy if you have a gingerbread fetish, but so comforting, homey and warm that it can turn a rotten day wonderful. Here are a few others I love, from the samples: High Tea: you will smell exactly like the steam rising from a cup of Lipton’s black tea. This takes me back to spending the night at my grandmother’s house, where she would bring me a cup of tea in bed every morning (she got up early!) It is plain, gorgeous black tea – not Earl Grey, not white tea with raspberries, not rooibos, but a simple, perfect cuppa. I am buying a bottle. Flossing: meant to evoke the stitching of a corset (or “flossing”), this one is dainty, pretty, and sweet. I can make out sweet orange, a wisp of vanilla, and a hint of spice, but this is not a foody scent – it is delicately floral and immensely ladylike. The Scent of Angels: this one smells like soap to me, in the best and most wholesome of ways. Flowers undergirt with vanilla and musk – again, very soft, clean, and soothing. Angels fresh from the tub. Silver Carnations: I adore carnations – not the powdery character that shows up in scents so often, but the green spiciness of the fresh cut flowers. I don’t know what the “silver” is, here, but I suspect it is a light musk. With it wafting up on the breezes as I took a spring hike, it gave a charming impression of a bouquet of carnations. Even the sappy greenness of the cut stems was there to my nose. In the interests of total disclosure, I will also mention those I didn’t love: Villainess’ Grundy (which I wanted to love): mulch, moss, dandelion sap, daisies, weeds, soil. More or less exactly as advertised, but it really was not as I imagined it. The first blast evoked a hectic and exhausting honey-do Saturday. Eventually it mellowed into something interesting but very Not Me. Possets’ Haute Love: very successfully evokes crystallized ginger dipped in milk chocolate. Unfortunately, Possets’ chocolate scents do not flourish well on my skin and take on unbearable levels of mixed syrup and skank for a bit. Your mileage may vary – I know many people love them. Possets’ Frou-Frou: old-fashioned floral but not in a good way – a maiden aunt’s handbag, or a box-store rose sachet. It’s a performance art piece of a scent, which is fine… but I didn’t find it wearable. Possets’ Id, Ego, and SuperEgo: lavender and chocolate at the heart, with different balances and embellishments. These are interesting, but may be based on too ambitious a contrast for my taste.