Here is my next installment. Some of these may have been posted before. They are here in sequential order. If you have any experience with these, please post.
I have to say I'm much happier now with the results after at least a 6 weeks cure time. I have about 10 FO's out of the first 38 from FB that I would be happy to use in CP. At one point, I was wondering what possessed me to order 100 fragrances from one place that I knew nothing about. Now I'm happy I did. The chance of many of these FOs surviving a year is very high. If I did HP, B/B or melt&pour, FB would be my one stop shop.
Pictures are coming soon. I think I might have 1 or 2 more from the first 38 to review.
219-Asian Sandalwood: Maximum usage rate: 8%. FP=180oF. No vanilla. Discolored to a dark brown. This is a more complex perfumy sandalwood. Hard to identify the additional notes even though you know they are there. It needed full cure for the scent to blend well. Minimal ash. Medium strong and holding. I’ll use it despite the discoloration. 12/17: This scent is changing still. I tried a wet test and I didn't care for it. There are some new unpleasant notes that weren't there before. It lathers white despite the dark discoloration. I wouldn't use it as it is today. I expect it to continue changing.
220-Vanillary: Maximum usage rate is 15%. FP=190oF. Vanilla=2.4%. This is a nice dupe. It’s a subtle vanilla with floral notes and something else. Discolored to a beige color. No ash. Scent got stronger with cure. Medium strong and holding.
221-Nag Champa: MUR=3%, FP>200oF, Vanillin=0%. Just a hint of discoloration. Very light nondescript scent. Just a hint of ash.
222-Snow Day: MUR=30%, FP>180oF, Vanilla=3%. Discolored to a medium beige. Soft green coniferous notes with a little something more in the background. I don’t smell any vanilla. Medium light scent. I don’t expect it to survive to 6 months.
223-Supernova: MUR=25%, FP=195oF, Vanilla=0%. Supposed to be musk with green ozone and patchouli. Very Slight discoloration. Light scent with hints of musk. It smells nondescript to me. Slight ash. Medium light scent.
224-Trichomania: MUR=6%, FP=195oF, Vanilla=0%. Supposed to be creamy coconut. Dicolored to a medium chocolate brown. It cured so hard I can use it as a hammer. Lots of ash. I smell some vanilla with hints of coconut. Medium light scent. I think it is much better for HP.
225-Honey I washed the kids: MUR=40%, FP>200oF, Vanilla=0%. It is supposed to be honey, toffee and caramel. It smells much better OOB. In the soap, it lost most of the complexity. OOB, it smells like candy you want to it. In the soap, I find it hard to identify the scent. I think this one is best for HP if you want to preserve the complexity. If you don’t do side by side comparison, it is a generic scent (to me) that works fine in soap. Medium strength.
226-White Tea & Ginger: MUR=18%, FP>200oF, Vanilla=0%. No discoloration, slight ash. This is a scent I’m looking for. It’s one of my favorites. I’m so glad it made it through cure. Medium strong scent. It is a nice version of WT&G. I’m buying a big bottle. I also have BB’s version which didn’t make it through the 6 weeks cure.
227- Sweet orange Chili: MUR=24%, FP= 200oF, Vanilla=0%. No Dis, more prone to ash. Medium strength in cp. OOB, it has a nice balance between the chili and the orange which was present in the soap at first. At 6 weeks, the orange is faint and the chili is dominating. This is a nice clean scent. I will probably mix it with a little FB orange blossom and BB 10X orange to bring back some of the lost citrus notes.
228-Wild Mountain Honey: The maximum usage rate for this one is 3%. I used it at 5%. It is lovely OOB like a wild flower honey. It lost a lot of the complexity in the soap. Medium strength, discolors medium yellowish beige. Because of the low usage rates, I wouldn’t use it in cp soap. I bought a big bottle because of reviews. I didn’t notice the usage rate at the time. I may use it at 1% in liquid hand soap. I may have a substitute for it (Honey from NDA if the scent survives until it is done curing). 12/17: Tested it in HP at 1.5% and it worked great and stayed true to OOB. I would use a little less next time.
229-Golden Sands: MUR=50%, FP>200oF, Vanilla=4%. Supposed to be sandalwood with orange flower and Tonka bean. Discolored to dark beige. Medium ash. Much better OOB. Not a bad scent but much less interesting in cp. Medium light scent. I’m finding that many of the scents that have vanilla in them are not surviving very well in cp.
230-Leaves: MUR=30%, FP=200oF, Vanilla=0%. Very light ash. This one is lovely. It screams fall to me but I’ll use it any time. Supposed to be golden nectar, fresh apple, and spiced berries. It is softer in the soap but retained a lot of the complexity of the original scent. It lost some of the cooked sweet notes that are present OOB (which I find a big plus). No discoloration, strong scent. It reminds me of BB Autumn Fig Harvest and TCS Spiced Apples and Peaches. It falls in between these 2. It doesn’t have some of the piney green notes of AFH but has more green notes than SAP. My own preference: it knocked AFH off my list but I would still make soap with SAP.
231-Sun & Sands: MUR=21%, FP=200oF, Vanilla=0.7%. No discoloration. Medium strong scent. No ash. I’m not sure how to describe this scent. It is light clean with a hint of complex floral. It seems appropriate for soap. I would buy it for me. I seem to prefer light clean scents that aren’t too in your face pushy. It smells very similar to Beach. See #238 for update
232-Beeswax & Propolis: MUR=6%, FP>200oF , No vanilla. No discoloration or ash. OOB, I smell beeswax with a hint of honey. In the soap, the scent morphed a bit. There is a new scent that I can’t identify that wasn’t there OOB. I like it better before soaping. If I used it, I would blend it for cp or HP. The scent is medium light. This scent is holding so far. It smells now more like beeswax and honey. It is not bad.
233-Rose Jam: MUR=4%, FP>200oF , Vanilla= 0%. OOB, I smell rose, citrus with a hint of geranium, a nice soft floral without the overwhelming rose scent. A lot is lost in the cp process. It became muddied and muddled in the soap. It isn’t bad but really much worse than OOB. I think this one is for HP. Beige discoloration, light scent, light ash. I used it at 5%. With a 4% MUR, this scent is out for CP. I prefer to stay significantly below the MUR to avoid not yet identified problems. The longer it cures the more nondescript it becomes. It is fading.
234-Lavender Sage: MUR=30%, FP=200oF, No vanilla. This was very nice and balanced when I first poured it but slowly lost most of the lavender over the last 8 weeks. What is left is sharp compared to OOB. Sometimes it reminds me of a cheaply scented men’s cologne. Other times, I smell a nice herbal scent. I also have FB Sage but it’s too early in the cure to compare the two. I ended up using the rest of the 1 oz sample in a shaving soap (HP process). It came out great. It is a masculine lavender without medicinal overtones. I like it enough to try to recreate it with TCS lavender and FB Sage.
235-Orange Blossom: MUR=6%, FP>200oF, No vanilla. Very soft yellow discoloration. Strong clean scent and holding well. This FO is just orange blossom/neroli with nothing else in the background. A Lush dupe. It has faded a little at full cure but it is still plenty strong.
236-The Smell of Freedom: MUR=7%, FP=190oF, Vanilla=0.4%. They smell freedom. I smell Chinese restaurant during down time cooking rice. This scent is out for me. Slight discoloration. Medium strong and holding.
237-Lust: MUR=7%, FP=195oF, Vanilla =0.7%. Supposed to be dirty jasmine, with notes of rose, ylang ylang, sandalwood, and vanilla. This one went from the most awful stench to a nice and unusual floral. It’s still banished. The color got deeper and more beautiful. I think part of the problem is exposure to oxygen. I can’t believe I’m considering this, but I think I’ll retest it covered tightly with plastic for at least a month before unmolding. With another banished FO that cured in the yogurt cup, I noticed that the side exposed to air smells very different (much worse) than the side that wasn’t. Yet another variable in this experiment. At the same time, I’m trying to come up with excuses to ditch Lust all together breaking the rules I set at the start. Nice to have something trivial to worry about.
238-Beach: MUR=12%, FP>200oF, Vanilla=0%. No D, definite A. It riced in the small sample I made but I was able to mix it. You can't tell in the cured soap. This was lovely when first unmolded. It slowly faded to a hint of something. I expected it to be completely gone by 6 weeks but it started to get stronger towards the end of cure. It is a subtle, light airy scent. It lost some of the complexity it had OOB but I like it enough to buy more for me. Smells very similar to Sun&Sands. 12/17: I just retested #231 and #238. The 2 scents are now very different from each other. 238 smells soapy clean with a hint of floral. I can see mixing it lightly with some florals like honeysuckle, jasmine or sweet pea. 231 took a turn towards more oceany scent and lost all hints of floral. It is hard to describe. Right now these 2 don't even smell anything alike. I don't think they are done morphing.
