Two from Demeter

Sweet Delights Vanilla Ice Cream
"Demeter’s Vanilla Ice Cream is sinfully rich, but also bright, warm and inviting, like the summer’s day that inspired it.  It took 200 years and the determination of Demeter Fragrance Library, however, to turn ice cream into wearable fragrance."

Thanks to the jolt of alcohol in my too-soon first whiff, Vanilla Ice Cream smelled quite a bit like a vanilla liquor or even vanilla extract at first. Then a slightly burnt sugar aroma of cooking caramel came forth, sweet and delicious, with creamy undertones, like a crème brulée. My husband swore he detected coconut in it as well, and when I thought about it, I decided he was right.

In the drydown, this caramelly-vanilla reminds me of Goetzes’ Caramel Creams or, completely inexplicably, like Licorice Allsorts, particularly the ones that are mostly coconut cream with just a thin strip of licorice (not that it smells like licorice, it’s just the overall impression I am getting).

So while I can’t say this smells like vanilla ice cream (personally, I don’t think vanilla ice cream—or any other flavor, for that matter—has much of a scent), Sweet Delights Vanilla Ice Cream is pretty delicious. It’s a sweet, but not cloying, vanilla that has enough going on to make it interesting, and will be a pleasant addition to my vanilla collection.

Baby Powder
"As clean and as fresh as it gets, just like the proverbial freshly powdered baby’s behind. But nothing ever comes to be exactly as you expect it to."

That description bothered me a little. What did it mean by “nothing comes to be exactly as you expect?” Especially following the phrase, “powdered baby’s behind.” It’s a clean behind, right?

Demeter’s Baby Powder scent is not quite Johnson & Johnson; the top notes are somewhat plastic-y and slightly astringent. It is oddly not at all powdery, but more crisp and fresh. Putting aside the obvious – it’s supposed to smell like baby powder, and it does have that effect – I can also detect an almost almond/cherry smell in the drydown, with another note that’s faintly wintergreen. It actually reminds me more of the Love’s Baby Soft that I wore as a teenager than something I’d put on a baby’s bottom. Overall, Baby Powder is a pleasing soft and gentle scent, that although does not smell exactly like baby powder, it is evocative of baby toys and other reminiscences of youth/childhood.

(Originally posted in Sniffapalooza Magazine .)