March 18, 2009

Silk Naturals Fragrance review: The good (Green Tea) and the bad (Pink Grapefruit)

Silk Naturals released a collection of some 20 fragrances around Valentines this year. These solid fragrances are made from a base of beeswax, and are packaged in lipbalm tubes. I love that they're solid because it makes them perfectly portable for hand-bag touch ups and I can put them precisely on my pulse points. As spray-on perfumes often break me out around my chest, neck and face, roll ons or solids are actually quite the god-send for me. And with Pink Grapefruit one of the releases, you can just imagine how excited I was to get my hands on these!

I bought the fragrance in Green Tea, and won Pink Grapefruit in an online contest SN ran. The fact that I won it, and my love for Green Tea, partially consoles me for the disappointment I felt over Pink Grapefruit. Read on for the full review.

Green Tea
The site's description:

Green Tea is clean and refreshing with just a hint of tartness. I remember the first time I smelled Green Tea- it was in France and it opened my eyes to a completely new experience. It's like a breath of fresh air- clean and light, very refreshing- a great fragrance for daytime.
Now I truly love Green Tea, it is closest to Elizabeth Arden's version but has the warmth and subtle bitterness of Bulgari's that the sweeter, more citrusy Elizabeth Arden lacks.

I find myself sniffing it constantly when I wear it on my wrists as I find it both refreshing, as well as comforting and warm - if that is possible. I'm a fan of subtle fragrances and this is very subtle. SO subtle that some of my friends with less able noses can't detect the fragrance at all. So be warned! If your nose isn't the most sensitive you may want to give this perfume a miss - you may not be able to smell it!

While I love that it is quiet and a perfect office fragrance I could wish for it to be amped up a little more - just so someone sitting right next to me can smell it without sniffing my wrists.

Pink Grapefruit
Because I love the scent of Pink Grapefruit so much, and because I had such high hopes for this fragrance, my disappointment in it runs deep - even though I got it free as a prize.

The site claims:
We searched high and low for a spectacular pink grapefruit scent. It's juicy, tart, a little bit sweet and very very yummy- purely pink grapefruit.
While I get the tartness, which I love, the grapefruitiness - also great, and the faint sweetness there is a strange, overwhelming acridity to this perfume that literally stings my nose. If I wear it, I get a headache - rare in perfumes that don't have an alcohol base or aldehydes for me.

It's hard for me to describe the note I hate so much. It's salty and bitter - while grapefruit should have a hint of bitter, this one actually leaves a bad taste in the back of my mouth. Some girls on the SN forum can smell it, some can't. Karen claims it's the tartness, but I LOVE tart fragrances - I'd wear fresh lemon if it was feasible. She's hoping to tweak it and brighten it up a little, I truly hope she succeeds and gives me a pink grapefruit fragrance I love.

Conclusion
I will definitely repurchase Green Tea even if the fragrance is never amped up. I hope she puts it into a moisturiser or something I can smear over a larger surface area! The fragrances retail for US$5.99 each and it's worth checking out the site as there are dupes of famous scents as well as samples for US$0.75 if you'd prefer to sniff it before buying.

4 comments:

Connie De Alwis said...

great review! I'm very lazy to spray on perfume. I wonder if solid perfumes would be more my thing... I really like herbal scents but I don't think there are a lot of fragrances out there with such scents :-/

Kahani said...

Good morning, Connie! =) I usually forget to spritz, plus the aerosols break me out. Solids and rollerballs you can easily tote in yourv handbag to apply in an idle moment.

Anonymous said...

Interesting product. I think Elizabeth Arden's Green Tea was one of my very first perfumes. I remember liking their Sunflower too. :)

Kahani said...

MisSmall: I've never smelled sunflower - is it still available? What's it like?