Review: The Strange South - Minimoon '17
Perfume: Minimoon '17
Brand: The Strange South
Format: Oil
Price: $10 for 5ml in a glass rollerball bottle. Also available in a 10ml rollerball bottle for $16. Note that you can choose between fractionated coconut oil or meadowfoam seed oil on the site, and I have the fractionated coconut oil version.
Availability: While not technically general catalogue, it is consistently available on The Strange South website.
Description: (From The Strange South website)
Strawberry, fig, honey (vegan), tomato leaf, violet, and benzoin.
Background:
I was not lucky enough to see the actual strawberry minimoon of 2017, but the notes of this fragrance still greatly appealed to me. The idea of having both strawberry and tomato leaf in the fragrance really made me believe this would translate as a realistic, strawberry-in-a-garden note and, spoiler alert, it totally did.
Originally, I purchased a full size of Minimoon '17, Before the Drop, and Begotten all at the same time as a first purchase from TSS, all of which were blind-buys, in true Kristi fashion. This was the only one of the three that I loved right off the cuff, but I grew to fall in love with Before the Drop after giving it some time to rest. More on that in a future post.
I've found that, more than any other house I've tried, The Strange South perfumes need. their. rest. After initially trying all three of these directly out of the package on various parts of my arm, I found the fragrances were faint and faded almost immediately. Begotten and Before the Drop really improved in longevity when I tried them again a month—yes, a full month—later.
That said, this review comes with nearly a half a year's resting time and multiple wears to substantiate it.
Review:
In the bottle, you get a very sweet strawberry that's well-tempered by a tartness that you don't typically associate with strawberries but which works very well. While in the bottle it truly smells a little bit like candy, the truth is that you can't get a whole lot of smell right out of the bottle, and it doesn't retain that candy-like quality when you put it on the skin.
Wet, instead, you get that sweet, fresh, realistic-smelling strawberry I mentioned above, given a musty bite which I can only assume comes from the tomato leaf and violets. It's a bit like smelling a literal strawberry bush in a garden... especially if that strawberry was going just a little bit old and soggy. And I don't mean that in a negative way; I find very slightly overripe fruit often smells the sweetest.
Dry, it smells a lot greener, somewhat like the inside of a humid greenhouse. If you read my review of Heat Lightning, you'll understand what I mean when I say it has sort of a musty and damp backdrop. I'm still unfamiliar with the exact scent of benzoin, so I assume it must be this which gives it this smell since I'm pretty familiar with the scents of honey and fig, and don't smell them in here. If anything, they may be amplifying the strawberry scent a bit, but they're undetectable as individual notes (to my nose).
This fragrance really doesn't evolve much as you wear it, and that's not a bad thing. Actually, I really appreciate the fact that what you smell is mostly what you get with some perfumes. Ultimately, this fragrance is a sweet, delicate, fresh smell, perfect for spring but wearable in any season, and great if you just want to inject a little bit of femininity into your overall presence for the day. Also great if you're a Sailor Moon fan and half the reason you purchased it was because it reminded you of Chibiusa.
Side-note: this fragrance is boyfriend-approved. As a summary, my fiancé likes very standard fruity-floral perfumes and isn't into some of the weirder scents that I like. He loved this one, and loves strawberry scents, in general.
Throw: Nonexistent. This is a bit of a bummer for me because I'm one of those vain assholes who like when people can smell you and be all like "Ooh, you smell so good!" but it's great if you're more into personal fragrances.
Longevity: 4-5 hours, and fades very evenly off the skin over that time.
Summary: Fresh and fruity realistic strawberry garden scent, perfect for people who prefer understated crowd-pleasers to the more bizarre scents in the indie universe. Also a great introduction to indie perfumes for someone coming off of mainstream scents.
Rating: I have to give this one a personal 7/10 because I subjectively find it nice and pleasant and a go-to when I can't think of what scent would be appropriate to wear in certain occasions, but a 6/10 for the community since it probably lacks a unique punch that people look for in indie perfumes. It also loses some points for low throw and longevity.
Song: Beat Connection, "Palace Garden, 4 am"
Brand: The Strange South
Format: Oil
Price: $10 for 5ml in a glass rollerball bottle. Also available in a 10ml rollerball bottle for $16. Note that you can choose between fractionated coconut oil or meadowfoam seed oil on the site, and I have the fractionated coconut oil version.
Availability: While not technically general catalogue, it is consistently available on The Strange South website.
Description: (From The Strange South website)
Strawberry, fig, honey (vegan), tomato leaf, violet, and benzoin.
Background:
I was not lucky enough to see the actual strawberry minimoon of 2017, but the notes of this fragrance still greatly appealed to me. The idea of having both strawberry and tomato leaf in the fragrance really made me believe this would translate as a realistic, strawberry-in-a-garden note and, spoiler alert, it totally did.
Originally, I purchased a full size of Minimoon '17, Before the Drop, and Begotten all at the same time as a first purchase from TSS, all of which were blind-buys, in true Kristi fashion. This was the only one of the three that I loved right off the cuff, but I grew to fall in love with Before the Drop after giving it some time to rest. More on that in a future post.
I've found that, more than any other house I've tried, The Strange South perfumes need. their. rest. After initially trying all three of these directly out of the package on various parts of my arm, I found the fragrances were faint and faded almost immediately. Begotten and Before the Drop really improved in longevity when I tried them again a month—yes, a full month—later.
That said, this review comes with nearly a half a year's resting time and multiple wears to substantiate it.
Review:
In the bottle, you get a very sweet strawberry that's well-tempered by a tartness that you don't typically associate with strawberries but which works very well. While in the bottle it truly smells a little bit like candy, the truth is that you can't get a whole lot of smell right out of the bottle, and it doesn't retain that candy-like quality when you put it on the skin.
Wet, instead, you get that sweet, fresh, realistic-smelling strawberry I mentioned above, given a musty bite which I can only assume comes from the tomato leaf and violets. It's a bit like smelling a literal strawberry bush in a garden... especially if that strawberry was going just a little bit old and soggy. And I don't mean that in a negative way; I find very slightly overripe fruit often smells the sweetest.
Dry, it smells a lot greener, somewhat like the inside of a humid greenhouse. If you read my review of Heat Lightning, you'll understand what I mean when I say it has sort of a musty and damp backdrop. I'm still unfamiliar with the exact scent of benzoin, so I assume it must be this which gives it this smell since I'm pretty familiar with the scents of honey and fig, and don't smell them in here. If anything, they may be amplifying the strawberry scent a bit, but they're undetectable as individual notes (to my nose).
This fragrance really doesn't evolve much as you wear it, and that's not a bad thing. Actually, I really appreciate the fact that what you smell is mostly what you get with some perfumes. Ultimately, this fragrance is a sweet, delicate, fresh smell, perfect for spring but wearable in any season, and great if you just want to inject a little bit of femininity into your overall presence for the day. Also great if you're a Sailor Moon fan and half the reason you purchased it was because it reminded you of Chibiusa.
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| credit to sailormooncharacters.wikia.com for this image! |
Side-note: this fragrance is boyfriend-approved. As a summary, my fiancé likes very standard fruity-floral perfumes and isn't into some of the weirder scents that I like. He loved this one, and loves strawberry scents, in general.
Throw: Nonexistent. This is a bit of a bummer for me because I'm one of those vain assholes who like when people can smell you and be all like "Ooh, you smell so good!" but it's great if you're more into personal fragrances.
Longevity: 4-5 hours, and fades very evenly off the skin over that time.
Summary: Fresh and fruity realistic strawberry garden scent, perfect for people who prefer understated crowd-pleasers to the more bizarre scents in the indie universe. Also a great introduction to indie perfumes for someone coming off of mainstream scents.
Rating: I have to give this one a personal 7/10 because I subjectively find it nice and pleasant and a go-to when I can't think of what scent would be appropriate to wear in certain occasions, but a 6/10 for the community since it probably lacks a unique punch that people look for in indie perfumes. It also loses some points for low throw and longevity.
Song: Beat Connection, "Palace Garden, 4 am"
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