haus of gloi the brier path

Haus of Gloi The Brier Path 6 oz pumpkin butter and 5 ml perfume oil

Sun drenched trail leading to a day dream of ripe berries and woods’ rose, rich forest loam, ozone, dark amber and cream.

The Brier Path was released with Haus of Gloi's summer collection. I got mine this past summer (2012), but I believe it's been part of past summer collections as well. I wasn't sure I would like this one, because I don't usually like rose scents and 99.9% of the time amber goes over-powering and disgusting on me, but I have this problem where I am helplessly compelled to covet and lust after any scent that purports to smell like a forest, or be in any way reminiscent of a day in the forest, so I ordered a sample with some other items. And as soon as I sniffed the sample, I fell hard. HARD.

The scent is a bit different in the different formats, so I'll give my impressions of both individually.

In the jar the pumpkin butter smells fairly mild - I smell the cream, a bit of rose and berries. On skin the scent becomes much stronger and more complex. The cream fades to the background and the rose and especially the berries become more prominent. There is also that "rich forest loam" note, which brings to mind a sun-warmed dirt trail rather than the dark, moist soil I would expect from a description like that. I actually prefer the former so no complaints there. The amber is minimal to my nose. It really does smell like being in the woods on a warm day, surrounded by thick bushes of berries and wild roses. This pumpkin butter is quite strongly scented and it lasts a good while.

In the bottle the perfume is mostly amber, dirt, and rose. Wet on skin it develops an interesting green note, but that fades to the background almost immediately to leave behind a creamy, woodsy rose and berry scent. The green note is interesting - it's not something I notice in the pumpkin butter. It doesn't last long after the oil dries down, but while it's there it really serves to amp up the foresty feeling.

The perfume smells a bit different than the pumpkin butter overall, like two sides of the same coin. You can tell they're the same scent, and they compliment each other wonderfully, it's just that different notes come out more in each. In the perfume I smell the amber more, but it's a rare not-horrible-on-me amber (SHOCK! I am seriously genuinely shocked), and the rose is a bit stronger than the berry. That sun-warmed dirt note is still there, and still lovely. The whole scent is, to over-use the word, very warm. It really does remind me of walking in the woods in the summer.

The perfume in particular actually makes me think of a very specific visual for some reason - when sunlight cuts through the leaves and you see dust and pollen floating through the golden sunbeam. Is that weird? I don't know why it makes me think of that. Either way, I love it. Even though it makes me think of summery things, it's not really a summer-specific scent. It's deep and strong enough that it can easily be worn in colder weather (like I'm doing today).

Throw and lasting power on the perfume oil are good, especially when layered with the pumpkin butter. It lasts 8+ hours on me. It's not going to knock anyone over, but you can tell it's there.

Would I buy it again? Absolutely. This is far and away my favorite from their summer collection, and easily one of my top 5 scents from HoG's entire catalogue. If it's released again this summer, I'll be buying it in every product I don't have, and probably a mini pumpkin butter to keep in my purse as well.