DROPPIN CANDLE KNOWLEDGE: Bronzeblogger's Fall Candle Collection
Well my dear readers, the official start of fall is right around the corner!
So as I was going thru my fall decor as I plan on putting on decorating the apartment soon as well as going thru my fall candles to see what I would be in the mood to burn in the coming fall months (yeah, I haven't been burning fall candles yet...honestly, I haven't been burning too much of anything as of late). Backintheday, I would take out and stack up all of my fall candles for an Instagram pic/post in honor of the autumn equinox. Plus I would see firsthand just how many and what candles I actually own. After I did it, I realized just how much of a headache it all was and how even backintheday I hated doing it. So here they are all were stocked up nice and neat and snapped/edited a few pics worthy of the 'gram...
My fall collection (multiples not included)
Well, here they all are, arranged year released (or year purchased in most cases)
Since I'm more active on here than I am on the 'gram, I figured I'd make it all worth it and write a blogpost.
So I'll go thru collection candle by candle and write mini blurb/review as well as leave a link if I did do an individual review of one in the past. Without further ado, let's get started...
Lavender Macaroon/Caramel
So this came out it 2011 as Lavender Macaroon (it was supposed to be Macaron but there was a misprint on the label) in a French patisserie inspired collection for late spring then it was brought back (and failed) as Lavender Caramel for fall. As I was very new to the BBW fandom and had no earthly idea what a test scent or test store so I didn't know this candle existed. Years later, I happened upon an old Youtube video review of fall test scents from 2011 by (at the time) upandcomers Touchthefiretwice and Sccentmyway and they both spoke about this candle. I really liked the sound of it so I was on the hunt for it on the black market, to no avail. Years later, by sheer luck and happenstance, I found one lone mini of it on Evilbay...right around my birthday...how fortuitous. I bought it with absolutely no hesitation and it has been sitting proudly in my sniff only collection ever since. So this scent is...unique. Despite what the name and notes suggest, it doesn't really smell particularly bakery-ish. And there's an obvious but undisclosed hint of sage that combined with the other notes brings the scent party over to Savory-ville...or as Scentmyway says in her review "Stovetop Stuffing". If you've smelled the recent Fall Farmhouse, add some lavender and brown sugar to the mix and that's Lavender Caramel.
Oatmeal Raisin Cookie
ORC was one of many one hit wonders from 2011, particularly in the fall. This was backintheday when I was vehemently anti-bakery scents so honestly I paid little to no attention to when it come out. Fast forward to last year... although by this point I had stopped my Golden Era candle treasure hunting days, I just looked up candles on Evilbay purely for S&Gs and lo and behold, there it was at a surprisingly affordable price. In a moment of pure YOLO, I bought it. So I must say, despite not being a part of the bakery brigade, this candle is legit and it's a shame that BBW never ever brought this back because it is legit. It really does smell like a fresh oatmeal cookie...which is actually one of my favorite kinds of cookies (I'm one of the whackadoos that prefer raisins over chocolate chips). There's a grainy bakery note with vanilla and hint of baking spices and you actually get raisin..though it leans slightly towards boozy rum raisin. With all the cider and pumpkin spice and pies and cupcakes we're inundated with during fall, this would make a nice change of pace but nope, BBW keeps playing games and staying basic.
Mountain Leaves
Yet another 2011 one hit wonder casualty from 2011. I had (and still do) have a wallflower refill of it but never had or found the candle then and subsequent years later. Fast forward to last year, a candlebuddy reached out to me and gifted me one from his collections as a birthday gift. Again, fortuitous! This too has joined the ranks of my sniff only collection. So this is definitely a mandle...right up my alley. If I could compare it to anything, I would say maybe The Original but 10x better and a lot more bright and crisp.It has a deep earthy manly base of vetiver with maybe a hit of cedarwood. There's the slightest hint of pine with a bright pop of citrusy bergamot. And somehow, the scent perfectly captures brisk cold air vibe like Autumn and Sweater Weather. One whiff conjures images of wet dewdropped leaves strewn upon a foot trail, mist rolling down the hill, mountains covered in fall colored trees and canopies of fragrant pine trees. I (jokingly say) this smells like you're lost in the woods but you've been rescued by Canadian Mountie and he's holding you safely in his arms *swoons
Chocolate Bacon Cupcake
OMG...this mutha-effin candle right here - the candle that started the infamous test candle craze, the macdaddy and grand poobah of unicorn candles...before the term even existed. This tested and failed in 2012 (I had just recently learned what testing and failed meant). Every Youtube candle guru worth their salt had one in the arsenal at the ready..particularly Tinadivalicious who really put the scent on the map. At the time I didn't know you could call a test store and buy candles over the phone; had I known that, I certainly would have made an order. For years, well after I myself became a reviewer and candle connoisseur, I was on the hunt for CBC to add to my collection; the few times I found one, it was always sold an insanely exorbitant prices - no candle on earth is worth $100+. One day I was on a roadtrip with my partner and his parents. I was on Amazon looking at candles on a whim (why I don't know as their prices are beyond ridiculous). Much to my shock and surprise, I found CBC and it was cheap - $20 something bucks! Oh you bet your sweet ass I bought it with no hesitation! Chocolate scents in home fragrance are always a crapshoot and I tend to avoid them but even I admit CBC is pretty legit...I would even argue that it's by far the BEST and most authentic chocolate ever released from BBW. Like typical BBW-ian "cupcake" scents, you get more frosting. There's also tiny bit caramel adding both as sweetness and savoriness. And it could be the power of suggestion/persuasion but I do get bacon. This might've been a little too out there which is probably why BBW never attempted to bring it back. I do thing if it was brought back, it would be a hit. If you remember Salted Caramel Chocolate from late spring/summer, which seemed to be popular; CBC is very similar to that.
Apple Crumble
For such an amazing scent, BBW really did this scent dirty. It first came out in 2011 (man, 2011 really was amazing year for fall/holiday newness) and came back again the following year. Then it disappeared. It came back briefly and randomly during Summer SAS in 2014 in a special bakery themed throwback collection; thank goodness I thought to stock up cuz after SAS was over, it disappeared for good. I'm not sure why BBW was so indifferent to AC; I would go on record for saying AC was the best apple-cinnamon bakery scent EVER. And who doesn't love some apple-cinnamon goodness for fall. Lately BBW came out with Dutch Apple Waffles which has a similar vibe to AC; that's probably as close as we're gonna get to AC.
Pinecone
I remember I watched with anticipation when Touchthefiretwice did a review vid on all of the fall scents testing in 2013 and Pinecone was one of them. Because his sense of smell is impeccable and our taste in scents are very similar, I knew I had to get my hands on Pinecone as he raved about it. And of course it failed. It came back the following winter as "Autumn Snow"...and it failed again! Fastforward to 2016 during the height of my ol school candle treasure-hunting days, I happened upon one on Evilbay and immediately bought it. Around that time, I was coming around to pine heavy scents as I wasn't particularly fond of them but this scent made appreciate them more. It's such a beautiful and mature scent, a complex blend of pine and herbal notes. It had a cedarwood base, resinous pine needles and some unmentioned herbal notes like rosemary. And there was this cooling blast of spearmint that gave the scent a cold brisk winter air feel to it; think Christmas tree farm on an early winter morning. In my most humble opinion, Pinecone was the best and most sophisticated pine scent BBW ever created (better than Evergreen and especially Fresh Ballsack) which is probably why it failed. (If you remember The Great Outdoors from a while back, it was extremely similar to Pinecone
Harvest Gathering
There's really not much to say about this one - it's a quintessential "Michael's/craft store in the fall" "autumn potpourri" scent. It's got all the autumnal notes you're looking for in a fall scent - apple, pumpkin, cranberry and cinnamon. It came out of nowhere back in 2013 and has been a fall staple ever since (the version I have is from a 2015 California vineyard themed fall transitional collection called "Cork & Vine " ) It's hanging on the edge of generic but I couldn't imagine a fall without it.
Pumpkin Caramel Latte
So this first came out in 2011 and, for a while, was a fall staple. Despite the name being a little misleading (there was no pumpkin or latte involved) but it was still a fan fav. I avoided it at first as I found it too intensely sweet (and I could not and still can not with caramel scents) but I decided to give it a try and actually grew to like it. Then in 2014, for absolutely no reason BBW decided to release it as a Christmas holiday scent - Maple Cinnamon Pancakes. And because folks fell for this candle con, it's been MCP ever since.
Porchside Pumpkin
A pumpkin scent for fall...that's NOT a bakery scent?! MADNESS! For that reason alone, when this one hit wonder first appeared in 2015, I had to sniff it for myself. It was a WB store exclusive (so many scents that fall were exclusives) and the entire fall season, I saw it only once and of course it wasn't sale; smell-wise, I loved it and I wanted to buy it. Of course, when there finally was a sale, it was gone and it never came back. I ended up buying one on the black market and because of that, it stayed in my sniff only collection. For a pumpkin scent, it was oddly...masculine. You got that typical sweet "canned pumpkin pie filling" note you get in most pumpkin scents but there were woody backnotes and a pop of cardamom that give it a very mandle-ish vibe. I always describe as a hipster boy carving pumpkins on his front porch or apartment stoop.
Cranberry Pumpkin
SMDH! This was a one hit wonder that (like most one hit wonders) should not have been a one hit wonder. When this appeared on shelves in 2015, I (like many others) initially paid little to no attention to it at first. At first glance, it was a very basic sounding candle; cranberry and pumpkin with cinnamon, not exactly groundbreaking. Boy, did this prove many of us wrong! It was lovely..dare I say fallgasmic. It was late fall/Thanksgiving time in a jar. It was..is...such much better than Harvest Gathering and The Perfect Autumn that BBW peddles year after year.
Pumpkin Pie
It is bizarre that for as long as BBW has been in business and cornered the market for fall inspired home fragrance, it wouldn't make a pumpkin pie scent (a fall staple and a scent virtually almost every candle company makes). BBW waited until 2015 to finally create one. And yet, despite its seeming popularity and novelty, BBW would henceforth continue to play games with it - either making an online exclusive or not releasing it at all. It certainly doesn't reinvent the wheel but it's a pleasant enough scent to be a fall staple.
Pumpkin Carving
Talk about a OG that has been straightup disrespected by BBW. I wont give the history (you can read that here ) but it's really ol school...like mid 2000s. It is barnone the BEST pumpkin scent EVER! And yet despite it's superiority and authenticity, BBW insists on overlooking and ignoring it in favor of Shit Cinnamon Pumpkin . Truly a mystery for the ages. And speaking of SCP, that damned candle turned me off to any and every other pumpkin scent, including Pumpkin Carving...until I finally decided to put my pumpkinphobia aside and give it a try. I'm so glad because I would've otherwise missed out on amazing scent.
Cider Lane
Say it with me now "...it's like drinking cider while walking down the lane". So real talk, when this first came out in 2012, I could not stand it! It came back the following year and I was not convinced but I said it would give it a try if came back the next year. It did...kinda...a waterdown "lane-less" version of it came out as Warm Caramel Cider and I actually enjoyed it. This or the original CL wouldn't come back out until 2016 and I figured I was long overdue to give it a try. I did..do really like it (it's one of the few caramel scents I can tolerate) It's not a fav or a must have for me but I do think it deserves to be a staple and it wouldn't be fall without it.
Autumn Day
So this came out in..yep, you guessed it...2011 but as "Acorn & Fig". I'm guessing because the name was a little too out there and non-appealing, it came back the following year as Autumn Day...and I did not like it. It came back the following year, and much like the aforementioned Cider Lane, I wasn't quite convinced but I said I'd try it the following year...and of course it didn't come back and it wouldn't come back until 2016 randomly in WB Core line. It's a very complex and upscale blend (a little too complex and upscale for BBW); there's a cedarwood base with a birch note that adds almost mint-like coolness with a blend of pear (not apple like it said in the 2016/17 notes) and fig. The name fits - AD always makes me think crisp brisk autumn mornings with mist rolling away with the sun and everything is covered in dew.
Peppered Plum
OMG... this goddamn mutha-effin candle..so much adjectives to describe this badboi - dark, lush, sensual, elegant, sophisticated, upscale, high-end. It's one of the few candles to give me both a nosegasm and fallgasm. I can't gush enough about this candle and it is an absolute shame..nay a travesty, that this hasn't returned (well it did come back as a mason jar the following year but who gives a crap about mason jars)
Campfire Pumpkin
This came out in 2016 as WB exclusive as "Pumpkin Fireside". And for some reason, BBW changed the name to Campfire Pumpkin because...reasons. This candle was kinduva mystery as i smelled familiar but no one (not even me) could place it or find proof of what it was before. Some thought it was another WB'er called "Toasted Vanilla Caramel" while others thought it was even older failed test scent called "Vanilla Firewood"...and there's still possibility that it's both...this is one of the rare instances where my scent memory failed me and other people either had a similar brain fart, didn't own either of those candles or never even heard of them. Anyway, this scent was a bit polarizing; most of us candle enthusiasts loved it but a few found it off-putting. The problem was the combination of the smoky wood accents, the burnt caramel and (what I think is) chestnut gave it meaty/umami savoriness (meat jerky or meat on a grill as some described it)
Sweater Weather
It's just not fall without Sweater Weather! Can you believe that one point in the distant past, this was a test scent...AND IT FAILED?! It tested and failed back in 2012 however thanks to Littleballadeer and Touchthefiretwice, it became an underground hit and folks bought it up in test stores. It ended up going wide the following year and it has been a staple ever since..surprising for a conceptual and herb heavy non-bakery scent. I saw it all the time - it makes me think of walking thru Central Park on brisk autumn afternoon in my favorite sweater.
Pumpkin Clove
This candle surprised the hell outta me; I was FULLY prepared to hate it! I LOVED it..still do. In fact, it joined the autumnal pantheon of my top 10 favorite fall scents. I thought for sure that it wouldn't come back this year but surprisingly it returned. The name and notes sound soooo basic but the scent itself is anything but basic. A pumpkin scent that's not bakery AND it actually smells like pumpkin (well, pumpkin pie filling) and NOT just cinnamon?! Crazy talk..but it's true!
Warm Apple Pie
There's really not much to say about this one - it's a quintessential apple-cinnamon and it smells like apple pie...or as close to apple pie as home fragrance can get. It's not bad, it's not good, it's just ok.
Blueberry Maple Pancakes
Again, there's not much to say about this one. It smells like what the name and notes suggest, it's seemingly popular and it's probably here to stay as a staple. Despite not being a fan of maple at all in any form, I actually do like this candle but I do find it to be a little intense; I can only burn for a small increment of time and I have to open the window after.
Leaves
This mama-jamma right here! This is..say it with me... "FALL IN A JAR" Leaves is just perfection! No fall at BBW (and in my life) is complete without Leaves. It's been around for YYYEEEEAAAARS and it still manages to stand the test of time. It would be an insane lapse of judgement for BBW to stop selling this, I can't even imagine it. I burn this damn candle with reckless abandon every blessed fall and I don't see myself stopping any time soon.
Pumpkin Bonfire
Hurray for getting some newness this fall! Very much a welcome addition to this year's lineup. Take Pumpkin Clove, smash it together with Palo Santo and you got yourself Pumpkin Bonfire...and it works. I do hope this scent sticks around cuz it's good stuff.
Fall Farmhouse
I keep sniffing this candle over and over and I just don't know what I think of it. I'm always here for a conceptual scent for fall. I'm also here for a pumpkin scent that's NOT cinnamon'ed to death or a bakery scent. And I can kinda see the image the notes are conveying (and a few people have said in their reviews) - dew or frost on pumpkins in a farmhouse on chilly autumn day. I just can't get down that unmentioned unexplained sage note that makes it smell a little too much like breakfast sausages. I dunno, we'll see.
Fresh Fall Morning
A herbal blended apple based cologney mandle for fall?! Sign me the eff up! For all of those aforementioned reasons, I'm beyond surprised that it came back. But I'm kinda glad it did!
Dutch Apple Waffles
I was kinda hoping this would be repackage of Apple Crumble or, at the very least, have a similar vibe.... I kinda got my wish. While similar, it's different enough to warrant calling it newness. It's got everything you need for a fall scent - there's (AC-ish) green apples, cinnamon (and a buttload of nutmeg), (unmentioned) caramel and warm sweet bakery-ness. Nothing special or exciting but pleasant enough.
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