Sweet Tea
by Elizabeth W

I've been looking for some time for a black tea scent, one that Just Smells Like Black Tea... and this is not it. I'm a Southern girl, and I grew up on sweet tea. My husband insists that we have sweet iced tea in the refrigerator at all times; I make a gallon of it every two or three days. So I was excited to find elizabethW's version available online. The customer service people there were kind enough to send me a free sample in the mail.

This smells only vaguely of tea; it's more lemon and honey than anything else. It's light and refreshing, and I can certainly understand its popularity, particularly for a summer fragrance. However, I was touched to find that the scent reminds me very strongly of my grandmother -- who never, to my knowledge, wore any perfume that I can remember. She's 89 now and still avoids perfume in favor of lightly scented lemon soap. I may indulge in a travel-size bottle of this, if only to keep a reminder of Nell on my dresser.

This is fresh, sweet, cold tea with lots of sugar and a tiny bit of lemon. It's a wonderful fragrance for a very hot day, especially after a bath or a swim. It makes me crave a nice glass of tea!

I understand that Sweet Tea is a most popular product for elizabethW (yes, they use a small e and cap W), and it is precisely what it claims to be: sweet tea, nothing more, nothing less. The tea part is fine; it smells like Lipton black tea. The sweet part imparts simply too much honey. Put one check mark next to "cloying" and one next to "boring." I find Carthusia Io offers more personality and depth.