Reviews of In The Library (2005)
by CB I Hate Perfume

I love the smell of libraries; not the smell of modern, suburban libraries where the oldest book to be found is twenty years old, but rather libraries with history and character filled with antiquarian books from the 19th century and before. Such libraries provide a unique, and for me quite satisfying, olfactory experience. There is a unique mustiness coupled with the smell of aging leathers that I just love. So I decided to try CB I Hate Perfumes offering, In The Library, in high hopes it would me a reasonable facsimile of the library smells I love. Alas, it was not. I get the shoe polish note, and a very sweet smell, perhaps slightly leathery, but to me it falls way short of anything I had hoped for. Libraries do not smell very sweet! I am not fond of this one at all.

Sweet parchment paper. Being in a library is more than just the smell, it's the feeling of overwhelming information and finding a private corner to read in. The scent here doesn't envelope you as the atmosphere in a library would. This should be a much larger scent then it currently is.

Yes, you are in the library. With moldy books. Don't get me wrong--I actually wanted to be a librarian, but... I don't think I like this type of book smell. Not on me, following me. It's just a one-dimensional dusty library smell, if that's what you wanna smell like.

I really enjoy how "In the Library" smells... I do get wafts of paper, leather, wood and furniture polish. I just don't think *I* want to smell like that. I'd definitely use this as a room spray when in a certain mood - though perhaps I'd need a fireplace, a pipe, or a tweed jacket.

“worn leather, worn cloth, wood polish”
This was weird. I don’t get any of those ingredients. I do get an odd, fruity/dessert chord. It is hard to identify. Peachy-pear, melon, pudding, bread pudding, custard… with a sharp note. I don’t care for this at all! Where are the old books, the wooden benches?

If you walk into a library...or an old bookstore. When you walk deep into the part where the old books are held in the old part of the building. Providing this is a properl maintained library. You will experience the initial fragrance of CB's frag "in the library".

You really have to stop analyzing the scent to really enjoy it and get whats it trying to say. Its the smell of an old place, there is a musty smell and lil leather and a really lite lemon prescence.

It lasts for a while on my skin, several hours, possibly five. The lemon and the sweeter notes take over after the first hour but it's still a very nice frag and the middle notes and basenotes are still reminiscent of the topnotes.

Where and when will I wear this...? I am not really sure.

It is just ok. The logevity is really the problem issue. I didn't even get an hour from it. It is too sweet to be a "library" smell. Like Caltha said, i was expecting a lether and paper smell. You can give the paper or library Demeter sample a try. It would be far less money.

In The Library starts out with a faintly sweet pulpy accord, not unlike some of the better "fig" scents, but drier and lighter. This is soon joined by a "musty" note which slowly moves into the foreground. The heart takes on a profile I recognize, but cannot immediately place. Then it comes to me: it's the inside of a brown paper grocery bag! Vivid and accurate to the point of being spooky. I honestly feel as if I'm wearing a paper bag over my head, like I did sometimes as a kid. (Don't ask.)

In The Library doesn't really develop so much as it just fades away after a couple of hours. The overall effect is fascinating, but I can't imagine why or when I'd wear it.

Boring. I smelled a vague sweetness, like I was wearing SOME sort of perfume, but that was about it. And it was gone so fast!

I love the smell of libraries, and I mainly associate it with the smell of musty books. This scent doesn't smell much like a library, but when I put it on the wrists of two friends on two separate occasions, each one said something like "If libraries really smelled like that, I would have spent a lot more time in them!" Sweet and pleasant, but not as emotionally involving and deep as some of his others, like his Forest Floor accord or Russian Caravan Tea.

I was hoping for more musty old books and leather chairs and smoke, but I got mostly a "mushroomy" note. Demeter's paperback has a musty, mushroomy note as well so perhaps my view of what old books smell like differ from Brosius'.