SMF

With warmer spring weather right around the corner I'm nearly out of my T&H West Indian Limes cologne and I'm considering the St John's as a replacement. I understand the scents are similar, and the St Johns is very nearly half the price of the T&H. One of the things that I like about the T&H is it's staying power, while still having a frsh lime scent. Any members have experience the the St John's WIL?

Craig, A number of years ago, yes ( also in HS but that was MANY years ago...sigh ). I do think that the St. John's and the T&H Lime colognes are pretty similiar, including staying power. There is a little more 'going on' in the T&H version, I think, but they're close enough IMO.
Regards,
Gordon

Thanks for the reply Gordon. With the difference in price between the St John's & T&H WIL I can buy a bottle of TOBS Sandalwood Cologne. Proof that there are still a few bargains left in the world of colognes.

Craig, Yes....a few...and the Taylors Sandalwood is certainly one of them. Hope you like the St. John's.
Regards,
Gordon

this question is for pure curiosity so please dont get all geeky on me .......are these lime colognes very different from the #74 lime?

thanks in advance

clive

Craig, I believe St John's sells a sampler pack still - I bought one years ago and it had the limes in it. It would be a cheaper way to go if you wanted to try it. Just email them, hope that helps.

Chris

fallingwickets wrote:this question is for pure curiosity so please dont get all geeky on me .......are these lime colognes very different from the #74 lime?

thanks in advance

clive

Clive, the short non-geeky answer is yes. They are limier and simpler than the #74 Limes from Taylor.

Longer, slightly geeky answer to follow:

The #74 has some other stuff in the base to extend the lime note, and the lime note is less pure than in these other lime scents. The lime in T&H and St. John's, while longer-lasting than some, is basically a really bright, pure lime, while the #74 has floral, wood and musk notes in it.

Further along the spectrum, there are some limes that are just a short hit of citrus and then nothing. T&H and St. John's at least dose up the lime so it lasts a little while and add complexity with some spice and wood, but basically they are straight limes scents, albeit potent ones.

Spot on descriptions Tim. I'll add that I've always considered TOBS Victorian Limes #74 to be a classic leather scent with the addition of limes to the leather base. T&H WIL has top notes of lime, lemon & bergamot on a slightly woodsy/clove base. I just pulled the trigger on St John's WIL via Barkley Crocker, so I'll soon find out more about that scent.

Clive, Well, Tim and Craig answered you quiry fully, so I don't have to!
Regards,
Gordon

Thanks for the info.....very much appreciated. next question is: does it attract 20 something nubiles?? Actually i bought a bottle of the 74 a few years ago in the hope of getting an eau savage experience, but of course that didnt work out to well....... thanks again for sharing your knowledge

clive

Craig, I had the #74 Limes and didn't care so much for it, but couldn't tell you why. Now, having read your description, you've put your finger on it. It was leathery, which for my nose, is a non-starter. Just seems to gall me, making me wretch and gag, almost as severely as Cella soap. So far, the best Lime for me is the vintage Old Spice Fresh Lime. Booster's makes a bargain basement version called Iced Lime, to go with their Original SC, but the Booster's has a half-life of about 2 seconds. Whereas, the OS Fresh Lime lasts and lasts in a non-intrusive way.

Leathery indeed. Good description, Craig. It's really an interesting juxtaposition of notes. Not something I wear anymore, but mostly because my love of lime has faded a bit. It's very good stuff.

Gary, Iwould love to find something similar to the original Old Spice Lime, both in terms of scent, price, and wide spread availability. There's an Indian produced OS Lime, but I understand it's nothing like the original, I've read that it's very sweet smelling (cloying candy sweet as one reviewer wrote). Some years back here in SMF a member (it might have been Gordon) wrote about a current production cologne that resembled OS Lime, maybe it was Col Cook Lime (I've always been curious about that one), or perhaps Caswell Massey Lime. The more I think about it I believe that it was CM Lime. Perhaps Gordon can tell us if I'm recalling this correctly.

Well this is disappointing. I just went to the Caswell Massey website and it appears that their Lime range has been discontinued.

Craig, yeah, Caswell-Massey must be pretty much on life support. Tricorn is discontinued, half of their "in production" fragrances are out of stock everywhere (including their excellent sandalwood), and the lime range is gone, too, now. I had their lime cologne a couple of years back and really enjoyed the spice component in it. Having never sampled Old Spice Lime, I can't say whether the two are comparable, but the C-M had some good wood and spice notes and a slightly powdery drydown that was almost too much for me (I dislike powdery fragrances) but not quite. In other words, I dug it.

Too bad what's happened to C-M. I expect they're not long for this world; had they revamped a couple of years ago and found a better supplier for their shave goods, one wonders if they might have righted the ship; the proliferation of wetshaving niche products the past few years and the company's history might have been enough to really drive sales if they could have delivered the goods. Instead, their creams were abysmal, their soaps worse, and I think gents moved on to firms that could deliver good product across the line.

Here's hoping I'm wrong and that Caswell-Massey gets up off of the mat.

Craig - give a sniff to Royall Lyme, seems often overlooked in the lime category.

Craig, Sorry to hear that about the C-M Lime Cologne. It ( now was ) somewhat similiar to the Old Spice Lime as is ( don't know if this one is still made either ) the Col. Conk lime offering. For many years lime colognes and similiar were really my thing. That's much less so today although I still like them. The best, in terms or straight and real lime scent, are, IMO, the Trumpers and the D R Harris's Classic Cologne. But because they are the most 'real' with the least amount of other notes, they don't last long at all. Royall Lyme is also somewhat in this bag although I don't like it as much as the other two. The Taylors No 74 is the current version of Royal Yacht Lime and it is much more long lived because the other notes in it prolong the scent. It's very well done in that regard. Plus, at least according to Chris M. the 'lime' used in it is a synthetic. I don't know if this is true....but I don't know that it isn't...could be. Personally I like the way that it dries down and because it has some longevity it is usually the only 'lime' cologne I will buy these days. To me, the T&H and St. John's versions are somewhere between the purity of Trumpers and the artful mix of the No74.
Regards,
Gordon

Gordon, from what I remember, isn't No74 Limes a fairly faithful recreation of the original Edwardian era cologne?

I received my bottle of St John's West Indian Limes from Barclay Crocker today. My first impression: It has a brighter, lemony-lime top note vs T&H WIL. In fact it's a somewhat lighter scent all around than T&H's WIL. It's also much shorter lived, particularly the lime element, which fades very quickly (Trumper Limes quick). Although St John's WIL is half the price of T&H WIL, I think that I would order the latter over the former. I'll have to wear this scent for a while to fairly assess it though.

I ordered two bars of West Indies Soap Company's lime bar soap ( http://barclaycrocker.com/merchant.mvc? ... gory_Code= ) from Barclay Crocker, but was sent two bars of St John's WIL Soap by mistake. Although the St John's is twice the price of one I ordered, it has no discernible lime scent whatsoever. It does lather nicely, however it doesn't cut it as a lime scented soap.

Craig, Umm...okay. Scent is extremely personal, as we know. I hadn't checked out the St. John's since HS ( mid '60s ) when I tried it again in the late '90s. I remembered it as being quite light and short lived but very fresh and natural 'lime'. But when I reacquainted myself with it in the '90s it struck me as more 'complex' and longer lived then I remembered it. But now, your description sounds closer to how I experianced it in HS! So, who can say? Maybe they've altered it several times or maybe it's just tricks of memory. Anyway, I'm sorry that it hasn't seemed to pan out for you.

Well, regarding the No 74 Lime, it's somewhat uncertain. The original Geo. Thomas's Barber Shop in Duke Street closed in the earlier '70s. As you know, it was Geo. Thomas who created the original Royal Yacht scent ( which was primarily a hair dressing scent in the earlier decades of it's existance, as was Trumpers Eucris ) in the very early 1900s. I'm not sure exactly what happened to the name and scent(s) after the shop closed, but by the 1990s 'Royal Yacht' products were being sold by Swaine, Addeney, and Brigg in London....they had acquired the rights at some point, I don't know exactly when. They offered a 'Royal Yacht Lime' line and at least one other ( that never made it to the US...'Old Bond' ). Mr. Bargepole ( who actually visited the original Thomas's shop ) believes that they probably did have a lime splash but he says that most of the products in the shop were plainly labelled, nothing fancy, no special names for the most part, So, there was probably a bottle of just 'Thomas's Lime Cologne/Aftershave around. If so, exactly how it smelled or for how long it had been available, I just don't know.
Regards,
Gordon