Go Wild, Honey, ‘Cause I’m Candy Crushing on This Beach Babe: With i smell great, Mixing and Matching Makes Scents

The following post is sponsored by i smell great. From the creator of CLEAN perfume, the scents you love, extracted, encapsulated, bottled. Isn’t that great? Learn more at ismellgreat.com.

Just call me “wild candy beach babe!”

Not a bad nickname, right? Got a nice ring to it. Could be a good backup drag queen name, in case I ever get tired of Kitty McDiamond.

Wild candy beach babe is my very own personal scent concoction, a layered combination of three products from i smell great, a brand new fragrance/beauty line by the creator of CLEAN perfume, Randi Shinder, and perfume industry vet/blogger Jane Daly.

There are four fragrances ? Beach Babe (my fave), Candy Crush, Angel Cake and Wild Honey ? and five product families. I like all of them by themselves, but I REALLY like this combo: Candy Crush Soft Body Whip ($28), Wild Honey Eau de Parfum ($68) and Beach Babe Hair Fragrance ($32), all worn together.

The whole mixing/matching/layering thing is a big part of these, because they were designed to layer seamlessly together.

Still, I’m kind of surprised that I haven’t come up with a gross combo yet. No matter which products I’ve layered, the resulting aroma smells fresh and feminine, like “La-dee-da! I just stepped out of the shower and skipped through a spring meadow.” Nothing too spicy or fruitastically sweet. Just chill, relaxed fragrances that one can wear practically anywhere.

i smell great: the four fragrances

beach babe: Ah, take me away to a land of tropical breezes, coconut cream and golden suntan oil…candy crush: Mouthwatering candied flower petals, rose syrup, icing sugar and candy hearts to tempt and tease you.angel cake: A comfy, cozy scent with notes of pink icing, powdered sugar and candied almonds…with a touch of sweetness. wild honey: A soothing synthesis of honey, brown sugar, Tahitian vanilla and sweet nectar make this intoxicating aroma irresistible.

To put it another way, these delicate, light fragrances do not trigger trumpets and spotlights when you enter a room. They are not obnoxious or overly strong, and the average human could not possibly smell them from a mile away.

Instead, they’re like something you might catch a whiff of when you hugged your best friend. Of course, right after you squeezed her good and tight, you’d have to ask, “What is that you’re wearing?” Then you’d make a note on your phone to check it out.

i smell great: the five product families

eau de parfum ($68, 58ml): Delicate, light and long-lasting.wellness water mist ($32, 200ml): Delicate and lighter than the perfume, it’s in a base of purified water, aloe and glycerin. I like to spray this all over my bod after a shower.soft body whip ($28, 200ml): A highly moisturizing lotion with soothing almond oil, coenzyme Q10 and vitamin E. It absorbs quickly, lasts a long time and doesn’t leave a greasy film.reactive lush lip ($28, 9g): A sheer, moderately moisturizing tint with good taste. All of them have a different flavor. Only problem: I’m always tempted to lick them off my lips.hair fragrance ($32, 150ml): A gentle conditioner to add shine to your mane. Makes hair feel and smell cleaner, longer. Ideal for post-workouts when you don’t have time to wash your hair…or it’s just too darned cold outside.

Despite their subtlety, these i smell great fragrances do not disappear right after you put them on, and that’s because of the power of self-renewing scent spheres, which is fancy-talk for “these fragrances stick around for a good 6-8 hours.”

Like something out of the Capitol in Hunger Games, touching or rubbing an area where you’ve applied them reactivates the scents.

I witnessed their longevity in action last Friday, when I sprayed the Beach Babe Hair Fragrance on my mop after my workout (didn’t have the time/motivation to wash my hair). It was date night for me and El Hub ? dinner and a movie ? and then bed a couple hours after we got home.

When I got up the next morning and ran a brush through my hair, I could still smell Beach Babe.

That’s like 12 hours later!

If the thought of mixing and matching your own aromatic elixir and creating your very own personal fragrance profile sounds enticing, i smell great’s Eau de Parfums ($68 each), Hair Fragrances ($32 each), Wellness Water Mists ($32 each), Soft Body Whips ($28 each) and Reactive Lush Lips ($28) are available now at ismellgreat.com (I don’t think they’re carried in stores yet).

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. TGIF! Mockingjay tonight!

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'Despicable Me 2' Crushing Competition

"Despicable Me 2" box office crushing "The Lone Ranger."

LOS ANGELES ? "The Lone Ranger" seems to be riding into the sunset on its debut weekend.

The Disney Western starring Armie Hammer as the titular character and Johnny Depp as Tonto was outpaced 3 to 1 by Universal's "Despicable Me 2," which also opened Wednesday. The animated sequel collected $59.9 million in ticket sales so far, while "The Lone Ranger" earned a paltry $19.5 million.

While Disney is likely to recover based on its other strong offerings this summer, including Pixar's "Monsters University" and Marvel's "Iron Man 3," the masked man's dismal box-office showing may spell trouble for Depp and all but ends any hope for a Lone Ranger franchise.

"This is one and done," said Stuart Oldham, editor of the industry trade site Variety.com. "You're not going to see another Lone Ranger movie after this."

It's a "big disappointment" for Disney, said media and entertainment analyst Martin Pyykkonen of Wedge Partners. Although the film had been set up for a sequel, "it's obviously not even going to come close to covering the production costs," the analyst said.

Years in the making, "Lone Ranger" filming was shut down for weeks in 2011 because of soaring costs that still ended up in the $250-million range.

Poor reviews for the film may have contributed to the sluggish ticket sales. Chicago Sun-Times critic Richard Roeper called it "slick trash," while the AP's Jake Coyle said the two-and-a-half hour spectacle "finally, exhaustingly collapses in a scrap heap of train wreckage."

""The Lone Ranger' is, alas, a runaway train," Coyle writes.

It's a serious misstep for blockbuster producer Jerry Bruckheimer, director Gore Verbinski and megastar Depp, who partnered profitably on the first three "Pirates of the Caribbean" films. Depp's take on Tonto has been compared unfavorably to Captain Jack Sparrow in face paint.

"(The studio thought) if we have Johnny Depp and we transfer him over to another funny hat and call him Tonto, we're going to be OK, but it's not OK," said Gene Del Vecchio, author of "Creating Blockbusters.

Part of the problem, he said, is that children aren't nearly as familiar with the Lone Ranger as they are with the animated characters in "Despicable Me 2" and last week's first-place film, "Monsters University."

"Kids really need to be reintroduced to the Lone Ranger," he said. "Instead, they were introduced to Tonto in the marketing."

The failure of "The Lone Ranger" could impact studio decisions about what to green-light going forward, and not just at Disney.

"From a film-industry standpoint, when you peel back the onion, you're not going to take a big risk on a big-production film that doesn't have a proven franchise," Pyykkonen said, especially in light of other recent bombs including "John Carter," "Battleship" and "After Earth."

"What's going to take a hit is creativity in Hollywood," Oldham said. "You're going to see more sequels and more remakes after these big bombs."

Pyykkonen said the future of the proven "Pirates" franchise could even be in question.

"There's probably going to be some head-scratching in the Disney film studio board rooms," he said. "Like, `We've had a few in a row here that didn't win at the box office, do we really want to do a `Pirates' 5?"

___

AP Entertainment Writer Sandy Cohen is on Twitter: . www.twitter.com/APSandy

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