Get Both Sugar & Spice With WEN’s Fall 2016 Seasonal Cleansing Conditioner Scents
Though the holiday season is in full swing, winter doesn’t officially start until late December so, in the weeks to come, it’s time to stock up on WEN’s limited edition Fall 2016 Cleansing Conditioner scents. This year, the scents include: Fall Vanilla White Pumpkin, Fall Apple Spice, and Fall Ginger Pumpkin. All 16 fl. oz. cleansing conditioners retail for $40 each at ChazDean.com and, as usual, they’re sulfate-free formulations are designed to remove any dirt and debris without stripping hair of the essential oils it needs to remain healthy, soft, shiny, and vibrant.
If you have a sweet tooth, I strongly recommend you try the WEN Fall Apple Spice Cleansing Conditioner since it literally smells like a caramel-coated apple. As soon as you pump it out of its bottle and begin to apply it to your strands, you’ll be mentally transported to a country carnival and will likely imagine yourself happily golding a wooden stick with a shiny, glazed apple on the end, then taking an enthusiastic bite. The scent seems to derive from the combination of the apple extract, sugar maple extract, cinnamon oil, vanilla bean extract, and nutmeg extract in the formula, but the sweetness of these natural extracts is balanced by the slight tartness of other natural oils that play a supporting role on an aromatic level — among them pomegranate extract, wild cherry fruit extract, and lemon peel extract. You can smell the sugar maple and apple above all else but the nutmeg, clove, and cinnamon notes do also rear their head, as does the pomegranate note.
This is by far the strongest of the three fall scents and, unlike its counterparts, it lingers for quite a bit. Now, this aromatic longevity could be construed as a positive or negative quality. I’m sure plenty of ladies will find themselves twirling a strand of hair and pressing it against their noses just so they can enjoy the saccharine scent. Im however, would have preferred for the scent to be more ephemeral since, a full day after washing my hair, it still smelled incredibly sweet. While the aroma brought me joy as I was cleansing my strands in the shower, I found it irksome the next day when I was getting dolled up for a night out with the hubby and I kept detecting the scent. Smelling like candy isn’t my idea of exuding sensuality or femininity, so the whole candied apple aroma was killing my vibe a bit! And, of course, after applying a perfume, there was an aromatic cacophony that was just unsettling. But again, I can totally see the aroma’s lingering quality being a positive trait for many a costumer.
My favorite scent in the bunch is actually the Fall Ginger Pumpkin Cleansing Conditioner, which has just the right amount of kick. I tend to roll my eyes at the recent surge in pumpkin-flavored goods (Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts? Pumpkin Spice Cheerios? What is happening?) and pumpkin-scented candles, body washes, lotions, and oils, so I expected to find this aroma yawn-inducing at best, to tick it off as yet another Johnny-come-lately release meant to capitalize on the pumpkin pandemonium. Boy, was I wrong! This cleansing conditioner does, of course, have a pumpkin scent but the hefty ginger note totally transforms the aroma, so that it has quite a spicy charm to it and less of a pie-worthy sweetness. When we think of a pumpkin spice aroma, we tend to think of a blend of pumpkin, nutmeg, sugar, clove, cinnamon, ginger, and allspice. But this isn’t a pumpkin spice scent — it’s a ginger pumpkin scent, and so the ginger essence really does shine brighter than the pumpkin note without completely overshadowing it. This shift in the paradigm, placing the spicy element in the spotlight as opposed to the pumpkin, really does make a huge difference. It feels like a celebration of the fall season and yet it’s not overly sweet. Also, the scent doesn’t linger for hours and days on end, so that you can enjoy a pleasant sensory experience while in the shower and then move on to apply whatever fragrance you desire without there being any aromatic conflicts (because, really, who wants to create a war between a ginger pumpkin scent and a jasmine musk perfume?).
As for my least favorite scent, that title would go to the Fall Vanilla White Pumpkin. This scent was simply not for me. I realized, as I was washing my hair with the cleansing conditioner, that I’ve never really smelled a white pumpkin but, if this cleansing conditioner is any indication of what a white pumpkin actually smells like, then I’m not a fan. Even the vanilla aroma was hard to detect! What I smelled most prominently was sandalwood and cloves, which I didn’t particularly love. The scent wasn’t offensive by any means, but it’s certainly one of the less pleasant WEN aromas I’ve experienced. That said, as with all WEN Cleansing Conditioners, it left my hair feeling soft and bouncy, and it didn’t strip my hair color (important since I spend good money on being a faux blonde!).
As Cleansing Conditioners, they all work wonders, so it’s just a matter of which type of scent you find yourself gravitating towards. I would, however, suggest narrowing your options to Fall Apple Spice and Fall Ginger Pumpkin, since I can’t imagine the Fall Vanilla White Pumpkin being too popular a choice given that it doesn’t quite smell like vanilla or pumpkin. Whatever you choose, start ordering now because it’s only a matter of time before these are pulled off shelves and replaced by new winter scents!
