The World Makes Scents – LavSander

I received this cute little box with 3 handmade incense cones as a gift from Raksmey and David, the people behind The World Makes Scents. A box like this costs $3.95 – currently €4.37 in their Etsy shop. There are also packs with 12 and 24 cones available. The price per cone is €1.46 – €1.28 depending on the pack size.

Ingredients: lavender flowers, Australian sandalwood, guar gum

When I burned the first incense cone, I was almost convinced that it must feature white sandalwood because the wood scent is very soft and gentle. However, it is actually Australian sandalwood, which normally has a significantly spicier note, compared to Indian sandalwood.
The balance between lavender and wood is very harmonious. It seems to me that the spicy note of the sandalwood merges with the strong herbal aspect of the lavender flowers, creating a particularly pleasant symbiosis.
I am now on the third and last cone, and I notice how my perception is deepening. By now, I can perceive more of the natural sweetness of the sandalwood and the floral aspect of the lavender. I increasingly appreciate the purity of these incense cones. Probably not least because I’ve been using very few heavily perfumed incenses lately. Usually, I love sweet scents, and I am not someone who explicitly avoids synthetic fragrances, but it’s like with sugar in food: you get too used to it and lose the sense for the subtle aromas and natural sweetness of plants. Taking a break from it every now and then does good and enriches the senses.

Towards the end, the scent changes slightly and surprisingly starts to remind me a bit of mild pipe tobacco smoke, and not at all in a bad way.
In my experience, cones always tend to smell very unpleasant at the end, burnt or like an ashtray, however LavSander has shown me that it doesn’t have to be that way.