First of all, I am by no means educated on scents (yet! I'm working on it though), so I'm sure I'll throw out generalist words instead of being really specific. Sorry about that in advance.

So I feel I've tried quite a few soaps at this point and am comfortable enough to start giving my impressions on them. I haven't seen many reviews for DD stuff, so I thought throwing down my initial impressions of Green Dragon might be insightful for some.

Anyway...I received my tub of Green Dragon last week, and have put it to use a few times now. Personally, Dapper Dragon soaps are one of my best performers, up there with LASCCo, B&M Black Label and MLS. So I'll dive right into that first:

• Cushion: 8.5/10 - Being a pretty new wet shaver, cushion is a big deal for me, more so than slickness. One of the big reasons I love DD soaps are that I feel very comfortable with them. MLS might have a tiny bit more cushion, and I hear Catie's Bubbles is the end all be all of cushion, but have yet to try any. So maybe not quite that much, but it's way up there.

• Slickness: 9/10 - DD soaps are one of the few that I can use with a blade I'm not so comfortable with, for the sake of verifying that I actually am not comfortable with it. I feel it's on the same level as B&M, and I've not tried Stirling, but no matter which blade I have in there, it cruises, for better or worse depending on the blade.

• Ease of Lather: 9/10 - Honestly, I'd have put this at 10/10 until trying Latha last night, which, and I'm not sure how this happened...but I glanced at it and considered using it, but decided not too as I'm not a fan of the powdery scent, and the lid popped off with a thick, rich lather. Maybe Will can explain that better, but jesus does it lather easily. ANYWAY, DD lathers just as well or better than any of the other artisan soaps, as I'm sure most everyone knows. I'd put almost all of them at 9 or 10/10.

Now for the scent! - What I imagine more people might be interested in as many are very experienced with DD performance (but perhaps maybe not in tallow?) This scent is just...incredible. As a note, I dislike floral and heavy lemony/lime scents, and I get neither of that from this. The layers to it are insane. I open it up and immediately get a very fresh smell, and the description of "growing things" is completely spot on. I imagine thats the cedar and bergamot, but my completely untrained nose just associates it with being cold and fresh.

If you really take a good whiff of it while in the tub, it changes substantially to more of what it smells like while lathered up. The best way to describe it is fresh air on a chilly morning. It reminds me of stepping out of the house into a crisp aired morning at my Dad's house on the lake. You can see the smoke coming off the water and everything is still, very peaceful. I have no idea what notes combine to make that scent and feeling, but its very evocative, and if that's what Eric was going for then he nailed it.

Some have thought it might smell similar to Through the Woods by MLS, but it absolutely doesn't. I found the MLS offering to be much more "piney" and woodsy. Green Dragon might be considered woodsy, but with a very fresh take on it.

All in all, I love the soap. DD's performance mixed with the scent make it one that I gravitate to more than any of my others recently. If you've been on the fence about it, pick some up, you won't be disappointed.