California Wave

It’s seems I’m a sucker for stuff that’s just sitting there, looking lonely, as I queue to pay at shops. This time it was TKMaxx. And California Wave. I quickly looked it up on Fragrantica. Not a lot of info - just a couple of reviews likening it to Cool Water (which I had in the 90s, and have completely forgotten). The queue was getting shorter. The notes on the box say: Splash of Rosemary Ozonic Breezes Vibrant Vetiver Oak moss What the hell - I have a couple of this one’s brothers (Orient Treasure, Glorius Day) - and value them both. So I bought. I applied at home around 10pm. On initial application, I got quite a big citrus hit that rapidly turned fiery and even peppery. While not quite losing the tingle, after thirty minutes, the heat subsided and, for a while, there was a buttery vanilla phase, just. But not enough to put me off. And then some ‘vegetal’ elements came through. These were interesting, even alarming since I wasn’t expecting them, and I'm going to need to spend some time trying to sort them out. Nevertheless, everything eventually combined, and what emerged was a creamy concoction that retained the warm woodsy lemon, but was elevated beyond this with an earthy character. The notes profile above lists sea notes - but I’m not sure what sea notes might smell like. I’ll be applying California Wave again to see if I can get an appreciation! Not a bad blind buy :) While I was awake (couple of hours), this was performing very well - not too restrained, but vibrant and noticeable. I slept by midnight, and there was no trace of perfume when I woke at 7am.

I really like this scent. I imagine an empty olympic sized swimming pool of mineral water with a couple of large palms at the side, it's a very open smell. It's clean, clean, clean and there's a touch of green at it's heart. It does stick around a bit, in fact longer than you'd think given the freshness of the opening. I would agree with the comment that it's linear but I for one was glad it stopped it where it started. It's also affordable. On a summers day It's as refreshing as cold wash. The bottle really nails a visual impression of the scent but I would say the colour of the box is a bit too gentlemanly and refined.

This is just perfect. It gets its freshness kick from the Rosemary instead of mint or citruses. This pairs up with an ozonic breeze and a playful woody oak moss base. Its like a dry, salty wind on the shores of the Atlantic. Performance is stunning also. WOW!

Similar to Davidoff Cool Water - seems to be deliberately aiming squarely into this fresh ozonic, sea breeze genre. Good quality - this type of scent isn't my favourite but it's done very well here. Others have said the vetiver is prominent but I think that's oakmoss. The oakmoss and sea notes are most prominent, followed by the rosemary then the vetiver.

The previous reviewer hit it on the head very similar to Cool Water except this is more refined and much more passable,the Oakmoss and Vetiver is more prominent than the Ozonic whiff and overall appears much more subtle and less brutal and therefore more sophisticated.