California Snow

What a special fragrance, and certainly one of the most interesting I own. California Snow is one of the least well blended perfumes I've encountered, but this is its strength, not its weakness. Rather, this is a study in opposites: you simultaneously get the musty wet earth/forest smell of the soil tincture, hay, and cannabis AND the insistent whisper of the herbal-floral accord through the rose, narcissus, and chamomile. My first impression was mildew and Wet Wipes, but with body heat it opens up considerably, and you smell a veritable waltz of alternating scent impressions: rich mulch against dewey petals, emerald leaves against sharp sage, herbal tea against woody cedar, sweaty skin against comforting coumarin. California Snow won't be for everybody, but—or because—it is truly remarkable. Much more forest enchantress than unbathed bohemian. The name is quite fitting: the gentle purity of driven snow in counter-point to the wild diversity, both botanical and ideological, of California. Surprisingly strong projection and decent longevity. At the far end of the drydown, the mulchy/mildewey notes evaporate and you're left with the most luscious fresh laundry scent. Remarkable.

The name isn't for snow, precipitation that falls from the sky. It's a strain of cannabis. It's def not one of my tastes, I knew that when I bought the sample, but I was interested in what this creation smelled like and I have to say I very much appreciate it and if I was one for green/earthy/freshies, it's be at the top of my list! You can absolutely pick up the earthy scent from the soil tincture and the cedar melds wonderfully with the hay! If you're looking for a frag reminiscent of buds harvested and this is not it! This is more true to the cannabis leaf and it's quite wonderful. I don't smoke and don't really like the smell of bud, lit or otherwise. I think Makenzie did a wonderful job on this frag and people are buying it without knowing the notes or it's inspiration (that house & the view just looks like it's nothing but green and earthy!) and it's impacting the reviews. EDIT: It's amazing so many people don't like this when wearing it side by side to Byredo Bal D'Afrique, the similarities are astounding & that one is a cult fave.

I have a strong emotional reaction to this scent. It's an underdog in the current wave of trends. It's disappearing fast online, and I've just managed to snag one of the few remaining bottles I could find. Opens with sweet wet grass and hay before becoming an adorable, comforting powder. It's like sitting in a meadow in the early evening after a long, pampering shower. I don't plan on wearing this for any specific occasion, so can't comment on sillage or projection. This is one of my go tos for when I want to feel like myself.

A white,clean and young perfume. It opens with a strong note of chamomile and very nice sage... after a while the scent becomes lighter and softer, the rose is soft and the narcissus gives harmony and carefree. The drydown is really beautiful, an ethereal scent,young,eternal... Sillage: 7./10 Longevity: 8.5/10 Scent: 9./10 Overall: 9./10

Loving this. A slightly sweet musky vibe paired with wet fresh earth and grass. It lasts, too. I find this very low vibe sexy, meaning not obvious or in your face, sensual in the way that you have to sort of think about it. Enjoy very much

I love it... It’s most like photorealistic snow with soil/dirt mixed in with it

A 'no' that turned into a 'maybe'. Chammomile is a fairly new smell to me, my first real experience of it was the recent launch of Gucci's 'Memoire' where I came to appreciate its slightly bitter aromatoc floral qualities. It is an off kilter smell and it needs to time to settle and dry down a little before you can truly appreciate what it is doing and how it works with the other notes of sage, tea, coumarin and hay. This fragrance kicks off with cheap ultra powdery dry floral body spray vibes, very granny chic! Then over the next 30 mins it settles, the powder disappears somewhat and I found myself reminiscing of late summer evenings driving through the coastal California meadows and hills, dried grass, end of year flowers, warm eath, salty skin. The patchouli buzzes away in the middle of the fragrance and it adds a warm dimension. There is still a little left over of that clean powdery smell some time later, so probably not a contender for me as I have an aversion to dry powdery smells, but I have enjoyed this perfume. I just think it leans a little old lady

This is one that changes utterly and completely over the course of its life on the skin. Initially, you get such an incredibly discordant jangle of notes, with an acerbic chamomile, dusty sage, fruity rose, musky narcissus and earthy geosmin battling for control. It’s a pretty wild experience, to be honest. It’s a fracas of notes that takes about an hour to settle into a more overall green perfume, but not a juicy green, a dusty and slightly acrid green. This is the California Snow referenced in the name, and brings to mind tumbleweeds on the sagey hills with a brilliant blue sky overhead. I was trying to figure out if I liked this more than as an oddity when it changed to a muted woody rose. Completely opposite to the circus of the beginning, more of a restrained woody smell with a dry rose lurking somewhere in its depths. It’s very interesting and fun to smell, not something I’d likely buy a bottle of but I recommend the experience of sampling it.

I love California Snow. By far my favourite from the brand (the second being Hossegor, by the same perfumer). It took me some time to decide whether I kinda liked it or loved it. Initially, it smells clean, a bit soapy, conveying the idea of "cold" and "white" (like snow, indeed). On the longer term its herbal, slightly earthy character is what eventually won me. Overall, it reminds of both snow and cannabis, the latter being the actual namesake for this perfume. And my final verdict: great smell, full bottle worthy (but definitely no crowd pleaser: do NOT blind buy this one)

Whilst I’ve never experienced real snow before, I do get a prominent watery accord within the fragrance. To a point, I found the fragrance to smell reminiscent of wet/waterlogged soil, rather than snow, as mentioned within its name. Despite this, after it’s opening, California snow proves to be a mostly herbal fragrance, with its prominent chamomile note almost producing a ‘plastic-y’ feeling. This ‘plastic-y’ note combines with its other herbal notes to produce a noticeable petrichor accord. Overall, it’s a nice and interesting wear, but not one I'd be buying.

Managed to get ahold of this cheaply so was a blind-buy. I love chamomile and hay so, I figured I would chance it. It weirdly smells like a skanky Moncler pour Femme to me even though there are barely any overlapping notes. I really like this. I can't actually smell the weed and dirt outright but I think this is perhaps where the skankiness comes from (I mean that in a good way, it's kind of hot). Kinda medicinal, herby like a new age wellness shop down a Dutch backstreet. I can practically hear the wind chimes.

Fresh garden, complete with dirt. Fresh, vegetal, herbal, floral - but not pretty-floral, more realistic-floral. Smells like a meadow or field. A sunny meadow or field. Very nice for spring.

The fuzzy texture of a cannabis bud with a clean musk, instead of an actual cannabis scent. It gives me the impression of the color white. It's not bad, I just don't like clean scents, so it might be good for someone who's looking for a twist on a clean scent. I've never smelled California Snow specifically but most other strains I've smelled have a wonderful aromatic quality, like sage, basil or lavender, but more robust and minty (aside from the skunky or dusty ones). I don't know why I keep trying to find a perfume that captures this smell since imitative perfumes have been disappointing.

As a native Southern Californian who has, indeed, experienced her fair share of snow, both in California and in other parts of the country, I was fairly excited for this one. But... I’m not getting any dirt, or snow, or even anything vegetal here. It smells like laundry musk and baby wipes, clean and white and synthetic and nothing of the natural world. This is a pass for me. Dauber sample from Lucky Scent.

My curiosity piqued - I ordered a sample with an order from Luckyscent. I get it! - it is I guess what is advertised - fresh dirty snow. Lots of notes but in the end it smells like dirty sleet or slush on the street curb after many cars have driven past as the weather warms up - fresh ozonic bright dirt. After an hour the carnation and cedar start a slight play for your attention... the cannabis as are many notes are pretty much blended into obscurity. Too many people here are over analysing, are too generous or talking like an expert breaking it down when it’s make up is hard to enjoy when the smell is realistically significantly in the odd category - plain and simple, regardless of the fact it is high quality in its oils. or is it maybe old Ice Cubes from the freezer that have absorbed all the fridge smells that this reminds me of... Doesn't work for me - if it works for you I think you are odd...

The notes and description are intriguing, but this is a total miss for me. Opens with very damp, green herbal notes that linger for much longer than expected. Once it settles down a bit, I understand the name more. Now, I've never experienced a snow in California, but I did live in Los Angeles as a child and now live in the midwest and certainly have experience with snowy winters. To me, this combines the feeling of the thaw after a big snowstorm (when the ground is soaked and musty smelling and the snow is almost black along the roads) and walking along a dirty, gritty LA street that you're not quite sure is safe. I'm usually straight forward with reviews, but this deserves a narrative description for sure. It's interesting, and I'm glad I got a sample to try, but I cannot imagine wanting to smell like this for any occasion. More of an experience than a perfume IMO.

I had been pretty excited to try this scent due to it's reputation as smelling like snow or dirty snow. Unfortunately, I did not have that experience. It started out smelling very green. Tea leaves, sage, hay, etc. It was very slightly spicy. As it developed it became more floral with narcissus and rose starting to peek through. And then everything started dropping away, just leaving a persistent scent of rose that lasted 12+ hours. Not for me unfortunately.

Really loved the listed notes as I’m a big hay & soil tincture fan, buttt this one was kind of dirty in a nasty way. It really did smell like LA’s pissy streets and like I was walking on the beach on a windy day and could smell someone smoking pot next to a garbage can.

Persil or Tide powder! It does smell exactly like a powder soap for washing clothes, and at the same time it does send the idea of the smell of snowflakes. It is soapy, yet herbal bits, some musk, and clean factors, beside hints of metallic for the mineral water note, and few sweetness as the combination goes optimum in presenting the snowflake like juice. So it's like this, soap are presented by chamomile, tea, and musk, while metallic is kind of presented by musk, soil, and hay, and few bits of tonka (just a tiny little bit so it won't go overly sweet) then you will get the snowflake blend. To be honest i didn't like it at first cause the herbal notes was quite vicious, and after around 30 to 45 mins it gone well blended and harmonized to present the snowflake. Mat Yudov in "Pitti FRAGRANZE 2017: The BEST Perfumes!" article said "This is exactly a type of fragrance that only daring, open-minded, and very talented young people can create." Well... not really Mat, but as an experimental creation AND Mackenzie Reilly being a new young artist to create such blend, i believe it's true for "California Snow" being her first creation. Eventually, don't expect the unexpected & forget what authors are saying about this blend, it's just a snowflake on your skin blend, fresh, soapy, and very cooling.

Like Senyoko’s Duo de Flores and it’s mitti attar, (distilled rainwater), this scent has set out to capture the fragrance of another weather-related phenomenon: fast melting California snow. Hmmm: I never really picked up on that. This scent is also supposed to remind you of coastal sage, rosebuds and dust. And, expanding on the trend of scents transporting us to a memory, we are supposedly taken to a Hollywood party, all bling and bong, (which explains the cannabis). My take: California Snow starts out herby then throws in a couple of florals, then gives us musk and finally, a cedar. I never really got the party in LA feel, either, but definitely, I got farm. It’s early summer and they are cutting the sweet grass of spring for fodder. There is a little patch of flowering meadow, with sage and chamomile in full bloom, growing wild at the edges of the fields, and the harvester is pulling up big clumps of clay, releasing a rich, herby, earthy bouquet. An antique rose is in full bloom, it’s branches drooping from the weight of huge red roses, and the last of the narcissus bulbs offer their last sweet aura. The breeze carries their scent to you intermittently. It’s summer and you are perfectly content to be smack in the middle of farm country.

When I sprayed the tester at the store, this smelled exactly how everyone here had described it--rain, soil, green, and fresh. When I came home with it, much to my disappointment, my bottle smelled bleachy and nauseatingly synthetic, like a white, messy blur. There must be some synthetic soil/petrichor accord being passed around in the fragrance world, because this unfortunately, smells exactly like Le Labo's Baie 19 and a little bit like OSM's 15 - Foreverness, which are supposed to have a petrichor smell as well. Has anyone else had this experience with fragrances before? I'm not sure how long a fragrance needs time to mature/aerate, if at all (I know batches are allowed to sit before they are packaged and sold) but it's been on my shelf for about a month now and it still is quite unbearable. I'm holding out hope that it'll change, so I've opened the bottle to let it aerate a bit. I'm hoping that either the fragrance changes or my nose does, because, from what I smelled at the store, I really do love this fragrance.

I didn’t grow up in the 90s so I don’t pick up the dreaded Cabbage Patch Doll skin scent memory. Thankfully on me this is a beautiful, albeit low key, country farm — complete with an herb garden and fresh bales of hay in the barn. There’s also the dichotomy of the opposing clean notes. Narcissus, vetiver and tea bring an overall fresh quality to this earthy blend. California Snow leans feminine without the predictable forward floral notes of jasmine or rose (the latter of which is in the mix but I don’t pick it up). I’ve been noticing a trend of hay notes in perfume over the last four or five years. I decided to look in the data base, and the first usage of a hay note in a perfume was from 1886! anyway, I’m a fan of that note it seems and I love how it’s blended here. I really like this creation. I would need to wear it with a couple of full sprays to determine longevity, but the splash method is giving me good performance of several hours. Don’t expect big projection though. My dauber sample is from Lucky Scent.

i think the title refers to its fleeting and dry character while being herbal, i can see how the composition is supposed to evoke the idea of snow in a dry and hot climate. kind of an oxymoron if you will. the notes are really driving it there with the light sprinkles of water and soil and weeds and herbs, you can almost see the snow melting upon arrival. hay like quality. its really nice, but also very light, either im anosmic or ive sprayed too little. and ive sprayed quite a bit actually. so i dont know. its a little bit disappointing to me unfortunately, the blend isnt so great and its too weak. continuing my search for a soil perfume :-)

I smelled this for over half an hour as it developed at the shop... i couldn’t place it... so familiar... something from my childhood... pleasant, powdery but not iris powdery... and then it hit me: this is the scent of Cabbage Patch doll skin. Confirmed with the perfume shop specialist, who also had one of the dolls. Not unpleasant at all, but it’s impossible for me to dissect the scent now. So if you’re a child of the 80’s you may appreciate this even more... and it makes me so curious to know what the actual doll scent was intended to be!!!

“High-end baby wipes” and “Cabbage Patch doll”! I have been giggling at reviews. I love them! I concur with both, but particularly the baby wipes. Wiping your hands off after repotting a plant...that’s what this is giving! It’s not unpleasant, but who wants to smell pleasant when they could smell delightful? Even if you wanted just to smell pleasant, it’s a skin scent anyway.

I love this. I read about the notes and knew that I had to have it and was not disappointed. It is like swimming in the river on a hot day, the heavy scent of minerals and herbs in the air. Across the water a soft whaft of burning sage or cannabis reaches your nostrils. Then you get up and dry of with a fresh towel.

I expected to be blown away but I'm definitely not. As a fan of herbal, grassy, soil smells I thought this was gonna be right up my alley but all I'm picking up is a stressful rose note that reminds me grandma in the 90's. And it never goes away.

Just went in in shop here in milan and try this on my skin and i love it.. and yes i feel the hay on it.. but aside from that i love how the scent combines the note! I love it! Longetivity is good.. 6hrs to 12hrs almost a day for me

herbal and grassy, like you're sitting in a damp field in the evening after the sprinklers just turned off. really pleasant but i think the chamomile (?maybe) makes this a little too powdery for my taste.

The perfume blurb did not match the scent at all...there's no petrichor smell or snow smell. It's like someone mixed some scent and put it on a bottle and sold it.

What in the... This smells like the inside of a lady’s public bathroom.