Oceania

Roja Dove's Oceania is a masterclass in translating the Mediterranean coastline into olfactory form—not through tired marine synthetics, but via an intricate lattice of citruses and aromatics that shimmer like heat rising off sunbaked stone. The opening is an absolute citrus symphony, with the peppery brightness of litsea cubeba amplifying the more traditional bergamot and grapefruit, whilst Provençal lavender and thyme add that garrigue-like herbal roughness you'd encounter on a clifftop walk above azure waters. This isn't your typical fresh fragrance; there's genuine complexity here, with the jasmine sambac in the heart lending an almost rubbery, indolic richness that prevents the composition from veering into shower gel territory. The aquatic quality emerges not from Calone or its chemical cousins, but from the interplay between green galbanum, crisp juniper berry, and moss—imagine crushed herbs and driftwood rather than synthetic ocean spray. What's remarkable is how Dove uses iris and vanilla to create that "creamy" accord without sweetness; it's more the texture of sun cream on warm skin, a lactonic quality that sits beneath the citrus-aromatic barrage. This is for the fragrance lover who finds Acqua di Giò too simplistic and Neroli Portofino too monochrome—someone who wants their Mediterranean escape to smell lived-in and real, complete with wild herbs, sun-bleached wood, and the faint memory of white flowers carried on a salt breeze.