Creed Silver Mountain Water Cologne Review

As a part of my ongoing fragrance reviews on this site, I have been gradually tackling the Creed line of colognes for men. Creed is a luxury fragrance design house which has hundreds of years of history and has created scents for the rich, famous, and leaders of the world during this time period. In this post, I want to take a closer look at what I consider to be one of their best colognes, Silver Mountain Water. How does SMW perform? What notes does it contain? Is it worth a buy?

What does Creed Silver Mountain Water Smell Like?

Notes include: mandarin, green tea, bergamot, black currant, musk, and sandalwood

Click here to try: Creed Silver Mountain Water, 3.3 Fl Oz

My Full Review

The opening of Silver Mountain Water reminds me of Imperial Millesime, in a lot of ways, as both fragrances contain mandarin and bergamot notes. The main difference between the two is Imperial develops into a melon scented cologne with a sea salt note that brings about images of the summertime, while Silver Mountain Water, is cooler in crisper in its presentation and evokes mountainous terrain.

The citrus notes are most noticeable during the first 20 minutes of wear and after that, the green tea emerges along with the black currant, to really become the highlights. The black currant and citrus notes together can be fairly sharp, but the tea note settles it down quite a lot.

SMW is a very clean type of scent and isn’t overbearing at all. The musk note gives this fragrance it’s heart in my opinion and keeps it from becoming a completely light and airy affair. Once the green tea takes over, it starts to have a more green/herbal type of vibe to it.

It’s almost as if it goes from being a summertime type of fragrance towards a springtime wear. It’s like the melting of the last snow of winter and life starts to come out in full bloom again. Another good springtime Creed fragrance is Green Irish Tweed. Silver Mountain Water is super fresh at this point, with a green herbal chill, running through the heart of the fragrance.

Finally, the ultimate dry down, is the tea, musk, black currant/citrus mix, on top of a sandalwood base. Together, it’s a pretty simple and fairly linear scent, but does everything it needs to. Clean, sharp, and refreshing.

Sillage, Longevity, and Versatility

Projection wise, I’d say it’s moderate. I can definitely tell I’m wearing it, but it isn’t going to choke out the rest of the room. I mean, it can if you overapply, but with a few sprays the sillage doesn’t stray too far. It’s longevity is decent in my opinion, even though it gets a reputation for being short-lived.

I can tell you from my experience, I get six hours from this more or less. I have applied it before in the morning, and went on a long running work out, and could still smell it on me afterwards. Sometimes, it’ll go up to 8 hours but that’s not usual for me.

Seasonally, it’s actually good year round. The coldness of the fragrance is interesting in the warm weather. However, that bright citrus/icy quality, hangs around well in the wintertime. SMW is a unisex fragrance.

It’s good for daily wear, not really a ‘sexy’ scent, but can go casual or formal. Personally, I’d wear it casually or in some kind of semi-formal fashion during spring or summer.

Overall Impressions of Silver Mountain Water

Is Silver Mountain Water worth a try? I’d say yes. I honestly like it a lot, though, it definitely isn’t my favorite cologne ever. I think it is a great idea for spring wear and it does develop this interesting herbal and almost metallic scent (the silver in the name), that is pretty unique and enjoyable.

I like the cold sensation that I get from the opening act, I do like a good black currant, and the tea is also a nice touch. It’s not a must have for me, but I have emptied the sample vials of this stuff over the years, and it didn’t just sit on the shelf forever.

I’d put it near the top of my Creed list and would choose it to wear out of the group depending on the weather and my mood (I have also been warming more and more to Original Santal, even if it is still a weak performer). Silver Mountain Water is a winner in my book.

Best Men's Colognes

Best Men’s Colognes started back in 2013, as a way to share my learning experiences with different fragrances, as I dove head first into the hobby. Since then, I have written hundreds of reviews and other pages about perfumes and colognes.