Club circle
Rain on hot pavement, coffee, cut grass, a bakery: everyday smells, put into words.
The Everyday Smells circle is about everything you smell without thinking. Rain on a hot sidewalk, morning coffee, freshly cut grass, the door of a bakery, laundry drying: members describe these smells and what they bring back. It is the right place to practice describing, with no bottle and no technical vocabulary. The Class on smell and memory explains why a smell can bring a memory flooding back.
14 posts · 37 active members
pip.rhubarbin Everyday Smells · Wakefield ·
Discovery
Did the Saturday market in Wakefield with my nose instead of a list. Onion sacks first, then apples (proper autumn ones, a bit winey), then the fish van, then wet cardboard everywhere. The last stall was the flower one and it smelled of chrysanthemums and…
bridie.hobart My apple stall at Salamanca smells of last season's fruit out of the cool store at the moment. Yours sound better.
aroha.rainin Everyday Smells · Wellington ·
Scent diary
Kia ora, first proper warm day of spring and then a southerly shower hit the car park at the terminal. Hot tarmac, wet dust, a bit of diesel from the ferry, and the bush smell drifting down off the hill behind. People call it petrichor, I just call it the…
nell.wattle Okay, nerd moment: in Melbourne it's wet bitumen, eucalyptus and the footy oval, and it's actually gone before the tram comes. Rant over.
noah.fogin Everyday Smells · Halifax ·
Snapshot
Fog in all morning, low tide, spruce on the hills. Seaweed, cold rock and woodsmoke from somewhere.
shona.whin The haar in Aberdeen smells just like that, plus the fish market.
nell.wattlein Everyday Smells · Melbourne ·
ReadingOkay, nerd moment: walking the dog round the oval after rain, the gums were so loud I could smell them from the car park. Part of the after-rain smell has a name: Wikipedia's page on petrichor ties the earthy scent of rain on dry ground to oils that build up…
ruby.sandal After a storm out at the mine the whole camp smells of gum leaves.
thiago.berlinin Everyday Smells · Berlin ·
Snapshot
The chestnut stand at the U-Bahn exit is back. Smoke, sweet and burnt, the first smell of the cold here.
harriet.hayin Everyday Smells · Bristol ·
Question
Last mow of the year at the garden centre this morning, and I had a friendly argument with a colleague about the smell. To me fresh-cut grass is sharp and green, like a split stalk, while the clippings heaped by the compost bins smell sweeter by the…
dougie_newcastle It's coumarin, isn't it? That's the hay smell in an old fougère.
otis_in_nolain Everyday Smells · New Orleans ·
Scent diaryLast set done, chicory coffee from the stand on the corner. Bitter, roasted, a little like burnt toast, and the night jasmine still going over the fence.
bridie.hobartin Everyday Smells · Hobart ·
QuestionFirst time this spring the sheets have gone back on the line, and they come in smelling of wind and cold sea air. The dryer ones smell of the washing liquid and not much else. Why the difference?
jess.in.philly I love the clean laundry smell so much I chase it in perfume. Is that the same thing as line-dried?
rafa_azaharin Everyday Smells · London ·
Scent diaryHello friends, after my night shift I take the Tube home and I always notice the smell when the doors open. Warm dust, hot brakes, a little like a coin in the hand. At eight in the morning the coffee is the smell of everybody, but at my hour it is only the…
kemi.cocoa Central line in the morning: coffee, wet umbrellas and somebody's bacon roll. Every single day.
kemi.cocoain Everyday Smells · London ·
ChallengeChallenge from my classroom: I sharpened a whole pot of pencils for Monday, and the children have to describe the smell without saying wood or pencil. Best so far, from a seven-year-old: a new ruler that's been in the sun. Your turn.
hana.neroli A cold classroom with the window open, and somebody next door sawing a fence. Maybe that's the real answer: the cedarwood note says eastern red…
carys.cardiffin Everyday Smells · Cardiff ·
Memory
The heating came on in the library and the old stacks woke up. Warm dust, a sweetish note, something like almonds and toast. Every autumn it takes me straight back to my first day as a volunteer there.
kit.clove Paste, old leather and paper dust is my whole working day. The sweet note is my favourite part.
ravi.teain Everyday Smells · Brisbane ·
Discovery
Making chai every morning, I finally noticed the cardamom smells a bit metallic when I crack the pods, and the ginger is almost lemony. I thought my nose was off, but the cardamom note says spicy, aromatic, slightly metallic, and the ginger note says lively…
priya.cardamom Cardamom chai is how I ended up here, Ravi, so this made my morning. Try the pods three ways: 1) whole, 2) cracked, 3) in the pot. Over to you.
dex_in_brooklynin Everyday Smells · New York ·
Snapshot
ok so the bakery under my building turns its exhaust fan on at five and the whole block smells of crust and scorched flour. you're welcome, Brooklyn.
teddy.tonka The bakery by my coffee shop in Austin does the same. Best alarm clock.
juniper_julesin Everyday Smells · Portland ·
ExerciseStudio notes: after a firing I walk round the block with no phone and just smell. Try it: ten minutes, same route out and back three smells on the way out, three on the way back no perfume words, only your own The way back is always different, like a pot that…
aroha.rain Out: salt, diesel, flax. Back: someone's barbecue, its spring so that counts.