frankie.incensein Ambers, Spices & Gourmands · Chicago ·
MemoryFun fact: Rachel Herz's review of odor-evoked memory says the memories a smell brings back tend to come from the first decade of life, and feel more emotional than ones cued by words or pictures. That's definitely me. The choir started planning the Christmas…
maeve.mossin History, Bottles & Houses · Galway ·
Reading
Here's a thing. UNESCO's entry on the perfume skills of Pays de Grasse was inscribed in 2018 and covers three things, growing the plants, knowing and processing the raw materials, and composing the perfume, and it says the knowledge is passed on mostly…
mags.lavenderin Home Fragrance & Candles · Norwich ·
Tip
Morning all, the lavender I cut in the summer has been hanging upside down in the shed, and this weekend I finally stripped the stalks and filled the little cotton bags for the airing cupboard. Rub the heads between your palms over a bowl and the buds drop…
beatriz.london My grandmother in Porto put lavender and a strip of lemon peel in her drawers. The lemon went first, the lavender stayed.
mags.lavenderin Florals & Bouquets · Norwich ·
Snapshot
Morning all, I cut the last few roses by the shed before the wind gets them. Half still in bud, the open ones holding rain in their middles like little cups. They smell of a warm jam pan and a cold wet leaf at the same time, alot stronger than anything from a…
grace_rose_nz Funny reading this with my first buds just showing colour here in Dunedin. Yours are going to bed and mine are waking up.
lupe.pinonin Ambers, Spices & Gourmands · Santa Fe ·
Discovery
A neighbour back from a trip gave me a little bag of frankincense tears. I only knew it as church smoke. Unlit, a tear smells like lemon peel and pine sap, nothing smoky at all. I warmed one on a tin lid over the stove and the church came straight back.
frankie.incense Fun fact: the first perfume-maker anyone can name is Tapputi, recorded on a Mesopotamian cuneiform tablet dated 1200 BCE [I definately want to know…
amara.oudin Ambers, Spices & Gourmands · Birmingham ·
Memory
Revising late and someone down the corridor is burning frankincense. Straight back to Eid at my aunt's, oud on the coals and everyone's coats smelling of it for days.
Class no. 10 · 7 min read
To wear fragrance well, spray it from a short distance onto clean skin or a fabric that won't mark, don't rub it in, and stop before your own nose asks for more. You'll learn where to put it, how much to use and why you stop noticing your own scent while everyone around you still can.
noah.fogin Woods, Mosses & Roots · Halifax ·
Snapshot
Fog off the harbour, then rain on the spruce all morning. The trail smelled like a cold Christmas tree soaked in sea water.
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.
callum.peatin Home Fragrance & Candles · Glasgow ·
QuestionWe're selling the flat and the first viewings are this weekend. My partner says it smells like a bothy, because of my coats in the hall and the smoky candles I like. I can't smell it at all. What would you do before people come round?
hamish_heather You'll no smell it yourself, you live in it. Get the coats out to the car or you'll loose the sale.
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.
hamish_heatherin Ambers, Spices & Gourmands · Edinburgh ·
Challenge
Aye, here's a wee challenge. In the shop, folk who come in call half the casks 'vanilla' and stop there, as if the word did the job. Split a vanilla pod or open your extract and describe it without saying sweet. It's dreich outside, so I've had time: damp…
dex_in_brooklyn wet tobacco and the inside of a cigar box. you're not getting sweet out of me
thiago.berlinin Welcome to the Club · Berlin ·
IntroductionHello, I am Thiago, from Brazil. In Berlin I carry food on my bike all day, so I smell the whole city from the saddle: bakeries, kebab shops, wet leaves. What I miss is coffee and ripe guava from home. My English is still learning, so please be patient with…
priya.cardamom Welcome, Thiago, your English is doing just fine. Coffee and guava is a lovely pair to arrive with, and coffee has its own page here if you want…
Class no. 9 · 7 min read
Fragrance vocabulary comes down to ten words you will meet everywhere: note, accord, facet, family, sillage, longevity, concentrate, jus, blotter and flanker. This class defines each one from the French Society of Perfumers' glossary and other reference sources, and shows you how to use them to describe what you smell.
joon.yuzuin Ambers, Spices & Gourmands · Seattle ·
Scent diary
TL;DR: coffee and cocoa both get their smell from the roaster, and my nose still mixes them up. Rainy Seattle Saturday, so I set out three jars: - roasted coffee beans: toast, nuts, a little smoke - cocoa powder: dusty, chocolate, slightly sour - cocoa nibs…
otis_in_nola Add chicory coffee. Roasty but bitter like burnt toast, nothing like cocoa.
rafa_azaharin Citrus & Fresh · London ·
Snapshot
Hello friends, night shift. I peeled a clementine in the porters' room at four in the morning and the whole corridor smelled of it, bright in the middle of all that grey. A clementine is my best friend at night. Un abrazo.
kasia.berlinin Florals & Bouquets · Berlin ·
Memory
When October gets cold, in Poland the stalls at every cemetery gate start to fill with chrysanthemums and candles for All Saints. Here in Berlin I found one stall near the Polish church and I stood with my nose in the pots. Bitter, green, a little like sage…
trudy.lilac Same bitter green as the pots on my neighbour's steps. I always thought they smelled of nothing until I put my nose right in.
maeve.mossin Woods, Mosses & Roots · Galway ·
Snapshot
Here's a thing. The rain stopped at four and I took the dog out the bog road before the light went and the whole place had turned up its volume, wet stone on the walls and the heather gone dark and that brown, almost sweet smell of the bog water in the…
cormac.bog Turf smoke and wet stone. That's my granny's road in Offaly, every word of it.