Tag: synaesthesia

Scent-inspired gins at Harvey Nichols!

Scent inspired gins certainly get our attention, and there’s no doubt that the gin-craze continues apace. Now, we’ve tried many a tipple here at The Perfume Society (purely for research purposes), but never one inspired by the smell of embalmed Egyptian mummies. Until last night, that is…

We were invited to the press launch of That Boutique-y Gin Company‘s four new gins, all inspired by fragrance and made with the collaboration of Lizzie Ostrum (AKA Odette Toilette) and presented with paintings by brilliant synaesthetic artist, Phillipa Stanton.

The concept takes synaesthesia (the mixing of the senses – ascribing smells and tastes to colours, for example) and bottles it, allowing your sense of smell and taste to take you on an immersive journey into some really quite wonderful (and weird) places…

Big Dipper Gin: Sweet cocoa, earthy cardamom and smoky botanicals capture the nostalgic smell of the funfair.

Fresh Rain Gin: Inspired by the science of perichor (the smell of the first rainfall after a hot, dry period), combining beetroot and edible clay.

Dead King Gin: Featuring botanicals commonly associated with the Egyptian embalming process – rosemary, honey, moss and myrrh.

Beware of the Woods: Wood-y botanicals such as Icelandic moss, nutmeg and cubeb combine to take you on a journey through the forest.

That Boutique-y Gin Company Olfactor-y Gins £42 for 500ml
harveynichols.com

Written by Suzy Nightingale

 

Smell-X installation explores future of smell

What does the future hold for scent? This was the question posed at a sensory installation called Smell-X, recently held at the Figment NYC festival at Governor’s Island in New York City. We used to rely on our sense of smell to stay alive, but as Helen Keller commented, this once-vital ability became something of ‘the fallen angel of the senses’ when we no longer needed to smell a sabre-toothed tiger or forage for food with our noses as the guide.

We teach people techniques proven to enhance our olfactory abilities in our regular How To Improve Your Sense of Smell Workshops (keep an eye on our events pages and newsletter) attempting to re-connect those neural pathways and genuinely get more pleasure from smelling things in a different way each day. But what if we lived in a future where smell had become so dismissed, we forgot the emotional connections and time-travelling memories that scent can tap in to…?

Olivia Jezler is a designer and scent strategist, who invited guests’ to save the future of humanity’ in the multisen­sorial installation. Having worked for fragrance houses including IFF, Symrise and Robertet, working with brands and participating in academic research in Human Computer Interaction at the SCHI LAB at University of Sussex, Olivia wanted to see how members of the public interact with scent in a series of  hands-on (or rather ‘noses-on’) experiments.

Participants were asked to imagine a future where, ‘…there is no need for the sense of smell and thus our smelling abilities have been genetically engineered to not exist. However, it has become noticeable that people have become joy-less, feelings of enjoyment, connection, beauty and emotion have disappeared and most worrisome, rates of suicide have increased…

Yet, there is hope. There are a few people who through a genetic mutation have retained their ability to smell, those in possession of the gene family Smell-X. Special agents search the world to identify these rare individuals who can perceive through their noses to be a “smell translator”. They are invited to a competition to translate basic smells into shapes. This is the first step to bringing humanity back into balance – giving them the ability to experience the elusive and emotive sense of smell through one of their other senses.’

We so wish we could have been in New York to see the exhibition in person, but for the rest of you who also couldn’t be there, luckily the Smell-X experiments are written about in great deatail on their website.

We’re completely fascinated by these ‘cross-modal’ explorations of smell – finding out the myriad ways our senses overlap. Indeed, we dedicated an entire issue of our magazine to the subject, including our award-winning feature on Synaesthesia. If you’re interested in discovering more, buy your magazine here!

Written by Suzy Nightingale