Have you ever heard a song that "smells" of something to you? Or seen a colour that took you to a taste? That points to synaesthesia: a neurological phenomenon in which a stimulus perceived by one sense involuntarily triggers a response in another.
What synaesthesia is
From the Greek syn (union) and aisthesis (sensation). The best documented forms are the visual and auditory ones — seeing colours while listening to music, associating colours with letters or numbers — but there is an olfactory version too, in which a scent evokes colours, shapes or textures.
It is estimated that a small percentage of the population has it, although the figures vary quite a lot depending on how it is defined and measured. Clinical synaesthesia is involuntary, consistent throughout a person's life and specific to each individual: someone who sees Saturday as blue always sees it blue.
What happens to the rest of us
Here is the useful part, and it should not be confused with the previous one. Without being synaesthetes, we share fairly stable cultural sensory associations:
- We associate citrus notes with yellow, with light and with cleanliness.
- Woody notes, with browns and dark greens, and with a sense of solidity.
- Floral notes, with pinks and lilacs, and with delicacy.
- Mentholated notes literally produce a sensation of cold — in this case it is not a cultural association but chemistry: menthol activates the cold receptors of the skin and the mucous membranes.
That is not synaesthesia, it is shared learning. But it works just as well when it comes to designing a space.
How this is used in a space
The practical idea is coherence: what you smell should go with what you see. A very fresh mentholated register in a living room of earth tones, wood and heavy textiles creates a small dissonance — it is not unpleasant, but the space feels less rounded. A woody note in that same living room fits without anyone being able to explain why.
It works the other way round too: if a venue is small and rather dark, a citrus or aquatic register helps it feel airier.
A word of warning about the famous cases
Plenty of stories circulate on this subject about specific brands that supposedly designed a scent for their shops with one aim or another. Most are repeated without a source. That major brands work on their olfactory identity is true; the novelistic details that get told are almost never documented.
Take it to your own space
Before choosing a fragrance, describe your space in two adjectives and check whether the scent reinforces them or contradicts them. It is a simple filter and it gets it right more often than you would think.
You can see the range in the fragrance catalogue, and the full method by decorating style in scent and interior design.
