Scent has the power to transport us. Unlike our other senses, the power of scent is linked directly to our brain’s limbic system, the region responsible for memory and emotion, which is why you can instantly travel back to high school, your grandmother’s garden, or anywhere in the world when you catch a whiff of a familiar fragrance.

For many years now, I’ve harnessed the ability of scent to enhance making memories, consciously choosing a specific perfume to wear on my travels. Though I rotate between a select few favorites in my “normal” life, traveling provides the perfect opportunity to road test a new scent, and, more importantly, help imprint the memory on my soul in a way that even the best photograph can’t.

At first, I experimented with having one travel perfume that I wore on all occasions away from home. As much as I liked the idea of having a reliable favorite on standby, the imprints became a little fuzzy, as I couldn’t remember which trip the scent was reminding me of. I soon switched to match the scent to the location — wearing Prada in Italy, Dior in France, Burberry in England, for example (a bonus is that many of the big perfume houses have multiple perfumes so you can work your way through them slowly). This is not only an excellent way to honor the host country, and a fun bit of extravagance to help set a suitably “off duty” mood for your wanderings, but also makes remembering choices even easier. (A travel scent journal is something I intend to start to help cement my memories even further.)

Last summer, my family and I escaped pandemic London for a week in Normandy and the Loire Valley in France. I was anxious about our first international trip during a global pandemic though COVID cases were low and the trip was allowed. Both to help comfort me, and represent the areas I would be visiting, I chose YSL Libre, with its top notes of lavender, cosy middle notes of orange blossom, and comforting base notes of warming vanilla. This scent proved perfect — I felt a little more French, and a lot more calm. Back home, with one whiff, I am reminded, not of the panic of pandemic times, but of the healing power of getaways.

There’s no right or wrong way to start making your scent memories, but I enjoy using fragrances I’m unfamiliar with before my trip. Otherwise, I find they come with strings attached. If you ask nicely at most makeup counters, you can walk away with small vials of perfume to help get you started. I find the samples easily last for a week’s vacation, with a little to spare for when you return home.

If you’d rather reference single-note fragrances, Demeter and The Library of Scent have inexpensive “purse sprays” that replicate almost any smell you can think of, quite literally — from Play-Doh to Kitten Fur. The companies offer a wide variety of scents meant to imitate particular foods, drinks, seasons, even destinations, including Ireland, Cuba, and the Great Barrier Reef, among others. If you have been lucky enough to visit these locations, you may find that you agree with these interpretations of the locale. I spritz their Apple Cider spray to remind me of my fall honeymoon in Vermont. Then again, your scent memory of the places you’ve visited may differ wildly from anyone else’s.

In a 2020 article in the Harvard Gazette, “olfactory brander” Dawn Goldworm explained that scent is the only fully-developed sense fetuses have in the womb, and it remains a child’s most vital sense until age 10 when sight takes over. This may explain why scents imprinted in childhood are so important, and lead to a lifelong like or dislike of certain smells that can be hard to override in adulthood. 

During our year-plus of enforced time at home, I’ve never been happier that I have scent memories to help me reminisce and recollect. Through the power of scent, I’ve been transported to more carefree times — reliving walks along a Venetian canal at twilight, a hunt for the city’s best strudel in Vienna, the zesty, citrusy tang and bite of a Moroccan souk — one magical sniff at a time.

Consider:

• Trying a scented hand cream, body wash, or even hair product. Most come, or can be decanted, into travel sizes;
• Essential oils — either single notes or ready-made blends– are another option, and you could consider creating your own bespoke combinations;
• Purchasing a scented product on your travels — the bonus being you have a portable souvenir that you can dip into right away.

Stefin Kohn is an American writer and editor living in London. Her love affair with perfume started with Debbie Gibson’s Electric Youth, circa 1989.