The Scent of Your Home

Have you ever noticed what happens when you open the door and walk into a home, even yours? You take a deep breath and smell. The human sense of smell has extraordinary capacities for discrimination. Cleaning concoctions are not the odor or scent I want people remembering about my home. What about you?

Real Estate Agents astute in the way of selling homes have used candles and arousal sprays with apple and vanilla scents in the kitchen to evoke the fond memory of favorite food. Scientists state that the human nose can detect over 1,000 different scents. Perhaps this is why we have so many colognes and perfumes? The person known as a sniffer in a perfume factory gets higher pay for his or her sniffing ability and who wouldn't like that job! But how many of us actually realize how much we actually use the sense of smell?

Our scents help us find food, avoiding predators and choose a mate. The sense of smell evokes memories of past experience. In my grandparents’ days, folks would “make a memory” by associating a particular smells with a person. So, if grandma always smelled of Peppermint, she would be remembered whenever her family smelled Peppermint. It was sure a better scent than old socks or bottles of medicine that smell up cabinets!

When you decorate the scent of the room should also be considered. The kitchen could always smell of fresh baked apple pie, vanilla donuts, or hot chocolate. The living room with a hearth could smell like pine trees. The bathroom could smell of lemon or oranges. The bedroom should be calming with the oils of lavender, marjoram, geranium, mandarin, cardamom or a floral spray of roses. There are many books on the subject of Aroma Therapy and the benefits it has on ones health and happiness and scientific studies have shown that fragrance technology is capable to elicit relaxation, exhilaration, sensuality, happiness and well-being.

Because of the importance odors or scents play in our body, it is an important consideration for every decorator to consider when building decoration into a room in the home. Scents stimulate our olfactory [nasal] pathways to produce emotions. Don’t forget to consider the air inside your car as well! I suppose you would prefer a calm and relaxing drive and less stress, “easy does it” emotions. We all want and need aromatic smells to evoke positive and happy emotions in our homes. Don’t we?