Scent and Memory

There are certain scents I can’t explain. I’ll be walking down the street or folding laundry, and suddenly, I’m somewhere else. I’m 9 years old in my grandmother’s garden, or standing in the hallway of my old school, or lighting a candle on a rainy afternoon ten years ago. The scent is invisible, but it pulls me back in time with full color.

Scent has this strange, powerful hold on memory. Not like photographs, which let you look back. Scent lets you go back. It drops you into a place, a moment, a version of yourself that you didn’t even realize was still with you. I’ve always found that fascinating, and a little magical.

There’s actually science behind it. The part of the brain that processes scent, the olfactory bulb, is directly connected to the amygdala and hippocampus, which are responsible for emotion and memory. It’s the only one of our senses that has that kind of direct line. That’s why a scent doesn’t just remind you of something, it makes you feel it again.

The first time I noticed this, I was in a shop and opened a candle that smelled like warm roses and earth. I wasn’t expecting anything, but suddenly I was in my grandmother’s garden, kneeling on warm flagstone, surrounded by lavender, peonies, and tomato vines. I could feel the weight of summer air, hear her voice somewhere nearby, and see my mother clipping a few stems to take home. She’d always bring them into the house and place them gently by my bedside table. I remember falling asleep to the soft scent of garden flowers, the room dim and quiet, and the feeling of being deeply cared for. It’s one memory now, blended together, shaped by two women who made everyday things feel safe and beautiful.

Now I find myself doing the same thing for my daughters. On weekends or quiet evenings, I’ll gather a few blooms from the backyard and place them on their bedside tables. Sometimes they notice, sometimes they don’t...but I like to think the scent settles into their sleep the way it did for me. Maybe one day they’ll catch a whiff of something familiar and find themselves back in this moment, in a room filled with flowers, with a mother who wanted them to feel safe and loved.

The beautiful thing about scent is that it isn’t just about memory. It’s about identity. The smells we’re drawn to say something about who we are, what we value, and where we’ve been.

This is why I love making candles. Every scent I create has the potential to bring someone back to something important, or forward into something new. You never really know what it will unlock.

I think we all carry these scent stories inside us. We just don’t always know they’re there until something stirs them. And when it does, it feels like finding a part of yourself you didn’t know was there.

So maybe that’s the real power of fragrance. It’s not just about filling a room. It’s about filling in the missing pieces of time, of self, of memory. And every once in a while, when the scent is just right, it feels like coming home, even if just for a moment.

Alexis xx