The Significance of the 21st Century Schnoz
America’s collective nostrils are working overtime these days, sniffing out myriad new products to help them relax, work harder, sleep better, awaken creative energy and develop appetites for food and sex. The nose has become the new gateway to enlightenment--a super-sensory filter for the ever-blooming (and ever-changing) wafts of pop culture, fashion and beauty, arts and entertainment, travel, fitness and a burgeoning holistic market for self-healing and self-discovery.
Big business has only recently harnessed the economic clout of the ancient tenets of aromatherapy by offering a smell-happy public the tools to transform environments by creating, altering or masking scents. Sea breeze for calm, lavender fields for relaxation, green tea for introspection, pine for energizing, jasmine for sensuality. It seems everywhere you turn--your home, your car, your work, your place of worship, your supermarket and shopping mall--scents are being strategically placed to entertain and seduce the nose.
The 21st century schnoz is bombarded. But it is also being fawned over, catered to, pampered and glorified. The nose is the new channel for self-fulfillment and self-expression.
“It’s as if we’ve just now discovered our sense of smell,” said Annette Green, president of the Fragrance Foundation and the Olfactory Research Fund in New York. “We’ve discovered the fact that the nose can improve our whole quality of life--sex-wise, energy-wise, sleep-wise. We’re just now learning to use scents in very innovative ways.”
The power of the nose was celebrated in grand style at the beginning of the new millennium. When Times Square welcomed Y2K, scent brochures carrying a custom-made “global fragrance” rained down on revelers along with tons of confetti and streamers.
Silly? Think again. The fragrance business is a $6-billion industry in the United States alone, according to the Fragrance Foundation. Home fragrance products reported double-digit increases over the last decade, with an increase of nearly 20% in 1998, according to an industry trade publication, Spray Technology & Marketing.
“Home fragrance is becoming more and more important,” said Catie Briscoe, director of public relations and communications for Crabtree & Evelyn. “It’s the trend of the moment: People’s homes are becoming more important to them.”
The home is a natural place for investing in scents. Even babies have their own lines of expensively scented baby talcs and colognes. But places like the locker room and spa are new growth areas, as aromatherapy seeks to keep people relaxed, fit, focused and pumped with energy and good vibrations.
“Right now, aromatherapy is taking center stage. People are becoming more savvy to what kinds of aromas affect them and why,” said Cristina Bornstein, co-founder of the scent- and color-connected line of beauty products called Tony & Tina. “Aroma is just another frequency. And we’re all about frequency therapy.”
Bornstein, a self-described “aromatherapy junkie,” said the reason for turning to scents is simple: “If bad aromas can make you sick, then it stands to reason that good aromas can make you well.”
While that proposition is nothing new (aromatherapy has been around for ages as a folk medicine), it seems that we’re only now waking up to the intoxicating possibilities of scent.
“Why? With the technological revolution, we’re finding it’s really important to create sensory environments where the human element is pronounced: touch, sight, sound and smell,” said Green of the Olfactory Research Fund. “We’re trying to put emphasis on our sensory selves, which is really nothing more than our human side.”
Smell will play an important role in the rapidly expanding world of technology. Man, for all his innovations, isn’t about to let go of his most primal urge to smell, Green suggested. She sees a day when a box in the home will deliver scents to correspond with various forms of entertainment.
Bornstein said the scent craze isn’t a fad but part of an evolution toward discovering and controlling positive energy.
“I think we’re all getting in touch with the fact that color, aroma and thought can heal and transform our lives,” she said. “Right now, it’s aromatherapy’s time.”
