I
Natives
Eastern seaboard and inland slopes
Wattle in flower as the smell of a particular week of the year. School photographs, frost on the morning grass.
The Wheel
Our Wheel of Olfactive
Memories
A working map of where a scent can begin. We are an Australian house, and the country runs through much of what we make. But a memory can come from anywhere a life has happened, and we reach for whatever it needs, natural or synthetic. Four families, sixteen kinds of remembered place, and at the centre, the thing we are really after: memory itself. The map is built on learned craft, and it runs from the simple, to the grounded, to the occasional artistic.
Botanical
Country · Time
II
Fruits & Citrus
The backyard lemon tree, the orchard rows
A lemon pulled warm off the tree, zest under a thumbnail. Blossom on the same branch as the fruit.
III
Green Bush
The rainforest fringe, the creek line, the bush kitchen
Lemon myrtle on a humid day. A clean shock to the head.
IV
Tasmanian Coastal
The Tasmanian coast, the samphire flats
The cold beach at Albany. Wind off the southern ocean, saltbush leaning sideways.
Red Centre
Weather · Time · People
V
Smoke & Ember
Every state. The smell of summer
Bushfire smoke on the wind, and the regrowth that follows. Charred eucalypt with epicormic green.
VI
Grass, Roots & Resin
Kimberley, Pilbara, Top End
Spinifex resin in the midsummer air. Boab and bloodwood gum holding the country together.
VII
Bush Spice
Tasmania, the centre, the south. The bush kitchen
Pepperberry's slow heat. Wattleseed roasted to coffee and hazelnut.
VIII
Desert Dust
Simpson Desert, Tanami, Nullarbor
Iron oxide warming in the sun, the ozone of dry electricity, stone heating up.
Ancient Woods
Country · People · Time
IX
Native Hardwoods
WA — the Mid West and the Goldfields
A quiet room, a small piece of sandalwood on a desk, late afternoon light. Patience as a smell.
X
Vineyard & Orchard
Barossa, Margaret River, Hunter, Tamar
Squashed grapes underfoot, fermenting must, an old oak barrel hall.
XI
Crafted by Hand
The workshop, the verandah where a guitar leans
Oiled cedar and timber shavings, the warm wood of a sound hole. The smell of a thing made slowly, by one person, at a bench.
XII
Snow Gum & Alpine
Kosciuszko, the Victorian Alps, the Central Plateau
Air that gets thinner and more honest with every step. The clean mineral edge of granite.
Weather & Water
Weather · Country
XIII
Petrichor
Everywhere. The first thunderstorm after a dry spell
Red dirt rising, eucalypt leaves slapping against rain, the relief of a continent finally exhaling.
XIV
Holidays
A tropical coast, a long way from home
Coconut and sunscreen, a cold drink sweating in the heat, a flower tucked behind the ear. The slow week where the clock lets go.
XV
Rainforest
Daintree, the Wet Tropics, the Tarkine
Six in the morning, the air so heavy with green it presses against the face.
XVI
Southerly & Storm Front
Bass Strait, the Great Australian Bight
A cold front up from the Antarctic. Ozone, churning sea, the suddenness of a sky changing.
The scents
Every scent finds its place here
This wheel is the map. Each scent we make is a place, a moment, a memory, and links to its own corner of it.
See the scents