Page 41 - Reside Magazine Briggs Freeman

Reside — Fall 2025
Photos: João Sousa; Courtesy Diptyque;
Far left: Moro Dabron and Jamb
have collaborated on a candle vessel
inspired by ancient Roman bronzes
Bottom left: Cork releases an earthy
scent, as in the custom-designed seats
of Herzog & de Meuron and Ai Weiwei’s
2012 Serpentine Pavilion
Left: Diptyque’s Bronze
Candle Reflector, made in
collaboration with Maison Intègre
or cooked rice with soy sauce and sesame oil.
This kind of olfactory storytelling echoes past
architectural experiments, such as the 2012
Serpentine Pavilion in London by Herzog &
de Meuron and Ai Weiwei, where the structure’s
cork-clad interior released a distinctly earthy
scent. A related dialogue plays out in the
exhibition “Scented Visions” at Watts Gallery
in Surrey, England, inviting visitors to engage
their sense of smell through scents carefully
paired with Pre-Raphaelite artworks.
Limited-edition artist collaborations
have elevated scents for the home to collectible
status. Diptyque’s Fragrance of Infinity—
a room fragrance housed in an optical
glass bottle created in collaboration with
photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto—retails for
€6,000 (US$7,000), exemplifying how interior
scents have become objects of desire as much as
sensory indulgence. Building on this crossover,
Byredo paired up with multimedia artist Dozie
Kanu for an exhibition in Milan exploring the malleability of memory, taking
cues from its Bal d’Afrique fragrance.
The Dusseldorf exhibition will invite visitors to rethink scent as both
medium and message: Müller-Grünow presents it as central to how we
experience space, memory and even visual art. Works from the museum's
collection, which spans 1,000 years of cultural history, will hang among scent
columns, atomisers and diffusers, highlighting the close connection between
art and the sensory experience.. One gallery will diffuse a bespoke “Kunstpalast
scent”—developed to reflect the building’s materiality and the museum’s
© 2012 Luke Hayes; Courtesy Moro Dabron. El Anatsui and Gerhard Richter.
identity, while grounding visitors within a space shared by works from Rubens,
Scent functions as emotional architecture: it anchors memory and gives
form to the invisible. Olfaction has become part of the spatial language of design,
as vital as color, light or material in shaping how we feel in a space. As homes
become more curated, sensorily rich and psychologically attuned, scent is
stepping fully into the architectural conversation. 0
Jessica Klingelfuss is a London-based writer, editor and photographer
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