Selfridges, The Future Laboratory and design studio Campaign have teamed up to create the interactive profiling experience which teams you up with a signature scent based on your responses to a social personality matrix and personal tastes gauged in an audio guided tour.
It sounds a bit like mad science, so intrigued I decided to test it out for myself. I don’t mean to brag or anything, but I can now safely say that my personality smells pretty awesome!
I was greeted in a very clinical laboratory-style check-in by perfumers dressed in lab coats, who ushered me over to an iPad where I was asked to complete a social personality matrix, a set of multiple choice questions about which images or statements best represented me. Which series of artwork, architectural designs and artistically taken photographs did I feel best represented who I am? Watermelon cut into rounds or jagged cathedral-cut triangles?
After this, I was asked to pop on a pair of headphones and an audio guide, which would lead me on a multi-sensory experience around four spaces, where I was instructed to sniff objects like drawers, books and other items that had been infused with different scents. A delicious second-hand book was scented with something floral and lovely which mixed in with the familiar smell of yellowed pages. Other scents conjured up holiday memories.
In between each space, designed by creative director of Campaign, Philip Handford, the comforting smell of coffee beans, placed in tubes on the wall, acted as a neutraliser.
The last room of the tour brings you into a Selfridges window display. Fog from dry ice hangs magically in the air and a lab technician waits to greet you. At this point, I was asked to smell various items and explain what memory I associated with them. After this, lab technicians take you into a booth, where they give your personality reading in a wonderfully enlightening experience that is akin to having your palm read. It’s magical.
Here, I was given my Fragrance Lab Bio which described me as a ‘person others love to be around’ with a ‘good sense of humour’. I was also told that ‘You believe life is for living and money for spending’ – my bank book would definitely agree on that note.
I was then given a 50ml bottle of my very own eau de toilette, an absolutely gorgeous scent with fragrant notes of juicy blackcurrants and warm pink peppercorns, jasmine, tuberose and lily, which apparently reflects my ‘sensual and sociable character’. I left the booth feeling enlightened, pampered and deeply understood and appreciated.
The Fragrance Lab runs until June 27. Tickets are £65 and include a 50ml bottle of your signature scent, worth £65. To book, click here.
Image credit: Selfridges
