BY ERIKA
If there is one thing Diana Rankin,
perfumista en Somerset West business owner, seems to understand intuitively, it
is arte-vita or how to imbue life with art.
Early
in the previous century, an Italian art and social movement called the
Futurists 1) had appropriated this phrase, art-life, for the sensory
revolution they envisioned. They wanted to empower and liberate society by infusing
art into everyday life and into everyday practices. The leader Marinetti, believed that we think, dream and act according
to what we eat and drink. Food should engage every sense and stir the
imagination.2)
THE ART OF FRAGRANCE
For the Futurists it was food and for
the owner of Perfume Power South Africa, it all starts with the art of
fragrance.
Diana has had a lifelong fascination
with everything to do with perfume and as so often happens, the desire to share
her passion and knowledge, grew into a business.
In 2011 she launched her company to educate, entertain
and make uncommon fragrances from all over the world available to men and
women.
The
vehicles she uses are Perfume Power SA's e-commerce website, presentations
at workshops and at private and corporate functions as well as exhibiting at
network events (Diana is the chapter leader of the Somerset West chapter of
Xtraordinary Women), conferences, expos and wellness days.
One
of the very special services is the three-hour personalised Signature Scent Session where you are guided to blend your own masterpiece.
SCENT ROOM
But it is the recent launching of
The Scentroom in a quiet cul-de-sac in Somerset West that reminded me of the
Futurists’ ideas of arte-vita and their notion of sensory elaboration and
combination to create
a
feast of sensory awareness.
As with the Futurists who made olfaction the ‘star of the gastronomic experience’ 3), every sensation
in The Scentroom brings your focus back to fragrance.
The
sound of running water in the beautiful garden, the tactility of fabric and
bead work, the colours chosen for the walls, the reflections of candle light
from the exquisite perfume bottles displayed on glass shelves, the feeling of body
and soul relaxing in the easy chairs, the touch of perfumed oil or wax on the
skin. It all has one objective only and
that is to enhance your smelling experience and by implication your emotional
experience.
The relationship between smelling and memory is a very special one.4)
While it is impossible to recall a smell
without the source of it present 5), smells, more than any other sense, triggers memories of situations, contexts and people.
And the memories evoked at The Scentroom have to be special.
“Rather
than a sleek and shiny sales room, I wanted to create an airy, peaceful and comfortable environment where people can have an
emotional experience but also receive accurate product information so that they
will find their perfect perfume match! “ says Diana.
So if you are looking to buy
something special for yourself or a friend, if you can get together up to 10
friends to join you for a Signature Scent Workshop, or even if you just being
in the moment in a beautiful space, give Diana a call and make an appointment
for a scentationalist encounter at
The Scent Room.
NOTES
3. Playing to the Senses: Food as a Performance Medium by Barbara
Kirshenblatt-Gimblett
4. Ibid
5. Ibid ‘The paradoxical objectivity of smell is that it is more intruding,
more immediate, than any other sensation, and at the same time essentially
fleeting and elusive. Its presence is never permanent. Not even when that which
emits it is present in its materiality is it possible to remain attentive to
the smell…. Smell does not permit the continuous examination and enrichment of
the first impression which we take for granted, when it comes to the other
senses…. The nose must continue to act incessantly, without being able to store
the impression. The impression does not become more dense, it is not solidified
as when we concentrate on a tone or a color. It is always
evaporating.' Ruin, Hans (198?) Smell--Notes for
a Phenomenology of Olfaction, Kris:138-41
