As an urban smellscape researcher and mapper, I was genuinely curious to discover to what extent Amsterdam’s notoriously famous odour pervaded and to explore the other aromas floating around the city, from the constant and subtle presence of any background smells to the episodic scents of specific neighbourhoods and the unexpected and curious aromas as detected by a local population. To explore the urban smellscape, I organised a series of smellwalks with perfumers, landscape architects, university students, design thinkers and members of the general public. The walks took place over four particularly windy days in the spring of 2013.
The distinctly urban scents, as delineated by the late urban smellscape specialist Victoria Henshaw, included food (waffles, asparagus, bakery, cheese, fat and grease, bacon, Dutch sausages, coffee and beer), traffic and exhaust fumes, synthetic odours (rubber, plastic, spray paint, cleaning products, bleach, chemicals), construction (wood, asphalt, paint) and plants (greenery, garden, grass).
Specifically localised smells (known in the trade as “episodic” odours) encountered during the series of walks included Albert Heijn (a local supermarket with a peculiarly distinctive smell at the entrance to many of the stores), wet fish (at the fishmonger stalls in the street markets), incense and Chinese spices (in Chinatown). Scent marketing, an increasingly common extension of branding, ensured that the scent of a well-known US-based clothing company was clearly identified some distance from the shop itself. In Vondelpark and Sarphatipark, the flowers and the rain each proffered nuances of green, leafy volatiles. Time and again, we encountered seasonal specialties: the scents were those of fresh growth, of the spring.
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My process of smellmap creation involves taking data directly from the comments of the smellwalkers and transcribing them into symbols on a digital or physical map. Some of the newer maps are animated. The symbols may be watercolours or digital icons in the form of morphed isolines or tiny dots. Each map is also full of white space, alluding to the massive smell voids where we simply don’t notice the aromas around us.
Whereas some maps are scientifically accurate symbolic representations of the reality of the earth’s surface, the mapping that I use in my practice is exploratory – pointing out transient and ephemeral phenomena. Ultimately, this means any final, printed smellmap can only ever be an indication of possibility: there might be a real odour in the location indicated by my iconography, but there again, there might not. As the security of the map is lost, it becomes instead a tool and a driver for further exploration – the map as a guide and a pointer to the more evanescent aspects of our lived environment.
Smellwalking reveals how – despite the human desire for control – temporal flows and fluctuations remain. Amsterdam did not emerge as being primarily a city of the scent of cannabis during my initial week of research, but on a return visit, the heady scent of marijuana assailed my nostrils both day and night. The urban smellscape is highly temporal – emanating from the rhythms of the city, the rhythms of its people and affected by incremental vagaries of the weather as well as seasonal growing patterns.