“No memory stimulus breaks my train of thought so abruptly and completely, transports me through the past so rapidly to some remote scene, as a proper quality of odour,” Dr. Walter E. Bundy once wrote.

The tart sweetness of an orange grove, the smell of wet moss underfoot, the sharp brininess of the seaside: scent, memory and place are undeniably interlinked, shaping many of our travel memories. As Bundy says, a whiff is enough to have you reliving some of your favourite trips – years and miles away from the place you visited.

This is true for Xavier Yin Tsang, the founder of Hong Kong candle company BeCandle. Burnt leaves recall his childhood home in Sai Kung, where his family swept away and burned the autumn foliage that clogged driveways. The aroma of cheese and basil rising from pizza furnaces transports him to Florence, where he lived for a year, and the fragrance of leather returns him to Mercato San Lorenzo.

“The smell that gives me strongest association with Florence reminds me of arriving at the Arno River, where layers of algae, mud and mineral from the ancient stones evaporate into the air under the Tuscan sunshine,” he says. “It’s like the smell gently tells me the history of the city.”

Much research has been done on the relationship between smell and memory, nearly a century after Bundy’s musings in 1935. Liana Cafolla, the Creative Director of Hong Kong brand Carroll&Chan, says, “Many studies have shown how scent is directly linked to the limbic part of the brain, which houses memories and emotions, so there is a clear biological reason why scent triggers memories."

It’s therefore no surprise that travel has been a fount of inspiration for fragrance makers. For Michael Wong, founder of Hong Kong perfumery One Day, food and environmental smells – scents related to “shared experiences of a city” – were influential when crafting the scents for the brand’s Ethos of Cities fragrance collection.

“The first step in my approach was to explore if there was any gourmand element of the local culture that I might be able to incorporate into the fragrance,” he says of the travel-inspired collection. “From there, I extended the construction of scent to the environment.”

As for the scent Wong finds most evocative? That of wood and moss, which instantly transports him to the churches and monasteries of Lisbon.

While fragrance can be deeply personal, experts like Yin Tsang, Cafolla and Wong have made it their life’s work to express joy through fragrance – and maybe even return you to the places you once visited.

“It’s all worth it when we watch people smell the scent for the first time and see the smile on their faces,” Cafolla says.

Here are a few fragrances that will transport you around the world, including a hand-picked selection by Cafolla and Yin Tsang. Best of all, you can purchase some of them through our shop using Asia Miles, cash or Miles Plus Cash.

Scented candles and perfumes for travel inspiration