A Month of Scent & Memory

Some memories arrive as images. Others return through scent.

This September, Oblique Table explores scent as a quiet way of returning to the places we carry with us. A peeled orange, steam from the kitchen, rain caught in someone’s hair, an old wooden drawer, incense lingering after the flame is gone—small smells can open memories before we even know what we are remembering. Through a month of workshops and sensory experiences, we’ll trace these invisible connections between scent, place, culture, and personal history, paying attention to the ordinary things that somehow stay with us.

This month also looks at scent as something shared across culture and everyday life. Many of the materials we’ll work with—Chinese aromatic herbs, incense, woods, dried flowers, and familiar kitchen ingredients—carry histories beyond their fragrance. Through workshops, conversations, and small experiments, we’ll explore how the same material can hold completely different meanings for different people, shaped by family, migration, habit, and the places we now call home.