I infamously don’t like dating. Actually, that’s an understatement. The idea of going on a blind date makes me want to claw my eyes out. But when my editor tells me about Scent of Connection, a blind dating event that uses a scent-based algorithm to match people, I’m intrigued. With a slightly manic “fuck it” mentality, added to the fact that the event is far away enough not to feel tangible, I decided to buy a ticket and go incognito in an attempt to find the love of my life. All in the name of research, of course. Plus, it is basically undeniable that scent is both a logical and pretty genius precursory avenue to dating, because how someone smells is a huge part of attraction.

BEFORE THE EVENT

About two weeks before the event, a letter arrives. Inside it I find a small ziplock bag with a few pieces of cotton cloth. The accompanying instructions tell me to get sweaty and then drench the cloth in my own sweat, adding on my own perfume, and to do this as close to the event as possible.

I hadn’t even thought about what to wear and had already stumbled upon my first hurdle: what to smell like. I don’t really have a signature scent, instead going between a number of perfumes based on my mood, the season, where I’m going and what I want to feel like. I suddenly wish I knew less about perfume. Should I try Inito’s Narcotic Delight, a boozy cherry that is built around Hedione, a molecule accredited with stimulating the brain’s pleasure centres? Should I experiment with a pheromone perfume that apparently drives potential suitors wild? Or should I opt for an atypical saccharine gourmand scent, like Parfums de Marly’s Delina, that I kind of hate but that I know is a crowd pleaser and appears regularly in “I was chased down the street because of how good I smell” TikToks?

The decision ends up being made for me when I suddenly remember that I need to collect my sweat the Saturday morning of the event. I’m going to a yoga class, so I assume that will make the sweat collection simple. However, by the time I leave the class and try to wipe the little square of cotton on my skin (while diligently avoiding eye contact with anyone in the changing room), I’m not that sweaty. I try shoving the cloth inside of my damp sports bra, but still no luck. With limited time, I power walk home with multiple layers on, the two cotton patches shoved into my armpits. For good measure I wipe the cloth on my now very sweaty chest, no doubt looking exceptionally weird standing in the middle of the high street, before shoving the soggy squares back into the zip lock bag. Curiosity gets the better of me, and I try to sniff the material. I don’t really smell like anything, besides the spritz of jasmine perfume that I sprayed that morning.

Lately I’ve been wearing Gabar’s 01 Float almost every day. A heady jasmine, it’s pungent enough to be a statement scent while being deliciously floral and musky. It’s very long lasting, edgy enough to be intriguing but not overpowering, and decidedly androgynous, albeit more feminine leaning. It’s actually the perfect choice for this occasion.

THE EVENT

The evening of the Scent of Connection event falls. I find myself in a cosy bar in Hackney, at the rear of a queue of people waiting to be given a number that will correspond to a label I wear and the tube that my sweaty little patch is placed in, and to sign a consent form that lets them use my scent. On the label that will be attached to your tube, you are instructed to write your gender, age and sexuality, as well as three words to describe yourself. These are then placed in a perspex tray, where everyone can go and smell each other’s scents and write their number on the ones that they are interested in. Eavesdropping on the people in front of me in the queue, they are clearly feeling the same level of silliness and anticipation.

“I don’t know if I am looking for love. I was thinking of getting on an app but I thought maybe I should just do this,” says one girl I speak to. It all feels very fun in an innocent way, like some sort of high school mixer, with the tarot reader, music and art hanging on the walls. My new friend is also wearing a jasmine perfume, which is weird because I can tell which tube is hers when I go to sniff the tubes and pick my connections. 

“Social media and dating apps have made everything so vision-based. It feels like we’ve kind of lost that thing of being able to just go up to someone in a bar. The meet-cute has disappeared. It’s been quite clouded by the gamification of dating,” Niko, one of the event founders tells me over coffee following the event. Jasmine, another of the team members, adds: “It’s about rerouting the way people feel about dating. This pulls it out of this sanitised, digital realm and back into the body in a more instinctual, bodily way. It’s sexy.”

Scent of Connection originally started as an art piece critiquing dating apps and modern dating culture. Conceptualised by a team of four, namely Niko, Jasmine, Jessé and Porsha, the initial installation was met with so much interest that they decided to try situating an event that specifically focused on bringing together people looking for romantic connection.

“The event attracts people who are more open and looking for something unique with dating,” Jasmine tells me. “In that way it’s also a great way to meet new people and be part of this community.” As I sniff the tubes on the scent board, I am slightly grossed out by some that are pretty BO heavy. Some smell like almost nothing, and others are heavier on the perfume side. I scribble my number on a handful that smell pretty good and wonder if I will get a match made in heaven. “Everyone got matches on the original computational board, which just shows how people have such specific and different preferences for smells,” says Jasmine.

THE AFTERMATH

At the Scent of Connection event we were all diligently wearing labels with the numbers that matched our tubes in case someone wanted to strike up conversation post-sniffing, but I didn’t hang around as I wanted to see what result I’d get purely on the blind smelling aspect. A week or so later, I got an email with the people who were interested in my smell. Two matches, with their names, @’s and mobile numbers. One match has a private profile and the other is a familiar face, who I then realise is a friend’s ex… It is the London queer scene, after all. 

A few days later, a text appeared on my phone. “It’s ___, I matched with you at Scent of Connection.” So I must have liked theirs. They then send a follow up message that has the cringey tone of a pick up line mixed with a Hinge prompt, which immediately dries up my potential interest. Maybe it was my smell, but I didn’t end up going on a date from the connections. Still, it was exciting to go to an event which is trying to challenge the dominance of cold, clinical dating apps. “For Scent of Connection, we want it to be based on smell but also on all the senses. It’s so interesting when you isolate one sense how much it shows how many specific dating preferences come into play when you are finding someone you are compatible with,” Niko tells me. “Apps now focus so much on just the visual, but there’s so much more.”