The Neverending Story

The lexicon of fragrance is often borrowed from other fine art forms, music in particular. A perfume is a collection of notes, just like a song, while the accords of scent run parallel to the chords we see in music. A perfumers collection of raw materials is called their organ. One aroma, however, has been granted an exclusively olfactory designation: Bibliosmia. The evocative scent of aged paper bound in leather has held persistent allure for generations. If you’ve ever been captivated by a book nose first, dove in for the smell of a freshly-cracked spine, or hunted for odorous clues of the lived experience of a used tome, this olfactive menu is for you.

Come smell the remarkable ways modern perfumers have crafted accords of yellowed paper, printer’s ink, worn leather, library woods, and dust settled beneath a reading light. Scents inspired by published works are featured. Perfume can foster a holistic connection to source material, at once drawing from the text to gather its form, and anchoring literature in the reader's mind by stimulating the sense most entwined with memory. Sometimes, a collaboration between a perfumer and a novelist results in a bespoke scent to enliven prose. A perfume composed entirely of materials found in the text of Homer's The Odyssey exists, and we will smell it together!

The Neverending Story is perfume curator Lucy Burrow's fifth Olfactive Menu.It will be hosted at Bookleggers, Miami's first and only free bookstore, located in Wynwood's Bakehouse Art Complex. A portion of the ticket sales will be donated to Bookleggers. "Shop" the bookstore while you're there, take home books for free. We invite guests to bring used books for donation, if you've been meaning to clear off a shelf.

April 4th, 2026, 12pm-4pm

Light bites and refreshments will be provided.

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Host or Publisher Lucy Burrows