“I just had no idea a smell could evoke a feeling like this,” exclaims TikTok user Christina Calcote, shaky with emotion. They lift the inside of their wrist to their nose again and again. They start to speak and then stop, as though close to sobbing. “You know when you’re snuggled up with someone?” they finally manage to say, pushing their arms together to mime snuggling on someone’s chest. “It sure isn’t helping my loneliness, I can tell you that much!” they blurt out to the camera after taking another huge whiff of their own wrist.
“You know when you’re” is the essential molecule of PerfumeTok, the fragrance-obsessed corner of TikTok, where this post went viral late last year. The revelation that “a smell could evoke a feeling like this” is PerfumeTok’s—and its sister hashtag, FragranceTok’s—unifying thesis.
