• Food
  • Family
  • Beauty & Health
  • Style
  • Great Women
  • Events/Win
  • Domestic Diva Awards 2022
  • Food
    • Eating Out
    • Cooking Tips
    • Festive Food
    • Asian Recipes
    • Food
    • Celebrity Recipes
    • Dessert Recipes
    • Healthy Recipes
    • Quick & Easy Recipes
    • Western Recipes
  • Family
    • Family
    • Save Money
    • Parenting
    • Sex & Marriage
    • Travel
  • Beauty & Health
    • Beauty & Health
    • Skincare
    • Makeup
    • Hair
    • Awards
    • Diet & Nutrition
    • Fitness
    • Wellness
  • Style
  • Great Women
    • Career
    • Great Women of Our Time
    • Real Life
  • Entertainment
  • EVENTS/WIN
  • #SchoolForLife
  • Hair Awards
  • Great Escape
  • Explore Singapore
  • Also available at:
Privacy Menu
SPH Media

Copyright © 2023 SPH Media Limited. Co. Regn. No. 202120748H. All rights reserved.

  • Food
  • Family
  • Beauty & Health
  • Style
  • Great Women
  • Events/Win

Beauty & Health

This Singapore-Based Brand Creates Scents Rooted In South Asian Memories

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
Home Ideas

This Singapore-Based Brand Creates Scents Rooted In South Asian Memories

Scents created to honour South Asian memories

by Keng Yang Shuen  /   November 29, 2021

Carrom is a board game that’s believed to have originated in India sometime in the 18th century. A “strike and pocket” table game, it holds some resemblance to billiards and is extremely popular across South Asia. But did you know that Carrom is also a name of a new Singapore-based lifestyle label?

It offers candles and home scented products, and recently caught our eye with its stylish visuals and dedicated homage to the South Asian roots of those who are behind the Carrom.

READ NEXT

8 Lavender Scented Top-To-Toe Haircare and Skincare Products To Stay Calm & Relaxed

Matching His And Her Fragrances For The Power Pairing Couple

Local Business Uses TikTok To Show How Beach Trash Can Be Turned Into Treasure

Speaking of the founders, four people are behind the label – Aditi, Manasa, Lathika and Adithya (the press-shy founders declined to share their last names and profile pictures), who are all in their late 20s.

The team has diverse roots: though each member had spent years away from their homeland in Singapore, Thailand, and Africa, a common thread is that their extended families all hail from various Indian states, namely Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

https://www.womensweekly.com.sg/gallery/style/home-ideas/carrom-singapore-based-scents-south-asian-memories/
This Singapore-Based Brand Creates Scents Rooted In South Asian Memories
custom

They launched the label in July, out of a longing for family. In an all-too-familiar scenario brought about by the pandemic, it’d been over a year since any of them had been able to visit their families in India.

“We found ourselves thinking more and more about the people, places, and experiences we missed,” says Aditi. “Fragrances have a really special way of bringing those memories back, and we decided to try recreating some of the familiar scents of our homes.”

Out of all the five senses, it’s been established that the sense of smell has the most primal and immediate association with memories.

And so, to re-create a sense of home away from home, the Carrom team delved into creating their first product – hand-poured soy wax candles. They debuted with five scents which are named Alamari, Beeda, Lalbagh, Malgova and Thillana.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by carrom (@by.carrom)

by.carrom
image

Candles and assorted scent products have been exploding over the last couple of years and are projected to continue upwards, with more and more luxury houses getting into the game. Cue recent notables include Aesop, Celine, Loro Piana, Byredo (with Ikea), Loewe and more.

It’s not hard to fathom why – the pandemic has only enforced focus on improving one’s home as it becomes the be-all and end-all for many people.

Carrom
custom

What sets Carrom’s versions apart is the firm affirmation to the founders’ South Asian roots. While the scent of each candle varies significantly – Alamari for instance, leans towards the woody with its concoction of sandalwood and oud, while Lalbagh is a lush blend of rose, lotus, jasmine, marigold, and mogra – they’re all intended to capture in olfactory form distinctive memories from the team’s childhoods.

Despite having no official training in fragrances (the team come from backgrounds in law, financial services, consulting and advertising), their works (the result of months of trial and error) have been warmly received, selling out more than half their stock only five days into the initial launch.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by carrom (@by.carrom)

by.carrom
custom

Their tradition- and memory-fueled M.O. is further boosted by the team’s artful and intentional approach. Late last month, Carrom expanded its repertoire to include incense in collaboration with Boond Fragrances, a family-run business based in Kannauj, India that specialises in organic attar fragrances.

Grounding these incense sticks are abstract holders that lent a stylishly contemporary touch to a very traditional apparatus. Resembling pools of molten mercury, the holders were custom-designed for Carrom by the Copenhagen-Singapore design studio Christian+Jade.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by carrom (@by.carrom)

by.carrom
custom

“Very early on, we decided whatever our brand put its name on – whether on our products themselves, or on social media – should be grounded in our brand values: refined, intentional, and rooted in history. This meant that our visual language and aesthetic had to be thoroughly considered, inspired by tradition, and always complementary with our scents,” says Aditi.

“For instance, when introducing each of our scented candles we used images and copy explaining the origins of the names we’d chosen, as well as the source of our inspiration (ranging from classical art and history to architecture and music). We’ve been really touched that it’s all been received so well!”

Below, the team walks us through their creative process.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by carrom (@by.carrom)

by.carrom
How does the team translate its nostalgia for your cultural roots into the products?
image

“Shared experience and memories are a big part of our ideation process. All of our candle fragrances have come from us discussing the most distinctive scents that have featured in our childhood. There were obviously a few favourites – the freshness of mango season, the comfort of our grandparents’ linen cabinets, the thrill of adults chewing on beeda around us, the ever-present role traditional Indian music and dance played in our lives – and we’ve tried to translate these vignettes into our candles.

Surprisingly, following the feeling made it much easier to identify the right ingredients that would then make up the blend of scents we eventually chose for each candle. What has really highlighted the sense of nostalgia too is when customers smell our candles and feel transported to their own childhoods or memories – it’s made us feel connected to them in a way that is authentic and personal to each of us, uniting us in a sense of community.”

Carrom
Can you tell us more about the formulation process?
image

“The candles are fully produced by our team of four here in Singapore. We began with conceptualising the scents we wanted to celebrate – it was important to us that we start with the concept/mood/feeling we wanted to capture, rather than any specific ingredient or scents.

We did some research to see how best to combine fragrances in a way that would ensure a holistic blend with identifiable components, and then began experimenting with small test batches. It took us several attempts of trial and error – from testing various materials for the wicks, choosing a wax most suitable to carry the scent in the strength we wanted, and even doing the research to make sure our ‘recipe’ and processes were accurate – we wanted to make sure our formulation was just right to capture the feelings we were trying to recreate.”

Carrom
How would you describe Carrom’s scents?
image

“We like to characterise our scents as nuanced and complex, without being overpowering. The fragrances featured in our candles and our incense are intentionally designed to be complementary: while our candles each use a signature blend of up to seven scents, our incense is designed to highlight single-note scents indigenous to India and central to our culture.

We’re not restricting ourselves to any particular olfactory direction – there’s a wide variety reflected in our products thus far (we’ve got floral, sweet, herbaceous, and woody scents in both our candle and incense ranges), so there’s something for everyone.”

Carrom
How has the response been so far?
image

“We’ve received some really moving comments from other members of the diaspora who have related to the scents on a personal level – one comment from someone who purchased a Thillana candle was that it brought her back to her days as a kuchipudi dancer in Chennai; and someone else who purchased an Alamari candle shared his memories of his grandmother unpacking treasured items in her sandalwood cupboard, chief amongst which was a photo of her late husband. It really speaks to the almost universal diaspora experience that we’ve had people react so personally to scents that we’ve created; and it’s been so meaningful to share in that.

What’s been equally validating, though, is seeing other people unfamiliar with the culture share their appreciation for the scents and the stories. All four of us have grown up in communities made up of diverse backgrounds, and it’s been wonderful to be able to share something of our culture and have it received so warmly and openly.”

Text: Keng Yang Shuen/Female

Read Next

8 Local Brands Offering Unique And Aromatic Blends

9 Best Local Jewellery Brands To Shop For Unique & Modern Pieces

Where To Buy Healing Crystals Online In Singapore

Carrom
  • TAGS:
  • candle
  • fragrance
  • scented candles
  • singapore
  • south asia
SHARE THIS ON

What’s Hot

Home Ideas

25 Lucky Plants And Flowers To Buy For C...

Home Ideas

14 Kid-Friendly DIY Decorations To Make ...

Home Ideas

Ah-Beng Actor Mark Lee's Home Is A Treas...

Home Ideas

An Inside Look At New Mum Annette Lee's ...

Home Ideas

3 HDB Owners Share Why They Chose An Old...

Home Ideas

Get Home Inspo From These Singapore Mumf...

Home Ideas

A $130K Renovated HDB Resale Flat Makes ...

Home Ideas

10 Tips To Design A Child's Bedroom That...

Home Ideas

8 Practical Tips To Get Rid Of Lizards I...

Home Ideas

This Margaret Drive BTO Has Amazing JB A...

Home Ideas

Gorgeous 5 Room Flats You Can Buy Withou...

Home Ideas

5 Homeowners Share Their Worst Renovatio...

Don’t Miss These
  • Beauty & Health SWW x Chloé: An Afternoon Of Layering And Setting Intenti...
Editor’s Picks
  • Home Ideas 25 Lucky Plants And Flowers To Buy For Chinese New Year
  • Home Ideas 14 Kid-Friendly DIY Decorations To Make For CNY
  • Style Welcome Into The Homes Of Four Mediacorp Artistes
  • Home Ideas Ah-Beng Actor Mark Lee's Home Is A Treasure Trove Of Art
  • Home Ideas An Inside Look At New Mum Annette Lee's $100K Industrial-Look HDB Flat
  • Home Ideas 3 HDB Owners Share Why They Chose An Old Flat
Don't Miss Out Ever Again!
Tips & tricks to stay sane + win invites to our events!

By signing up, you indicate that you have read and agreed with our Privacy Statement
Footer Menu
  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Conditions of Access
  • PDPA
  • Privacy Policy
?>">
SPH Magazine

Copyright © 2023 SPH Media Limited. Co. Regn. No. 202120748H. All rights reserved.