Cyrano Perfumes The Air Near You, Just You

Cyrano Perfumes The Air Near You, Just You

The connected air freshener sends short bursts of fragrant, if hard-to-place, scents into your personal space.

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Overall Rating:
8
10

Last updated: October 10, 2016

Pros: Scents stay close to you and personalized to create own melody of fragrance.

Cons: Price point is slightly high, and scents are not easy to recognize.

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We may all have different ideas of what smells good. Universally, though, we all like for our immediate area, whether at work, at home or in the car, to have a fresh aroma. Some folks burn candles, others spray air fresheners, and plenty douse themselves in perfume or cologne to ensure a favorable fragrance wherever they go.

All of those ideas work for most situations, but also have something in common. After a while, the pleasant scent goes unnoticed. Unlike sight or sound, the sense of smell can diminish over a period of time due to olfactory fatigue.

That's where Cyrano hopes to stands out, thanks to its inventive design, with a variety of aromas ready to keep your nose perked for hours.

The device, what Cyrano calls a "scent digital speaker," is about the size of a chunky scented candle you'd put on your mantle and costs $149.95. It comes packed in a leather-style pouch and a protective plastic container about the size of a standard container of coffee grinds. Along with the main gadget, there is a battery charger and a starter mood cartridge called an "oChip."

Armed with a review copy, I decided to see how Cyrano could, or would, adjust my mood with its melody of aromas. In order to get the scent party started, I had to download the iOS app. That process was quick and easy to follow. All I had to do was press the "on" button on my Cyrano and the app located the device immediately, giving me simple instructions to get going.

From there, I choose one of 12 different scents or "oNotes" to match my mood: a medley of awake, relax, or escape mixes that include vanilla, honeysuckle, lilac, lavender, pine, orange ginger, wingz (a scent I did not recognize…), peppermint, coconut, suntan (lotion, I presume), Venetian Bellini, and guava. There's also the option to create your own "melody." (The company claims the scents are safe, endless, and clean, but I have yet to locate on Cyrano's site what they are made from exactly.)

Each scent emerges from the device for 1:12 minutes—perhaps determined to be the ideal time to enjoy a scent before experiencing diminishing returns. Then there is a 47 second "breather" between scents, although the smell from the prior scent still lingered until the next one hit my nostrils.

I chose to start with the "awake" program, which launched with peppermint. While I have to say the aroma smelled good, it was unlike any peppermint scent I've inhaled before. I had the same sensation with each scent: they smelled fine, some better than others, but none exactly as I would have expected. Put it this way, I couldn't pick any of the scents out of a lineup if I were part of an olfactory crime case.

To better hone in on my sniffing skills, I decided to play one of the games on the app: Cyro Scent. Given four scent options for each question, the game guided me to press play where one of four aromas came piping out of the device. I answered two of four questions correctly, and they were lucky guesses. Normally, I am pretty sure my nose is in working order and have no issues with my sense of smell in other situations. Perhaps each scent should play for longer than the 1:12 in order to have time to fully enjoy and immerse in the aroma.

Cyrano also allows you to create a mood melody, and then send the combo to a friend through the app. The scents are paired with a video on the app so they travel through each scene: kind of like a scent-o-gram.

Living in a studio apartment, I found Cyrano worked well for me, as the scent doesn't travel far beyond a small space. The founders actually imagine the device working in a car for a commute, which I can see, along with potentially placing Cyrano on a nightstand for some scented sleep time.

As for the cost, though, $149.95 is definitely an investment. Each cartridge will need to be eventually replaced, and comes in at $19.95 a clip. Still, with designer candles priced at $40 and above, Cyrano may actually be a longer-lasting option. I'd like to see their scents get more specific—and true to their natural form—but can envision Cyrano taking off as a go-to fragrance device for those looking for some scented variety to their personal space.

Click here to buy Cyrano.

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