Zibaldone VI

In some places, such as Haymarket, smell is an important tool for organizing space. Haymarket is such a dense space of a seemingly random placement of tents that it would be easy to describe the place as unorganized - quite different from a modern grocery store where everything is placed on a specific shelf in a specific aisle and labeled. In Haymarket, smell can be used instead of signs or labels as a tool for orientation or as a way finding device. For example, the differences in smell between the areas where fruit and fish are sold are fairly significant. If someone was there shopping for strawberries, they would probably know they were in the wrong place if all they could smell was iced cod and salmon. In a place like Haymarket, smell can define space in the same way elements like walls, topography and light can.