Index pop-up
“I was sitting with my grandma one morning and we were sorting through her old beauty products from her days as an Avon representative,” I’m tentatively telling a machine through a DJI Mini Mic. With beakers filled with coloured liquids and wires spilling everywhere, it looks like something out of a mad scientist’s laboratory.
“There were lots of lipsticks, powdery beauty products and the living room was warm – I could smell porridge, fruit and nuts (her favourite breakfast), and I remember the remnants of her perfumes,” I go on. “She’s always been a fan of Chanel N°5,” I trail off. Then comes the robotic voice of Index. “When you picture her hands moving through those powders and lipsticks, what did she do or say that you still carry with you?” Slightly startled by the intensity of the question, I reply that she didn’t say anything specific, but her ability to make something mundane feel fun has always stayed with me. Detecting my emotions, the machine says, “I’m going to keep it gentle and stay with that feeling of safety, while I shape a question.”
After a pause, it asks me to recall what else my grandma and I did that day, and then to describe a sound from the memory I wish I could hear again. “To be honest, it’s the quiet hum of the birds outside her house and her laugh – it’s soft and endearing.” That seems to be enough for Index. Moments later, I’m given a summary of my custom fragrance as I watch it trickle into a 6ml glass bottle. Elizabeth, named after my grandmother, is made up of milky black tea, cedar, soft musk, “warm skin”, amber, yuzu, cream soda, peaches and jasmine flowers.
Founded in 2025, Index is a fragrance house that’s using conversation, robotics and AI to distil memories into vials of perfume. “We’re translating something abstract into a physical product that you can wear,” co-founder Tigris Li puts it. It works like this: the machine asks, “If you could relive one memory, what would it be?” Clients are then guided to tell their stories and “uncover the hidden details within each memory (like people, places and sounds),” Li explains. Overall, the chat lasts about three to five minutes, during which the machine carries out two stages of analysis. “First, it identifies the narrative structure of what you’re sharing and ratios the emotions it detects,” she says. Next, it maps out the physical elements of the story. “Say, you’re talking about being near the seaside – one of our base fragrances has sea breeze and driftwood in it, so it’ll pull that into the final fragrance formula and then it dispenses it in real time, so you can watch the perfume funnel down.”
The nine fragrance bases – formulated by Isabella Smith, Index’s nose and the brand’s other co-founder – are visible through the machine’s vein-like tubes, collected at the bottom in chunky conical flasks. “Behind the conversation, the AI agent has been given a detailed profile of every base, its scent notes, the ‘scene’ it belongs to and the emotions it carries,” Li explains. The 28-year-old duo have also given the robot a set of rules to follow. It’ll never match a fragrance with an emotion based on a single word alone (so mentioning rain won’t automatically equate to sadness), and it will always select between one and three bases that best fit your story. “We’re also very careful with what you share,” Li adds. “Your [full] conversations are never saved,” although Index retains your fragrance formula and a summary of the memory so you can revisit it later.
Index launched its first pop-up last month on London’s Columbia Road and was taken aback by the response. “There were a lot of really emotional moments,” Smith shares. “We had people who were curious walk in from the street and end up in tears because of the installation – it was really moving to see.” One fragrance was called “his stupid fucking cap” – inspired by a meet-cute between two people who had been texting and finally made plans to see each other in person. At the end of the night, one person’s hat flew out of the window, so they stopped the car to retrieve it. Then, in a moment of passion, one pulled the other out of the car and kissed them.
Many of these stories can be found on Index’s web archive, which Smith calls a home for people’s memories. Interestingly, the index experience isn’t limited to real memories alone. “Someone came in and spoke about a dream they had,” Li says. The client was surprised by how specific the machine’s probes were. In a way, the fragrance became a journal entry; a physical piece of something otherwise abstract and intangible.
Index first began with Li’s Emotional Alchemy art installation, commissioned by Converse during London Fashion Week AW24. “I have synesthesia, a neurological trait that causes involuntary sensory experiences, so I started by questioning what it would be like to taste your memories,” Li says of the project’s beginnings. “When I see certain colours, I can taste them – the scariest colour for me is a deep purple – I taste blood and metal.” After seeing a bright purple dress, she says she once almost fainted. “Reliving memories through scent and [human-like] prompts became the more practical option.” Further commissions from Google, YouTube and Replit eventually pushed Li to turn the installation into a portable robot.
While buzzy, Index exists at a time when scepticism about AI-based products and their role in society is only growing. I ask the duo whether they’re subverting the role of an in-house perfumer. After all, instead of starting with a scent and imagining how it’ll be used to make memories, they’re beginning with the memory itself. “Index’s perfumes are impactful because they’re (hopefully) already integrated with a current memory,” Smith says. “In some ways, it makes the fragrance more personal.” She also suggests that the brand is “inherently human”, despite the robotic element. “I’ve formulated every perfume base myself and Tigris has soldered the machine; the entire project is handmade,” she says. “We’re certainly not aiming to replace a perfumer. I am a perfumer.” Instead, they want to create another way of interacting with scent. Li also points out that while many of our gadgets are permanently with us – our phones and laptops, for example – you can choose to take home an Index fragrance and leave its digital archive behind. For all the AI and robotics behind it, what I’m left with is something surprisingly analogue: a tiny bottle that smells, somehow, like my grandma.
Index’s second pop-up store is open 14-25th October 2026 at 30 Cheshire Street, E2 6EH.