How to keep your home smelling sweet and boost indoor air quality 

Filters in the kitchen extractor ensure the unit is not distributing a honk back around the room. File picture

Most of our homes have a special aroma, it's true. It’s something we recognise instantly, but is it benign or beastly? You might be suffering from olfactory fatigue or nose-blindness. Freshening the air is not deodorising with scented candles and deploying half a bottle of Febreze to mask a musty, damp issue. Layering on natural and artificial scent should only follow a proper purge, ensuring the air you breathe is clean and healthy, without a hefty moisture, chemical or biological burden. This depends primarily on consistent, good housekeeping, promoting a controlled ingress of fresh air, and steadily expelling stale air. Most of us are not enjoying the silent, automated magic of whole-house mechanical ventilation (with heat recovery if you’re very lucky). Still, air exchanges from outdoors are at the heart of a healthy home with good indoor air quality (IAQ).

If you’re aware that your home has a scent, or a slight damp issue (you might find signs of condensation such as moisture running down the insides of windows) — don’t panic, but don’t just throw out a bowl of bicarbonates of soda and flame up an Irish designer candle. Designer scents for the home, tickling the limbic system (dried flowers and herbs, scented candles and sprays) are influencer fluff if they are masking humidity, biological pongs, and petrochemical toxins. Weird smells can affect a new or old home, and “notes” of lavender, chamomile and cedar will not address the baseline quality of your IAQ.