Tea and Olfaction: Deconstructing Taiwanese Oolong

Most tea tastings end when the cup's empty. This one keeps going until you've built a fragrance out of what you tasted. On Saturday, October 24, the Institute for Art and Olfaction runs Tea and Olfaction: Deconstructing Taiwanese Oolong, an in-person class from 1 PM to 3:30 PM at its space on Chung King Road in Chinatown. If you're looking for things to do in Los Angeles that don't involve a bar tab or a screen, a smell lab is a good change of pace.

The tasting half

Tea specialist Anna Mariani leads the first part. You'll taste two Taiwanese oolongs side by side, picked because they're very different from each other, and work through exercises built to pull individual aroma notes out of each one. The idea is that flavor is mostly smell. The organizers put it at up to 80 to 90 percent of what you experience as taste, which is why a complex tea makes such a good starting point for a perfume.

You'll also learn to describe what you're picking up in a perfumer's vocabulary. Mariani takes each tea from the dry leaf to the brewed cup and then to the scent that hangs around in the empty cup after you've finished. The oolongs come from Tap Twice Tea.

The perfume half

In the second half, IAO instructor Julianne Lee takes over. The group starts with a baseline tea accord, a simple formula that shows how tea gets built as a note in fragrance. Then you change it. Lee walks the class through adding specific aroma molecules to push that base toward the profile of each oolong you tasted earlier. So the first hour is about noticing, and the rest is about using what you noticed.

About the IAO

The Institute for Art and Olfaction is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in Los Angeles. Its stated goal is creative experimentation with scent, and giving people outside the perfume industry a way in. Eventbrite files this class under food and drink. It fits there, though it's just as much an art class, which is why it's on our arts calendar.

Tickets and getting there

Tickets are $145.90 through Eventbrite. Refunds are available up to seven days before the class, so October 17 is your last day to back out. The class runs two and a half hours, all in person.

The address is 932 Chung King Rd, Los Angeles, CA 90012. Chung King Road is a short Chinatown street known for its small galleries. The Metro A Line's Chinatown station is within walking distance, which is easier than circling for street parking on a Saturday afternoon. If you drive, plan on a paid lot.

For more Things Happening In Los Angeles this fall, browse Downtown LA events or the full arts and culture calendar. One tip: bring a small notebook. The whole first half is about turning smells into words, and you'll want those notes once the formula work starts.