Printed from smellbook.com/smells/new-apartment. This printout keeps the entry for New Apartment itself: its description, reference card, Connections, questions, evidence, related smells, record details, states, names and citation. It leaves out your own notes, the map, the lists of paths, routes, stories and fragrance directions, and the lists headed “Also linked to” (other entries that share its place or material) and “Linked from”; they are on the page online. The entries this one links to are still printed under Connections and Related smells.
Categories and types group entries for browsing; they are editorial, not evidence. How smells are grouped.
A recently finished domestic interior combining paint, new materials, clean surfaces, cardboard and low personal history.
Setting: new · material · interior. An editorial word for the kind of place or occasion the smell belongs to, not a smell word.
A newly finished apartment smells clean and blank, led by fresh paint and the sharp, slightly sweet smell of new materials such as flooring, sealant and fittings. EDITORIAL
This entry links to
Other entries that link to this one
Links SmellBook records for this entry: where you meet it and related smells. EDITORIAL links are chosen by SmellBook editors. Nothing here is a ranking.
QUESTIONS ABOUT NEW APARTMENT
A newly finished apartment smells clean and blank, led by fresh paint and the sharp, slightly sweet smell of new materials such as flooring, sealant and fittings. Cardboard from moving boxes adds a dry, papery note. The smell is noticeably impersonal, with no cooking or lived-in warmth, like a room that is still waiting for the first meal, the first guests and the first ordinary day.
In SmellBook’s words: clean.
It is met on move-in day, during viewings of new rentals and freshly renovated rooms, and while unpacking boxes in a home that has not yet taken on the smells of everyday life.
Typical settings: move-in day, new rental, recently finished room.
SmellBook links it to one place page: see it in Connections.
One VERIFIED scientific claim from one published source is recorded for this entry: Indoor air in new apartments over two years. This claim says only what its source supports, in the scope shown with it.
The scientific study behind this evidence is chemistry or emission work, not a study of how the smell is perceived.
New Apartment is descriptive only and not a building-material or air-safety assessment.
Words that are easy to mix up: Is fresh the same as clean?
No historical source or heritage record is linked to this entry yet.
Answers marked EDITORIAL are written by SmellBook editors to describe the experience and add no scientific fact. Answers marked VERIFIED point to claims on published sources, checked against each source's own summary where one was available (each claim's page says how); what each claim supports is in its own text and scope.
Scientific evidence · 1 claim
Indoor air in new apartments over two years
In new apartments monitored every month for 24 months, total volatile organic compounds and most individual compounds tended to decrease; floor and wall coverings were the most influential indoor source, followed by household cleaning products, wood panelling and furniture, paints and moth repellents.
Newly built apartments in one study; it measures air composition, not odour.
How this was found: Emissions or air measured. What a material, product or place releases into the air was measured, usually without assessing odour. Source: primary study; material-emission work.
Seung-Ho Shin & Wan-Kuen Jo
Environmental Science and Pollution Research
DOI 10.1007/s11356-012-1296-zLinks chosen by SmellBook editors, not a ranking.
Associations can vary strongly by person, place and culture.
PATHS FROM HERE
Each step is a relationship SmellBook editors recorded in the knowledge graph, named as it is published there. Paths are not ranked or personalised, and they do not mean the smells smell alike.
MY SMELLBOOK · LOCAL ONLY
These controls save only in this browser. Nothing here is uploaded to a SmellBook account or server.
Personal tags stay in this browser and do not change the entry's own smell words.
MAP THIS SMELL
Follow the related smells our editors recorded, or use Smell Between to compare this smell with any other, field by field.
WHERE THIS SMELL APPEARS
These links were chosen by editors to help you explore; they are not scores or rankings.
FOR RESEARCHERS AND EDITORS
Identity, revision history, corrections and how to cite New Apartment.
CULTURAL: This entry's associations depend on context, language, memory or culture; its description and smell words are editorial. It says nothing about research or historical evidence; evidence for this entry is shown separately: VERIFIED.
A state says how an entry is met, such as wet, aged or roasted. It does not create a new smell, and it adds no scientific fact by itself: states marked EDITORIAL come from the entry's own records, and only those marked VERIFIED are reported by a VERIFIED claim.
How this entry is identified and named, for citing it or matching it with other records.
SmellBook SB-0174 — New Apartmentsmellbook:smell:new-apartmenthttps://smellbook.com/smells/new-apartmentSmellBook. (2026). New Apartment (revision 4, 2026-10-06). SmellBook Public Atlas. smellbook:smell:new-apartment. https://smellbook.com/smells/new-apartment@misc{smellbook_new_apartment_r4,
author = {{SmellBook}},
title = {New Apartment},
year = {2026},
note = {SmellBook Public Atlas, revision 4, 2026-10-06, smellbook:smell:new-apartment},
url = {https://smellbook.com/smells/new-apartment}
}TY - ENCYC ID - smellbook-new-apartment-r4 TI - New Apartment AU - SmellBook T2 - SmellBook Public Atlas PY - 2026 DA - 2026/10/06 ET - revision 4 UR - https://smellbook.com/smells/new-apartment N1 - SB-0174; smellbook:smell:new-apartment; resolver https://smellbook.com/id/smell/new-apartment ER -
The citation names revision 4 of 2026-10-06, so a reader can tell exactly which version was cited. Citing records what was read; it does not grant a licence.
New Apartment is descriptive only and not a building-material or air-safety assessment.
Other entries whose editors linked to New Apartment:
Editorial description expanded to answer what it smells like and where you meet it; independently reviewed.
Created 2026-09-22 · Updated 2026-10-06Dataset history In the SmellBook dataset since the first of three dataset releases of 2026-09-30; changed in the first of two dataset releases of 2026-10-05 (descriptors).
No correction notices published for this entry. Corrections policyEVIDENCE MATTERS
SmellBook separates cultural association, community perception, verified evidence, prediction and experimental relationships rather than presenting them as the same thing. Read the evidence guide ↗ See the evidence coverage report ↗