When it’s dark and chilly in her hometown, Geneva, the fragrance entrepreneur Clara Molloy pours herself a cup of fresh hot chocolate, curls up with a book and applies a tonka-bean-laced fragrance. “It makes me feel warm,” she says of the wintry ritual. As the creative director and co-founder of a trio of stylish perfume brands — Memo Paris, Floraïku and Hermetica — Molloy finds herself gravitating toward cozy elixirs during the frigid months, fragrances that conjure the feeling of coming in from the cold, warming up by the fire and inhaling something delicious.

A handful of other perfumes, both new and old, bottle such forms of atmospheric escape. For food-infused scents, piping in the right background ingredients rounds out the formulas — so nothing feels too heavy-handed or literal: Ojai Wild’s Chamomile Flowers ($110) perks up the mellow plant with grapefruit and cognac.

By Kari Molvar, Dec. 19, 2018.