Burning Flesh The New Fragrance by the London Dungeon

The authentically repulsive aroma has been created to push senses to the limit in the attraction's newest feature, Bloody Mary: Killer Queen, which tells the story of Mary Tudor's 16th century killing spree and conjures up the sights, sounds and acrid smell of a public burning. Final public smell tests commenced at the attraction today to find out just what modern audiences' sensitive nostrils can actually tolerate before the new experience opens next week.

"We want to immerse our guests totally in this experience and smell is an extremely potent part of the story we are telling" says Nicola Ratcliffe, General Manager for The London Dungeon. "At public burnings the smell could linger in the air for days. We have used odours with great success before - from putrid puke to stale urine - but this is pushing new boundaries. We need to strike a balance between authenticity and what our guests' senses can physically bear."

Frank Knight, MD, of smell specialists Dale Air comments: "Our sense of smell is unbelievably powerful. In fact, it can be 75% more powerful than visual experiences thus allowing it to easily trigger emotions and capture our imagination. I have created some extreme and very strange smells all over the world, including dinosaurs, Egyptian mummies and sweaty feet but burning flesh is one of the most unusual and challenging. The aroma we've come up with has a similarity to barbe-qued bacon but with a far more extreme charred quality. In tests it has provoked some pretty strong reactions. It's definitely up there in the five smells people find most disgusting along with sweaty socks, extremely over ripe cheese, smelly fish, wet dog and flatulence."

The use of smell has fascinated the entertainment industry for a long time with examples of odour first being used back in the fifties when American film producer Mike Todd developed 'smell-a-vision' - releasing aromas into movie theatres. Since then all kinds of scents have been employed to enhance guest experiences - from pleasant floral bouquets in hotel lobbies to dragon's breath and otter poo at themed visitor attractions.

Enter the most gruesome of London Attractions set in the middle of historic Southwark, the London Dungeon invites you to discover the capital's secret past and relive the terrifying events that have gone down in history.