I Just Discovered How to Make My Home Smell Like Williams Sonoma (It’s So Easy!)

There’s nothing worse than walking into my own home and getting a whiff of stale air, pet odors, or strong cooking smells from yesterday’s dinner. My home should be an oasis — but sometimes, obviously, it smells like just everyday life. That’s why I was so excited when I found a new way to make my home smell fresh (almost) all the time — no candles needed.

In fact, I discovered that there’s a whole side of the internet dedicated to making their homes specifically smell like a Williams Sonoma store — which one blogger perfectly described it as “heavenly, but not in a cloying [or] overpowering way.” 

To re-create the company’s signature olfactory mix of fresh lemon, rosemary, and vanilla, a journalist revealed that she’d cracked the code just in time for spring with a Williams Sonoma simmer pot recipe that’ll “make your house smell like you just cleaned it — even if you haven’t.”

Lora McLaughlin Peterson, a reporter, shared her dupe recipe in an Instagram Reel titled “How to make your home smell like Williams Sonoma on a Walmart budget.”

“Have you ever noticed how INCREDIBLE Williams Sonoma smells? That’s because they constantly have a simmer pot going!” she captioned the short clip. “While they tweak the recipe depending on the season, THIS RECIPE is their SIGNATURE SMELL that’s on the stove more than any other! And you won’t believe what the SURPRISE INGREDIENT is.”

(The secret ingredient is 1 teaspoon of black peppercorns, Peterson revealed in a blog post.) She paired it with 8 cups of water, one lemon that was cut into slices, three sprigs of fresh rosemary, and anywhere from 1 teaspoon to 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract depending on how strong you want that note to be.

Several followers took to the comments section to applaud the “winner” recipe while sharing their additional tips to perfect the simmer pot recipe. One person wrote that they’d found a budget-friendly way to make sure the scent wafted through their entire home instead of just the kitchen area.

“My little secret … I went to thrift stores and bought tiny Crock-Pots (warming pots), and they are placed behind large plants and furniture,” they wrote. “They come on with a timer. (Each pot was like $1-$5). Making this house smell hack [was] so inexpensive, and no candles, which can not only be a fire hazard but [also] emit smoke in the air.”

You can also do like Reddit user @BobsBurgersStanAccount and pair your new concoction with some woody incense to recreate that woodsy olfactory note that’s missing from the simmer pot recipe. 

As Peterson noted, Williams Sonoma also has different simmer pot recipes for different seasons, so you can try this classic one or give your home a spring twist with grapefruit and fresh thyme.