Katia Apalategui was inspired after seeing her mother cope with the loss of her husband by clinging to his pillow . Pictured posed by model . A grieving daughter has come up with an unusual way to keep the memory of loved ones alive - by bottling their scent . Seven years ago , Katia Apalategui 's mother coped with losing her husband by holding on to his pillowcase which his smell clung to . This inspired the 52-year-old French insurance saleswoman to think of a more permanent way to capture a person 's individual scent in a bid to help others in mourning . The strong link between smell and memory is the reason her product will provide 'olfactory comfort ' to customers , she says . 'We are going through funeral homes to offer families a small box containing a vial of the departed 's odour that we would have extracted from a piece of material provided by them , ' she said . But the 'made-to-measure ' perfumes will be rather costly and be priced at around 560 euros ( £400 ) . To help develop her idea , she teamed up with the Havre university in France , where researchers have developed a technique to reproduce the human smell . The university 's Geraldine Savary explained the process involved taking a person 's clothes and extracting the odour - a few hundred characteristic molecules - which is then made into a bottle of perfume in four days . She said : 'There was a perfect synergy between what she wanted to do and what our researchers are doing so we decided to get involved . 'There is a very strong link between memory and smell which is similar to that between the memories we have from looking at old photos , videos and other things . 'We take the person 's clothing and extract the odour , which represents about a hundred molecules , and we reconstruct it in the form of a perfume in four days . ' She came up with a more permanent way to capture a person 's individual scent in a bid to help others in mourning . File photo . Popular Science reports the classic process of perfume distillation is the most likely method , which involves passing steam through an object at high temperatures and capturing the result . And Ms Apalategui , although first inspired by death , is hoping her product could be also be ideal Valentine 's Day gifts or even for children away from their parents . Her son , who is in business school , is planning to launch by September this year .
Seven years ago , insurance saleswoman Katia Apalategui 's lost her father . Her grieving mother coped with loss by sniffing late husband 's pillowcase . Inspired her to come up with permanent way to capture person 's scent . But bottles of loved ones perfume will set customers back £400 a bottle .