Springtime

The port of Niras in Ashar used to be a place that stank. Horribly so. Merchandise, urchins, dead fish, rats, rubbish and sailors. During the summer months, one would not even dare open a window, and even in the dead of winter, the smell was stuck on the wooden platforms and the stone pavements. It was, however, also the place where most merchants and ship owners needed to have their businesses. The ones who flourished, needed to demonstrate that they were now upper class, eligible, perhaps, for a title, or a seat on the council. They could not afford to receive Lords in an environment that stank!
So it was the the device of springtime came to be. It was a ceramic small tower with three levels. On the lower level there would be a source of flame, either magical or natural. On the second, water would boil and right above it there was room for a small satchel. Accomplished herbalists made small pouches of dried herbs and flowers in combinations that excited or relaxes the senses - occasionally a little too much - and those satchels hung directly above the boiling water and the vapours coming out of it made the air smell like springtime.
Currently, the springtime is in every Asharian home, and is also a symbol of status; the materials, size and decorations of the springtime, the quality and rarity of the flowers and herbs used - some noble families have their own, personalised mixes - all are used to signify status. Even in the smallest and poorest households, people make their own springtimes out of clay, and their own satchels with weeds and herbs that grow wildly, or discarder flowers.
Furthermore, it is tradition that when a couple is joined in matrimony, the closest relatives and friends of the couple have the honour of gifting the springtime to the newly-weds.