Patent Application
20240140648
This invention relates to diffusing devices, and more particularly relates to an implement adapted to house an olfactory mass or substance for keepsake purposes.
Romantic partners often wish to memorialize their relationship with keepsakes from one another. These keepsakes may include photographs, rings, clothing, or organic materials such as lockets of hair and even vials of blood. These items have primarily memorial and/or sensory function, eliciting an emotional response from the individuals keeping, observing and touching them.
Although items such as photographs are designed to appeal to the visual senses, there exists a need in the art for a device which may house and diffuse a keepsake appealing to olfactory senses, such as perfume, cologne, or organic materials.
Such a device must necessarily have opening from which smells can be diffused, but must also securely house and store such olfactory keepsakes without allowing it to easily fall from the openings. Traditional devices do not provide a means for diffusing and housing an olfactory keepsake. These difficulties inherent in in the art tend to make the useful a device which would solve these inherent difficulties. An olfactory implement, therefore, which solves these difficulties is desirable.
From the foregoing discussion, it should be apparent that a need exists for an olfactory implement. Accordingly, the present invention has been developed to provide a olfactory implement comprising: an olfactory implement, the implement comprising: a bulbous polymeric body having an orifice on an outer surface and defining a hollow interior cavity with an open end; a detachable polymeric insert capable of being inserted through the orifice into the hollow interior cavity, the insert comprising: a planar base having a planar top surface; a hollow olfactory recess defined by the base circumscribed by an ovoid ring; a sidewall jutting superiorly from the planar top surface, the sidewall circumscribing a lower portion of the ovoid ring; a peripheral sidewall jutting superiorly from the planar top surface, the peripheral sidewall circumscribing an outer edge of the insert.
The insert may further comprise an arcuate top surface. In various embodiments, the sidewall is one of v-shaped and u-shaped. The olfactory recess may be ovoid. The bulbous polymeric body may be heart-shaped. The insert may be shield-shaped.
Reference throughout this specification to features, advantages, or similar language does not imply that all of the features and advantages that may be realized with the present invention should be or are in any single embodiment of the invention. Rather, language referring to the features and advantages is understood to mean that a specific feature, advantage, or characteristic described in connection with an embodiment is included in at least one embodiment of the present invention. Thus, discussion of the features and advantages, and similar language, throughout this specification may, but do not necessarily, refer to the same embodiment.
Furthermore, the described features, advantages, and characteristics of the invention may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments. One skilled in the relevant art will recognize that the invention may be practiced without one or more of the specific features or advantages of a particular embodiment. In other instances, additional features and advantages may be recognized in certain embodiments that may not be present in all embodiments of the invention.
These features and advantages of the present invention will become more fully apparent from the following description and appended claims, or may be learned by the practice of the invention as set forth hereinafter.
In order that the advantages of the invention will be readily understood, a more particular description of the invention briefly described above will be rendered by reference to specific embodiments that are illustrated in the appended drawings. Understanding that these drawings depict only typical embodiments of the invention and are not therefore to be considered to be limiting of its scope, the invention will be described and explained with additional specificity and detail through the use of the accompanying drawings, in which:
Reference throughout this specification to “one embodiment,” “an embodiment,” or similar language means that a particular feature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment of the present invention. Thus, appearances of the phrases “in one embodiment,” “in an embodiment,” and similar language throughout this specification may, but do not necessarily, all refer to the same embodiment.
Furthermore, the described features, structures, or characteristics of the invention may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments. In the following description, numerous specific details are provided, such as examples of programming, software modules, user selections, network transactions, database queries, database structures, hardware modules, hardware circuits, hardware chips, etc., to provide a thorough understanding of embodiments of the invention. One skilled in the relevant art will recognize, however, that the invention may be practiced without one or more of the specific details, or with other methods, components, materials, and so forth. In other instances, well-known structures, materials, or operations are not shown or described in detail to avoid obscuring aspects of the invention.
In various embodiments, the implement 100 comprises an outer polymeric housing 102 as shown. This housing 102 defines a hollow interior cavity 302 into which an insert 104 in inserted. The hollow interior cavity 302 is larger in diameter than the orifice 304 through which the insert 104 is inserted.
Because the insert 104 is also formed from a flexibly, polymeric material, the insert 104 compresses and folds facilitating pushed entry through the orifice 304 into place within the cavity 302.
In various embodiments, the housing 102 is heart-shaped as shown, ovoid, cubic, bulbous or irregularly shaped. In various embodiments, a teardrop-shaped ring 310 circumscribes the orifice 302, said ring 310 comprising a recessed surface from that which would otherwise contour the heart-shaped housing 102.
The olfactory implement 100, 300 comprises the housing 102 and an insert 104. The insert 104, in the shown embodiment, is fashioned in the shape of a shield having an arcuate top edge 212 which bends, or arches, downwardly. The insert 104 comprises a planar top surface 202 which defines a hollow olfactory recess 204 into which an olfactory substance in inserted, such as cologne, perfume, or body fluids or tissue. This hollow olfactory recess 204 is circumscribed by an ovoid ring 206.
Additionally, the insert 104 comprises a sidewall 208 which protuberates from the planar surface of a base 202. The sidewall 208 juts superiorly to the planar surface 202 forming in alternative embodiments a v shape, a u shape, a chevron shape, or a semicircle. The sidewall 208 partially circumscribes a lower portion of the ovoid ring 206, and is capable of preventing the olfactory substance from falling into lower recesses of the implement 100, 300.
Additionally, the insert 104 is circumscribed by an interrupted peripheral sidewall 210 which also protuberates from the planar surface of the base 202. The peripheral sidewall 210 may fully or partially circumscribe the exterior edges of the planar surface of the base 202.
In various embodiments, the insert 104 comprises a planar reverse surface, or planar obverse surface. The insert 104 may be formed from a flexible polymeric material capable and operable to deform when pressed through the orifice 302.
The present invention may be embodied in other specific forms without departing from its spirit or essential characteristics. The described embodiments are to be considered in all respects only as illustrative and not restrictive. The scope of the invention is, therefore, indicated by the appended claims rather than by the foregoing description. All changes which come within the meaning and range of equivalency of the claims are to be embraced within their scope.
