Drinks company boss sips and sees

Dec 24 2009 by Gil Lightfoot, Chester Chronicle

Rosie Sedgwick’s famous fruit liqueurs are so tasty she actually paints them!

Or to be more accurate the MD and founder of Chester-based drinks company, My Gineration, paints the shapes and colours that flash before her mind’s eye when she tastes them.

For Rosie, of Mollington Village, has a rare condition known as synaesthesia in which at least two of the five senses – normally experienced separately – are automatically joined together.

Whenever she tastes anything the flavours picked up by her taste buds are accompanied by an incredible and unique three-dimensional ‘lights show’ featuring a range of colourful mental shapes and images.

“It means that I don’t simply taste the flavours, I actually see them,” explained Rosie, who believes her unusual condition is part of the reason for her success as a fruit liqueur maker. “In fact, some of the images are quite dramatic and memorable.

“And if I concentrate, the shapes and the images can change and become even stronger and more representative of the taste I have experienced,” added Rosie who has now posted a range of examples of the images she sees on her company website.

Synaesthesia was thought to be relatively rare but is now believed the condition could affect as many as one in 23 people with some reporting the ability to taste sounds, hear colours and find personalities in numbers and letters and there is significant evidence that the condition runs in families.

“I’ve had the condition all my life and I didn’t know I was experiencing anything different until I spoke to family and friends,” said Rosie, who believes her eldest daughter, Abigail, also shows signs of the condition through an ability to see patterns in shapes and numbers.

“My sensitivity to taste has been extremely useful in setting up my fruit liqueur-making enterprise because this business is all about taste. We like to say My Gineration has the taste that makes you go “Oooh” and perhaps we’ve achieved these extraordinary tastes partly through my gift.

“People do tell me they appreciate my passion for taste, so I decided to post my taste pictures on our website so customers could get a flavour of the sensations I experience when tasting.”

Rosie’s painting of the taste of blackcurrant features a purple cloud-like shape which she describes as: “Tangy and squishy, bursting with flavour.”

Her cranberry is a shape made up of a cloud of stars which she describes as: “A long tingly tang of a drink with spicy notes which sizzle on the tongue.”

Rosie’s passionfruit is represented by a yellow UFO shape whose surface is covered with red teeth. She describes it as: “A long, exotic tingle – a tropical holiday in a glass.”

And her redcurrant is seen as an elongated pink shape with an explosion of tears at one end. Rosie’s describes it as: “An opening zing and a long followthrough which finishes with a zip.”

Click onto www.mygineration.co.uk to see the images that tickle Rosie’s taste buds.