No oud that is not oud
Where a perfume contains real distilled agarwood, the record says so. Where an accord is built from other materials, the record says that too. The word is worth too much to spend loosely.
The maker
One man,
one still.
Rafi Ahmed Baig
No team, no factory, no production line. A table, a copper still, a cabinet of oils and a great deal of waiting.
Wood is bought in parcels of a few kilos. A splinter is heated on a pin and smelled before anything is paid for, because resin content cannot be read from a photograph. It is ground, soaked for one to two weeks, and run slowly — slow fire on ordinary wood beats a rushed run of good wood almost every time.
Then it waits. Months, sometimes years, because fresh oil is loud and nobody should be sold a loud oil. When it is finally right, the bottles are filled by pipette, the labels lettered with a dip pen, and the boxes folded and tied by hand.
Which is why the handwriting on your bottle is his, and why there are only ever twenty or thirty of anything.
What this house will and will not do
Four promises
Nothing is sold in the month it was made
Resting is not a marketing line. It is the difference between a sharp oil and a round one, and it is why the record carries two dates.
Cultivated wood only
Agarwood is bought from cultivated plantations and traceable parcels. Wild protected trees are not worth a bottle of perfume.
Finished means finished
When a batch runs out it is not quietly reformulated to keep the name alive. A new batch is labelled as a new batch, and if it smells different you will be told before you buy it.