Incense in The Wind: Aargee Imperial Raja Rani Lavender Fragrance (brand discontinued)

Third review - scroll down for earlier

I've had this incense for nearly 10 years, and it still smells fresh and strong. A proper job masala incense with essential oils, resins, herbs, and halmaddi mixed in a charcoal paste, and then hand rolled onto a hand cut pink dyed bamboo splint, and covered in a dried tree bark powder, partly to stop the moist sticks from gluing together as they dry, and partly to give the appearance of a masala incense.

The scent on the stick if from the fragrant oils - it's fresh, citric, jammy, and floral with sandalwood notes. There's elements of peach. We're looking for the lavender, and agree that it is there, but it's toilet water lavender, not the real stuff.

The burn is quite smoky. It's warm, woody, and attractive, but a bit blurred, so it has lost the top notes. An halmaddi scent, which I associate with lambs wool - your mileage may vary - is entangled in the burn scent pretty much all the way. There is a vague sense of lavender being burned in a late summer field a little distance away.

It's OK this incense, though - perhaps due to age, or perhaps due to burning more interesting incense since I last burned this, I find I'm not as impressed today as I was in 2017, nor even 2014. It's enjoyable, it's decent, and I'd certainly be interested to buy it again fresh if it was still being made, but it's not top end.

Date: June 2023 Score: 30

Second review

I'm returning to these with curiosity. I reviewed them in 2014 when I hadn't been reviewing incense for that long, so it will be interesting to see how I respond to them now, almost three years later. There is a pleasant musky undertone, with some sweet patchouli and sandalwood, Some lovely sharp nips of halmaddi, and swirling around this are soft floral tones, which suggest lavender, but are swiftly carried away by more swirls of halmaddi. There is much going on, and most of it is woody, though now and again there's that whiff of floral, lavender-like, but never quite settling. This is a teasing scent, quite gorgeous, and I don't think I did it justice last time.

I'm not sure how it is made. There is a charcoal base, and a fine brown powder rolled on, but when smelling the stick there is an intense volatile aroma - quite sharp, much sharper than I would imagine one would get from a dry masala. It does appear to come from a concentrated essential oil or solvent of some sort, so I do think there is some dipping involved.

I like this. I am moving up my score to something more deserving, and more in keeping with others in the Imperial range.

Date: Feb 2017 Score: 39

First review

Charcoal base on red sticks, then rolled in pleasing aromatic brown masala powder including halmaddi, and also perfume dipped, resulting in a heady, flowery fragrance from the packet.

Imperial is Aargee's special halmaddi range of incense. Halmaddi is a resin, like amber, frankincense, and myrrh, which comes from a tree. As with other such resins, it is sticky when first extracted, then becomes brittle when dried. The aroma is particularly favoured in the West, where it is associated with Nag Champa and traditional, artisan incense makers who make incense entirely from raw, natural ingredients as opposed to the larger operations where sticks are dipped in perfume, sometimes synthetic, as the main manufacturing method. When the ailanthus triphysa tree from which the resin is extracted, became scarce due to excessive harvesting for match sticks, the price went up, meaning it became even more valued and precious. In the 1990s the Indian government protected the trees; then in 2011 and again in 2013, leased the trees out to responsible extractors, so the price has come down, and more incense containing halmaddi is coming out of India.

There is the warm slightly sweaty wool jumper smell of halmaddi in this. It tends to be sweet, though with a little acidic tone which gives it interest and character. There are also some pleasant slightly heady flowery perfume tones, which I could be convinced are lavender, though could also be violets. It gently fragrances the room with flowery notes underpinned with soft musk and sandalwood - the occasional pinch and squeak of halmaddi comes in and catches at the back of my throat and nose. While I like halmaddi, it does tend to scratch at the soft palate at the back of my mouth so I can't take too much of it.

Date: April 2014 Score: 33

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