Incense in The Wind: 2025

Wednesday, 5 March 2025

Sai Handicrafts UK Pakiza

I was playing around with Chatgpt this evening, and fed into it some of my notes on this incense. I was surprised at the response:

Pakiza is an evocative name, carrying echoes of purity and warmth—perhaps a woman’s name, or a nod to the saffron-infused sweetness of the Indian dessert, Chum Chum. The incense itself lives up to this richness, offering a scent that is both indulgent and comforting.
From the first spark, Pakiza unfurls a sweet, golden warmth. The saffron notes are unmistakable—honeyed yet delicate, lending an airy brightness rather than a heavy, resinous weight. This sweetness is balanced by a mild spice, reminiscent of cardamom or dry ginger, adding depth without overpowering the composition.
As the incense burns, a soft, woody undertone emerges, grounding the fragrance with a smooth, balsamic richness. There’s a faint whisper of sandalwood or aged cedar, blending seamlessly with the saffron’s floral, almost sunlit glow. The overall impression is both luxurious and serene, like the lingering scent of a sacred space or the warmth of a home filled with old-world charm.
Unlike some saffron-based incenses that lean sharp or metallic, Pakiza maintains a softness—an elegant, rounded profile that invites stillness and contemplation. It’s a scent that lingers gently, not demanding attention but leaving a quiet, golden imprint in the air.
For those who love saffron’s distinctive warmth, or who seek an incense that is both sweet and subtly spiced, Pakiza is a beautifully balanced choice. Whether inspired by a name or a dessert, it certainly lives up to both—a scent as pure and inviting as its namesake.

This is what I gave it: "write a review of a saffron coloured hand-rolled masala incense called Pakiza which smells sweet, with saffron notes. It's mildly spicy, with a soft woody, balsamic base. The name might refer to a girl called Pakiza, or an Indian pudding called Chum Chum, which has a variant called Pakiza that uses saffron."

There's stuff in there which is nonsense, but I did have cardamom in mind, which I didn't offer it. However, the Indian pudding, Pakiza, does use cardamom, so it likely got it from a Pakiza recipe. The girl's name, Pakiza, means pure or chaste, so it got "echoes of purity" from that. The colour of the stick is red rather than yellow, and the colour impression I get as it burns is also dusty red, so the "golden" is not what I get. Nor am I getting a "sunlit glow", nor an "airy lightness" - indeed, there is some "resinous weight", rather than a lack of it. But, any faults in the AI review are down to me not feeding it precise enough information. And, of course, I am free to edit it afterwards, both for accuracy, and to make it sound more human an down to earth. On the whole I am impressed.

And I also like the incense!

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 36

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Sai Handicrafts UK

Oneironaut Dickens No 10

I've been enjoying the Oneironaut incenses. They remind me of the 100/60/30 packs that were commissioned by SifCon, and sold in various pound-stores and hardware shops at low prices. They were simply made perfumed incenses - well done, but nothing fancy. Some of the scents were basic mono-scents, and a bit boring. But some were modern and bold. The modern scents were excellent value for money, especially as the packs would come with a free wooden ash catcher. Some of these are still available via eBay, though probably not for long. I suspect that these sticks are made by the same incense house (or, at least, in the same Asian country - I doubt they are made in India), but where Oneironaut stands out is the perfume blends, which tend to be modern, bold, and exciting. They also have good marketing and presentation, which always gives a product an extra vibe.

This stick is rather more perfumed and volatile than the others (though Outdoors also had a degree of sharp volatility). It is surprisingly floral, like an over-bearing rose or gardenia (or a blend of both), and is not my style at all. There's woods and mineral notes and some zesty citric - mostly sharp lemon, which should help balance the florals, but to my mind simply confuse matters.

It is more attractive on the burn, though it comes over more as a room freshener scent than some of the exciting fragrance blends I've been experiencing from Oneironaut. What I like about Oneironaut is the boldness in the fragrance blends - striking out in new directions. I suppose inevitably when wandering down roads less travelled by there will be some wrong turns or dead ends. Scents that work for some, but not for others. We can either continue with the popular well travelled scent paths, finding no surprises or delights, but enjoying the familiarity and the comfort of the known; or we can follow the road less or even not previously travelled, and deliver some unique and exciting scents. The well travelled paths will get most travellers, while the less travelled will at times be hard going, and not appreciated by all. Some folks will like this. Those who created the blend no doubt liked it. But it's not for me. It's too perfumed, too floral. There's wood and musk in here, but way down in the mix.

The website says that the scent ingredients are "Amber, Musk, Frankincense, Cedar", but I'm not getting much of that. The musk and wood notes develop as the stick burns, enough to start making an impression on the floral notes, but not enough for me to dislodge the floral notes from my mind.

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 26

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Oneironaut in Shoreditch

Monday, 3 March 2025

Oneironaut Outdoors No 25

Quite an earthy fragrance on the stick of this Oneironaut incense, and then along comes fruit, along with some fresh late summer grass, and then a volatility. The first Oneironaut where I become aware of a cool, sharp volatility. It's difficult, even after several years of experiencing, questioning, and researching, to know exactly what is going on in an incense, or why I (or anyone else) reacts in a certain way to certain incense. We all react slightly differently due partly to our genetics and chemical composition, and partly to our experience, memories, moods, and emotions; due partly to the environment we are in where the incense is burning - and Irene's incense blog, Rauchfahne, is excellent for exploring that aspect of incense, and I have learned so much from her regarding how space and ventilation impact on incense experiences; and due partly to the unknown unknowns that mysteriously influence everything that happens.

Knowing the ingredients and/or production method of an incense is interesting, and can point to aspects of the scent experience that may have been overlooked, though may alternatively suggest a scent that is actually not present (despite the scent ingredient being present). And knowing the ingredients and method before the experience can result in an expected response: give someone a piece of apple, but tell them its a pear, and they will focus on the qualities that remind them of pears. They may at some point recognise the apple qualities, but the initial focus will be on pear. I feel the best way to open ourselves up to the experience of an incense is to not focus too much in advance on ingredients or production method. Let the interaction be open and truly valid, without any preconceptions or prejudices.

In the same way that two or more colours make a third colour, two or more scent ingredients may blend together in such a way that they create a third scent. A number of perfumers use this knowledge to create out of cheaper ingredients the fragrance of a more expensive, or difficult to obtain, scent - such as musk. Bold and interesting perfume and incense makers can blend together various scent ingredients to make something new and interesting. And I like those people. At one time the Nag Champa fragrance was new and interesting. Today it is a rather tired and overly familiar scent. And the more I experience it, the more familiar I become with it, and the less exciting and interesting that encounter becomes. It's not that the scent has diminished over the years, it's just that it has become tired with familiarity. The only way, then, to spark it up, is to experience a new variation. It doesn't mean the new variation is better than the first one; it just means that our mind becomes more excited at noticing the variation in something familiar.

All this is to say, that I like what Oneironaut are doing with their scent blends. I don't know exactly what their working relationship is with the incense maker, but the suggestion from comments they've made is that they have some control over deciding the blends in some of the sticks they are selling. And it appears to me that they are approaching these blends from a fresh angle, which is fascinating for me. It's also to say that I don't know the production method, but have made some assumptions based on prior experience. My assumption is that the sticks are made in Asia - hand-rolled from wood and joss powder, and then dipped in a perfume solution. All the sticks are sold at the same price, so my assumption is that if expensive scents are being used, that the maker will balance out the cost by using an ingredient like DEP to act as both fixative and carrier - diluting the scent so it goes further, but also amplifying the fragrance, so the dilution is balanced out. If small amounts of DEP are used, it will not be noticed. However, if large amounts are used, such as with many low cost Floras, then I tend to feel it as a cold sharpness in my nose, eyes, and throat. If I burn too much incense with DEP I can get headaches which tend to focus on my forehead. (I am somewhat caught between the devil and the deep blue sea, because as well as reacting badly to DEP, I also react badly to halmaddi and other tree resins which are more traditional scent fixatives). Anyway, though I like the scent blend used on this stick, I feel that some DEP has been used, which is pushing me away both physically and aesthetically. But I am still feeling very positive.

Oooh. This smells lovely on the burn. Pine and Christmas are the immediate impressions. And a feeling of being outdoors in early, crispy Spring. There's some quiet, warm musky notes, like soft moss, to support the lively pine. There's a bit of smoke in the fragrance, and a general lack of clarity. It settles into a general woodiness, though without the initial clarity of the pine when first experienced. I guess the senses get a bit overloaded by a range of wood notes that are so close together that eventually the mind just deals with it as "woodiness" and perhaps brings in a bit of smoke as burning wood. As time goes by some orange notes develop, though that could be my own association of oranges with Christmas, so I'm twisting some of the citrus notes into something personal and individual.

I like this (quite a lot!), though feel it's a little muddled. I like the original sharpness I experienced, and I like the journey the incense has taken me on. I liked the walk through a pine wood in early frosty Spring, and I liked the memories and thoughts of Christmas that were brought to me. Yeah. Nice one.

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 35

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Oneironaut in Shoreditch

Saturday, 1 March 2025

Oneironaut Cinematographic Still No 28

Oh gosh, I am loving these modern fun scents by Oneironaut, a shop in hipster Shoreditch, London. This has raspberry, vanilla, grenadine, white florals, and a general sense of happy pleasing perfume. This is hugely commercial, and I can imagine so many people enjoying this. No, it's not spiritual or deep, but it's damned great fun, hugely lovable, and bloody gorgeous. Sexy as hell. There's musks in here - oh god, there's all sorts going on. I absolutely adore this before even lighting it up. And my experience with Oneironaut so far, has been that the scent on the stick is the scent you smell on the burn. Bang on. No tricks. No nasty chemicals to keep the costs down. Just a mind-blowing awesome blend of great smelling fragrances. They work. They really do.

The scent on the burn takes a moment to settle, then bursts forth with violets, peach, blueberries, lovingly cradled in the arms of warm musk and amber, coloured slightly with oily wood. Oooh this is nice. There are so many scent associations - baked apple, orange, toffee-apple, leather, musk. Radiohead's "Creep" comes to mind as the musical equivalent of this incense. I love it so much! I dare say I'm just getting carried away, and when I return to it in a month or so, I'll take the score down a bit, but for now I'm just blown away!

The scent ingredients are given as Tonka, Myrrh, and Guaiacwood. And they produce a magical accord all of their own - shifting, evolving, and always surprisingly delicious.

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 47

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Oneironaut in Shoreditch

Oneironaut In The Branches No 09

I love the scent on this Oneironaut incense - both on the stick and in the burn. Huge blast of fruit. It's like a mango sorbet informed by wild grass, seaweed, patchouli, and other stuff. Gorgeous. I like modern, funky scents on incense. There's some ancient dark rose developing later in the burn. This is fun. Clean and wild. Good stuff.

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 37

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Oneironaut in Shoreditch

There's a funky shop in Shoreditch, London, just off the trendy Brick Lane. It sells candles, oils, resins, and incense; and is called Oneironaut, which means "dream traveller". It was founded in 2017 by "a gyal and a boy" who, seemingly inspired by the brilliant novel Perfume (if you haven't read it, get it now - it's extraordinary, and you'll learn a lot about the nature of scent), wanted to work on a "concept of scent that's devoted to develop spiritual intelligence". Cool.

They have a good marketing concept where you can sign up for a subscription, and they will send you three different Oneironaut incenses every month. They appear to have 29 incenses currently. I signed up for two months at 3 incenses a month, and got one of the incenses twice, so there will be some repetition but it works out cheaper than selecting your own scents. They say that as well as traditional Indian and Japanese scents, they also commission their own blends, and that their sources use natural ingredients and sustainable practises.

The sticks are 10 inches long - and most of that is incense. It appears that the sticks may originally have been longer, in the Asian style, and the ends have been broken off to make the sticks easier and cheaper to post. The sticks are hand-rolled out of what appears to be mainly wood powder and joss powder, and then immersed in scent. The scent on all the sticks is quite clean, so it appears that DPG or DEP have not been used. I think they are more likely to be Asian made than Indian. They are rather likeable.

Reviews

Oneironaut Cinematographic Still No 28 (P)
Mar 2025 - Score: 47

Oneironaut In The Branches No 09 (P)
Mar 2025 - Score: 37

Oneironaut Outdoors No 25 (P)
Mar 2025 - Score: 35

Oneironaut Whitechapel No 13 (P)
Mar 2025 - Score: 33

Oneironaut Dickens No 10 (P)
Mar 2025 - Score: 26

Reviews: 5
Top score: 47

Bottom score: 26

Average: 36

Conclusion: Quite variable, and not cheap, but I like the boldness of some of the fragrances, and the cool marketing. The monthly subscription is a nifty idea - and the randomness of it is part of the appeal. When I've reduced my backlog, I can see myself being quite happy having a subscription.

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Own brand / Private label

Oneironaut Whitechapel No 13

The scent on the stick is fresh and clean like lotus fragranced soap. The scent on the burn is dry, a little sombre, some black pepper and spice, with some gentle and engaging sexy warmth. There's amber and musk with gentle hints at pine and cedarwood. It's solid and engaging, and fairly straight down the line. I like it. They remind me of those wonderful bargain packs of 100 Sticks With Holder that were a such a feature of hardware stores around 2017, and can still be picked up now and again. But these Oneironaut sticks have a much better presentation, and way cooler marketing. Both sorts of sticks are cool. I liked the 100 Sticks packs, but they always came in cheap and crude packaging, and you didn't feel like you were getting anything special because the focus was on the low price. The Oneironaut sticks have a really cool image and funky marketing which marks them out as special. Also, while the method of production and overall quality appears the same, I like the Oreironaut scents more, as they are fresher and more funky.

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 33

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Oneironaut in Shoreditch

Kunjudo Tokusen/Special Karin

As part of my purchase of Japanese samples from eBay seller Shi, I was sent several free samples, including this "Special" (Tokusen) version of Karin, which I have just reviewed and enjoyed. Shi sells a pack of 90 sticks of Tokusen Karin for £14.23, including postage. Kogen, in Japan, sell a box of 220 sticks for 1,320 yen (approx £7.00), plus international shipping.

Tokusen Karin

The scent on the stick is soapy, perfumed, pleasant. It's like an elegantly fragranced bar of soap. Some lotus touches. Quite creamy. The scent on the burn is gentle, pleasant, fragrant, perfumed. There's a smudge of sandalwood. Not oily, sexy sandalwood. A clean, woody sandalwood. Better than the wood powder used in Chinese incense, though inclining in that direction. I like it as a wood content, though it's not the sort of sandalwood scent that I adore. This, despite the soapy lotus type fragrance on the stick, is not really a floral scent. It hasn't attracted me the way the regular Karin did. There are some faint herbal notes - kinda vague. An awareness of sweet musk, which grows once the mind catches that note. And overall it is nice, but not as elegant and beautiful as the regular Karin.

Looking on the Kunjudo website, the contents are listed as "Oak bark powder, sandalwood, fragrances", which is vague - the bark powder would be the binder and part combustible, the sandalwood is part combustible and part fragrances, and the "fragrances" are unspecified fragrance oils. Kohgen says this Special is Karin with added "natural incense ingredients such as Patchouli and Cassia (Cinnamon)", which is more helpful. Though, I sometimes find that knowing the ingredients can lock me into finding those scents, rather than allowing me the freedom to explore and experience my own personal journey with the incense. However, yeah, in retrospect I can see the presence of patchouli and cinnamon.

Date: Mar 2025 Score: 30

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Japanese incense

Kunjudo Karin

A sample of Kunjudo Karin, a cheap, basic Japanese sandalwood incense, usually sold in a nice box, bought as a set of five sticks from eBay for 0.99p (though currently - as of Feb 2025 - £1.75). Sold in Japan from kohgen.com in boxes of 80 sticks for 473 yen (appox £2.50).

Kunjudo is based on Awaji Island, Japan, and was founded in 1893, initially as an incense shop, though by 1909 was involved completely in incense production. Karin incense was launched in 1987, and has, along with Takara, become the company's most popular product. The company are forward thinking, and focus on producing low smoke, low cost, popular incense. They run family focused factory tours, and encourage children to make their own incense. That looks pretty cool!

Kunjudo Karin

The sticks on the burn have a fairly basic though pleasant sandalwood scent with light, floral touches. Not the earthy, sexy, oily sandalwood that I like - this is a clean, woody sandalwood. Initially my feeling is that it's nice, but it doesn't really do much for me. It feels as though this is the sandalwood which doesn't contain much oil. This doesn't present as heartwood sandalwood - this feels like its more from the edge where less of the aromatic oil is found. More wood than fragrant sandalwood oil.

I find it quiet, clean, well behaved, quite light and pleasant - though without much to hold my interest. But then I start to really notice the floral touches. And the floral notes are beautiful, and they subtly shift and develop as the sticks burn. I can see why it is popular. At this point I find it the most attractive Japanese incense I have tried. I'd be happy to buy more (certainly at the prices charged by kohgen.com - who ship internationally).

Date: Feb 2025 Score: 35

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Japanese incense

Friday, 28 February 2025

Shoyeido Daily Incense Kyozakura "Kyoto Cherry Blossom"

I've not yet explored much Japanese incense; but what I have experienced hasn't encouraged me to explore further. I find Japanese incense to be quite dry and sombre, and with such a mild scent that it is easily overlooked, yet the price is generally quite high. I recently noticed on eBay, some sellers offering samples of Japanese incense, so I got in touch with one of them, and ordered a bunch, which kept the shipping cost low.

This sample pack was very well packaged by slipping the sticks inside corrugated cardboard. There are five sticks which cost me £1.79, though this has now (as of Feb 2025) increased to £2.58. Shoyeido are rare among Japanese incense companies in that they do sample packs, though not in the UK - they have to be imported from the US, and even then they only have one stick per fragrance, while this eBay seller provides five sticks.

Kyazakura

This Kyozakura (Kyo is short for Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan, while zakura is cherry blossom - and Kyoto is famous for its cherry blossom in the spring) is part of a range that Shoyeido call Daily Incense. The Japanese do not consume incense everyday the way that Indians do. It is generally reserved for special occasions, and only used by a small proportion of the population. This makes it difficult for Japanese incense companies to lower costs through scaling up; and so inhibits an expansion of their market. Creating a range for everyday use is good marketing.

There is a pleasant cherry note in this incense. Along with a scorched plum or raisin. Some faint sandalwood which toys with hinting at burnt paper, but doesn't quite get there. I'm impressed at the strength of the fragrance from such little sticks. Mildly sweet. There's a curious curry, fenugreek or cumin note hovering over it all - both on the stick and in the burn. And I've done a "curry" search in my blog, and found that a curry note is, for me, a fairly common experience with Shoyeido incense.

The cherry note was fairly short lived, and after that first impact my mind was more focused on other elements - some natural licorice, some bay leaves, and that fenugreek. If I stopped focusing, and let my mind go neutral and wander away, I could pick up sweet cherry, but only at a glance, whereas initially it was more insistent. After the burn is over, there is a mild sense of cherry in the air, but somewhat elusive - the main note in the air is a sort of vague woody pungency. I liked that moment of cherry at the start, and in general I liked the incense as it burned, but it didn't lift me much, and is not an incense I would reach for. But it's a fun incense to review.

Date: Feb 2025 Score: 28

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Japanese incense

Shoyeido

"Amber" Frankincense from Yemen

I am fascinated by incense resins, especially frankincense. This is one of our oldest, purest, and most acclaimed incenses. I have burned frankincense resin a few times over the 11 years I've had this blog, and I have liked it, but have found it a steep and tricky learning curve, with only slow progress because at no time have I really settled down to concentrate on exactly the best way to burn this extra-ordinary incense. Initially I burned the resin on charcoal discs. A messy, awkward process, but it worked well, and I had moments I recall as being very special. Then after discussion with a few enthusiasts, I was encouraged to get an electric burner. I have tried three static electric burners (two have now broken - it seems the cheap ones are not that sturdy); though I also found using burners awkward and messy, and found it hard to control the heat to get at the optimum temperature, which enthusiasts have assured me will result in olfactory heaven. Then I moved to an adjustable tealight burner, which I have found more pleasing than the static electric burners, though a little fiddly, and apt to errors. I have now acquired a cheap adjustable electric burner, though still not finding it easy to use, nor that rewarding. Melted resin can be difficult to clean off the burners. Yet using foil to protect the burners can sometimes inhibit the heat so the resin doesn't burn as well as it might (especially as my cheap adjustable burner doesn't go to a very high heat anyway). However, I will keep experimenting.

I know only a little bit about frankincense, so over the last couple of days I've been doing a bit of research. I'm finding conflicting and/or incomplete information in various places. Resin sellers can be useful sources of easily digestible info, though may be inclined to favour their own sources, and so not give a complete picture. Some sources may focus a lot on the scientific aspects, while others focus a lot on the political aspects. It's a complex and somewhat huge area which I've only dipped into so far, but will give a quick summary of the main points of what I've gathered so far, with the intention of adding more as I go along.

Resins are a gum produced by trees, essentially to protect them when cut. The gum will ooze out of the tree to cover the cut, and then harden. This gum may be classed as sap or resin. Resin is similar to sap, but is not the same substance. While all trees produce sap, only trees in the pine family produce resin. The tree from which frankincense comes is not in the pine family, so technically frankincense is not a resin, it is a fragrant sap. Fragrant sap contains the active ingredient α-Pinene, and it is that which is responsible for the fragrance. Saps contain sugar (maple syrup is a sap), so a fragrant sap is sweeter than a resin.

Frankincense comes from several different trees in the Boswellia family - with each tree producing distinctive resin with its own character. The trees are native to the countries of Oman and Yemen, in the south of the Arabian Peninsula, and to Ethiopia and Somalia, in the Horn of Africa, and has been traded from those countries for thousands of years. Though these days the countries are war torn, and with a recent demand in the West for the healing properties of frankincense, crude harvesting by desperate farmers is threatening the existence of frankincense trees in these countries. In 2012 it was replanted in Israel in the Middle East, 1,500 years after dying out there. Frankincense is also sold as coming from North Africa and India, though most sources agree that the southern Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa are the regions producing the best frankincense, and of those, it seems most folks point to Oman as having the best of the best.

Incense is graded by size and colour. The lighter the colour, and the larger the size, the more expensive and prized it becomes. With the very pale coloured resin giving a green appearance, and these are often termed "Royal". This Royal green frankincense, also called Hojari, grows in the Dhofar mountains in Oman. The Boswellia tree family in addition to frankincense provides the other classic incenses Myrrh, Copal and Palo Santo.

Included in an order of incense from Herbal Dimensions.com was this small sample pack of Amber Frankincense from Yemen. This is regarded as not as pure as the royal or green frankincense, though is more suited to incense burning as it contains more of the fragrance oil content. I burned it on both my new adjustable electric burner (it struggled to get warm enough to allow the resin to really display itself - at least for me as I wanted more aroma), and my adjustable tealight burner (more successful, though it took me a while to find the right height - too low and it singed, too high and there wasn't enough aroma).

There are pine notes, citric notes, some turps and petrol, and a general sense of "church incense". It's overall very warm, bright, uplifting, and pleasant - reaching into memories and associations. I liked it.

Date: Feb 2025 Score: 32

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