{"title":"Coming Soon","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"hainan-rose","title":"Hainan \u0026 Rose","description":"\u003cp\u003eHere's a confession: I always thought of myself as a not-a-rose guy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEarly in my journey into artisan perfumery, the Turkish Delight profile turned me off almost every time. As luck would have it, that was most of what I sampled back then.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLater, I explored the wider range of rose profiles and started to appreciate the nuance in each species, cultivar, region, and even batch. I began working rose into my blends, and gradually it claimed a central place. \u003ca href=\"www.elkhaldistudio.com\/products\/qinan-rose\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"\u003eQinan Rose\u003c\/a\u003e came out of that stretch, and it's the one people kept asking me to repeat.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eHere's the thing: I don't remake blends. I don't keep formulas, on purpose. So this isn't a reissue, and it isn't meant to be one. What I wanted was to return to the same palette, colors, and materials to see what my nose would do with them now, a few blends later. That is the thread. Everything else is intuition.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSame rose, same supplier, with another layer of premium ouds and roses on top. The result, Hainan Rose, is a rose oud that holds from the first moment to the drydown.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI made a large batch of the base, and I'm offering part of it, for now, as an attar. A spray version may follow, but much later. Why? In my experience, perfumer's alcohol can amplify a note or silence it completely. When alcohol is the carrier, I let a blend age until it settles into balance. That's a discussion for another day.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMaterials\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe ouds in the base came from collectors and oud suppliers. There's Assafi, to my nose one of the most leathery ouds out there. Don't let that scare you: it's used in a small amount, there to give the other ouds a shoulder to lean on.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen there's a creamy aged Malay from 2012 and a Manipuri from the same period. Not funky, not cheesy, just honeyed oudy goodness. There's an aged Merauke from 2010 and a vintage Burmese from 2005, the same two I offered as add-ons. And a premium two-day-soak Thai like no other: floral, woody, and slightly sweet.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOn the rose side, there are two vintage SQ roses, Hindi and Bulgarian, plus the White rose used in Qinan Rose. Borrowing a lesson from that blend and others, I also added a dose of a vintage SQ Papua oud-rose (listed here as Two Souls).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhy Vintage?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVintage materials do wonders for a blend. Sometimes, no matter how well crafted a formula is, you approach the point asymptotically: closer and closer, but never quite there. You're stuck at 95%, and what you need is a shift to reach that last 5%. That's where vintage materials come in. I wrote a few lines about the material and price question \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.elkhaldistudio.com\/blogs\/approach\/prices-and-materials\"\u003ehere\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThen there's the hallmark, the material the blend is named for: Hainan.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFinding good Chinese oud is its own pursuit. Plenty of it is clean, correct, and unobjectionable, and honestly, forgettable. What takes effort to find is character: the kind that stops you mid-swipe, makes you pause, and keeps you inhaling. That's what I was after, and most of what I sampled wasn't it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the end, I chose three. One is a decade old (circa 2016), from a collector who acquired it at the urging of its original Chinese owner. The other two came from artisans and collectors renowned in their own right. One dates to 2019. The other may be younger, but it's wild, traditionally distilled, and has a full-blown, satisfying Hainan profile.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI've been including preview samples of this blend with some orders. The final version will be rosier than the sample you may have received.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eA Spray?\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYep. In the works. Similar to how I tried to align \u003ca href=\"www.elkhaldistudio.com\/products\/soul-of-my-soul\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"\u003eSoul of My Soul\u003c\/a\u003e with \u003ca href=\"www.elkhaldistudio.com\/products\/two-souls\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"\u003eTwo Souls\u003c\/a\u003e, the vision for the spray version is to stay true to the attar. At least, for now.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"elkhaldi studio","offers":[{"title":"0.5gr","offer_id":67582337253529,"sku":null,"price":80.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"1gr","offer_id":67582262345881,"sku":null,"price":130.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"2.5gr","offer_id":48888256135321,"sku":null,"price":280.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0720\/5866\/7161\/files\/Oud_Rose_SQRE.jpg?v=1790747037"},{"product_id":"bateekh","title":"Bateekh","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhen I made Ananas Tabac, I meant for tobacco to become a regular part of what I release. Most people wore it without any issue, but a few reported skin sensitivity, so I discontinued the blend entirely. That didn't change my plans. If anything, it made me more eager to finish this one: a fresh, fruity tobacco.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI wanted to treat tobacco as a base you can build on, and to offer an artisanal tobacco at a price that stays within reach. To me, tobacco is earthy, sweet, damp, and woody all at once — a wide canvas that can hold many colours without feeling crowded.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLike Dukkan, this one began in a café. The coffee beans caught my attention: distinctly tobacco-like, with beautiful fruity notes of banana and chocolate. At the same time, I was working on a watermelon accord. Slowly the two ideas merged into one blend. That's how these two worlds met.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is the café where it started.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0720\/5866\/7161\/files\/Tobacco_Beans.jpg?v=1789133769\" alt=\"\"\u003eThe result is remarkably fruity-fresh. The structure rests on Virginia tobacco and Hindi oud, with floral, leathery Moroccan saffron, roasted Brazilian maté, and caramelised coffee adding depth. A tincture of Nepalese musk gives the composition volume without weighing it down.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe opening is where it gets interesting: fruity and floral, with banana, peach, blood orange, and my own watermelon accord. 🍉 I built the accord from cucumber, tomato leaf, and berries, with a touch of melonal. It's fresh and crisp and, to my nose, has a balanced sweetness rather than the obvious sweetness you might expect from watermelon.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eKashani rose carries it from there. Its floral weight bridges the bright opening into the base. It's rosy, though not as rosy as Dukkan can be. Here the rose sits underneath the fruit instead of leading it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhy Bateekh?\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBateekh means watermelon in Arabic. For me, as a Palestinian, it means much more.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eCut a watermelon open and you'll see red, black, white, and green — the colours of the Palestinian flag. After 1967, when Israeli colonial authorities criminalised displays of the flag in the West Bank and Gaza, Palestinians began using the fruit to carry those colours without carrying the flag. \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/time.com\/6326312\/watermelon-palestinian-symbol-solidarity\/\" target=\"_blank\"\u003eRead more about it here.\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe artist Sliman Mansour once told the story of an exhibition of his in Ramallah being shut down, and of an officer of the Israeli colonial regime warning the artists that even a watermelon painted in those colours would be confiscated.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat story has always stayed with me. Something ordinary, something you grew up eating without a second thought, becomes a way of holding on to who you are.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYou can ban a flag. But not its colours.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor me, Bateekh is one of those things. It's familiar. It's Palestinian. It's home. And in its own quiet way, it carries a history of resistance that is still unfolding today.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eMansour passed away in August 2026. Even though perfume is a different form of expression than painting, I still see Bateekh as a tribute to him, and to resistance in all its forms.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eNo add-ons?\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNot this time. I went on a hunch about what the appetite would be for each add-on I had planned, bought the materials in one batch for a better price, and rebalanced the formula around each one. So instead of add-ons, you have editions.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEvery edition is still Bateekh. What shifts is what sits at the centre, and the composition moves to make room for it. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3 dir=\"ltr\"\u003eWhich one is the one?\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eI've been blessed to reach more people in the artisanal space, and one question about the editions comes up more than any other: which one would you recommend?\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eHere's my answer (you might not like it) — I don't think one is better than another. If anything they complement each other. But here's how they differ:\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eThink of Kashani as the centre. It holds the weights in balance: tobacco, watermelon, the oud base, and rose all sitting level with each other. It's the original, and the only version with a touch of kewra.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSQ Hindi Rose pulls rosy — everything you'd expect from an aged Hindi gulab, sweet and dense, with Bulgarian and Turkish roses layered in.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eAged Malay 2012 pulls deep and earthy — creamy, caramelised, resinous, that sweet Malay profile.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eAged Malinau 2016 \u0026amp; Hainan 2019 pull bright — corn-silk sweetness from the Malinau, a cooling herbal sparkle from the Hainan.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eEach one takes Bateekh somewhere different. Kashani is where they all leave from. \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eIf you're not sure, go for the OG.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(245, 219, 219);\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cspan style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"\u003eI started sending some preview samples of this blend on some orders. The final version will be slightly different from the sample you may have received.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eFuture Bateekhs?\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eI've set a portion of the base aside, because I'm not done with Bateekh. Perhaps a Bateekh Civet? We'll see. 😉\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3 dir=\"ltr\"\u003eFinal thoughts\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eIf Dukkan and Nightfall both landed for you, I think this one will too. And if you're new to my work (welcome 🤗), Bateekh is a good place to start.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"elkhaldi studio","offers":[{"title":"Kashani Rose \/ 15ml","offer_id":48998184386713,"sku":"BKSO-15","price":105.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Kashani Rose \/ 30ml","offer_id":48998184419481,"sku":"BKSO-30","price":199.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Kashani Rose \/ 50ml","offer_id":49025106641049,"sku":"BKSO-50","price":315.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"SQ Hindi Rose \/ 15ml","offer_id":48997633163417,"sku":"BSRO-15","price":135.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"SQ Hindi Rose \/ 30ml","offer_id":48997633196185,"sku":"BSRO-30","price":256.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"SQ Hindi Rose \/ 50ml","offer_id":49025106673817,"sku":"BSRO-50","price":405.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Aged Malay \/ 15ml","offer_id":48998473760921,"sku":"BMLO-15","price":160.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Aged Malay \/ 30ml","offer_id":48998473793689,"sku":"BMLO-30","price":305.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Aged Malay \/ 50ml","offer_id":49025106706585,"sku":"BMLO-50","price":480.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Aged Malinau \u0026 Hainan \/ 15ml","offer_id":48997657444505,"sku":"BMHO-15","price":185.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Aged Malinau \u0026 Hainan \/ 30ml","offer_id":48997657510041,"sku":"BMHO-30","price":370.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true},{"title":"Aged Malinau \u0026 Hainan \/ 50ml","offer_id":49025106739353,"sku":"BMHO-50","price":585.0,"currency_code":"OMR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0720\/5866\/7161\/files\/Bateekh.jpg?v=1789200298"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0720\/5866\/7161\/collections\/WhatsApp_Image_2026-09-12_at_13.36.21.png?v=1790712271","url":"https:\/\/www.elkhaldistudio.com\/collections\/coming-soon.oembed","provider":"elkhaldi studio","version":"1.0","type":"link"}