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The Founding Four: Mitti, Old Delhi, Mogra Night and Smoke and Oud in their oxblood boxes, with a gold flacon

Arka House · Kannauj

Perfume oils, distilled slowly.

Four attars from the perfume city, finished by hand in Gurugram. Alcohol-free, batch-numbered, made to sit close.

Shop the Founding Four Try all four

N° 01 · The first rain

Mitti

Monsoon on sun-baked earth. Calm, grounding, impossible to forget.

Opening
Petrichor
Heart
Baked clay
Base
Vetiver, sandalwood
Discover Mitti Try all four
6 ml and 12 ml · Perfume oil · Alcohol-free

Chapter I · The House

What remains after fire and water have done their work.

arka, Sanskrit. The distilled essence of a living thing.

Kannauj sits on the Ganga, and for centuries its distillers have drawn scent the same way: flowers, earth or wood sealed in a copper deg over a slow wood fire, the vapour carried through bamboo into a bhapka of sandalwood oil.

Arka House works with distillers who still do it this way. We choose each oil by hand, compose it for modern skin, and finish it in Gurugram in flacons made to be kept on a dresser, not hidden in a drawer.

We call it a house because it is meant to grow. Perfume oils first, then home and ritual, each carrying one idea: Indian craft deserves to be the luxury, not the souvenir.

Read the full story
Clay, saffron, mogra, sandalwood and agarwood around a gold flacon
What goes into the degBaked clay, kesar, mogra picked at dusk, sandalwood and oud.
“Perfume oil does not announce itself across a room. It waits for someone to come close.”
The Arka House belief

Chapter II · Collection 01

The Founding Four

Concentrated perfume oils in 6 ml flacons and the 12 ml Tola. Each named for a moment, not a flower.

Chapter III · The Craft

Deg and bhapka

Two copper vessels, a bamboo pipe and a distiller who reads the fire by hand. No machine has improved on it, so we have not tried.

How an oil is made
DEG · FIRE BAMBOO PIPE BHAPKA · WATER
  1. I

    Harvest

    Flowers picked at dawn, earth gathered before the rains. Each in its own season.

  2. II

    Distil

    Sealed in copper over wood fire. The vapour travels to sandalwood oil, which holds it.

  3. III

    Rest

    The oil settles before it is ready. Patience is the one ingredient we never cut.

  4. IV

    Seal

    Composed, skin-tested and batch-numbered by our team in Gurugram.

A gold flacon being rolled onto the wrist, with the Mitti box behind

The ritual

One stroke. Then wait.

Roll it once on the inner wrist and once behind the ear. Do not rub. The warmth of your skin opens the oil, and over the first hour it settles into something that is only yours.

  1. IRoll on the pulse points
  2. IILet it warm, never rub
  3. IIIIt stays close all day

Chapter IV · Your scent

Three questions. One flacon.

Perfume oil is personal. Tell us a little about how you would wear it and we will point you to the one to begin with.

When would you wear it most?
Which pulls you in?
How should it sit?
Alcohol-freePure oil. Kind to skin, lasts on it.
Copper-distilledThe deg-bhapka way, in Kannauj.
Batch-numberedEvery flacon traceable to its batch.
Gift-readyBoxed, with an engraved note.

Begin here

The Discovery Set

All four in 3 ml flacons. Wear one each day and let your skin decide. Includes a ₹300 credit towards your first full flacon.

Details

For the one you keep

The Tola

One tola. As Kannauj has measured attar for centuries.

Twelve millilitres of the scent you have made your own, in a taller flacon and box with the tola card inside. Every scent in the Founding Four comes in both sizes.

Choose your Tola
The Tola, a 12 ml Mitti flacon in its tall box, beside the 6 ml size

For someone

Gifts, with your words inside

Every order carries an engraved card. Write your note at checkout and we print it for you.

Shop gifts

For occasions

Corporate and wedding gifting

Custom sets with your crest on the card, delivered across India.

Speak to our gifting team