#deciem

I was so stoked when Deciem first announced the release of Avestan, a niche perfume line, back in 2018. As a Toronto resident, I'd watched Deciem's brand, The Ordinary, grow from its initial opening in the Distillery District into a cult following until its acquisition by Estee Lauder. You can still read about the planned release of Avestan online and if you click through the gallery in the link below, you can read a brief description of all the scents as well as see the original product designs.

Shortly after all this press copy was released, the Avestan line was put on hold following Lauder's moves to seize control of Deciem and the death of its founder, Brandon Truaxe, in 2019, which was reported as an accidental fall.

However, later that year, in 2019, Deciem opened an Avestan store in London's Soho neighbourhood, selling one unnamed fragrance. Years later, this remains the only store where you can purchase the scent. In 2024, it opened another store in New York which only sells Svalbard, a name from the original line-up. (Though when I compared the current ingredients list, it does not match the 2019 label which suggests a reformulation without the guidance of Truaxe.)

My initial excitement over Avestan was not simply because I was interested in niche perfumes and The Ordinary. It was because so many of Avestan's scents were connected to the MENA region, where Truaxe hailed from as someone born in Tehran, Iran. Finally, I thought, instead of the Middle East viewed (smelled) through an orientalist European lens, we will have something in the mainstream perfume world that's different.

While Avestan's unnamed scent does not disclose a notes pyramid nor a place name, the Avestan website does show us where it is situated.

Here we see that the unnamed scent is located west of Beni Isguen, Algeria. The unnamed latitude and longitude coordinates correspond to Asni, Morocco, which recalls the original marketing for the Avestan line, and is attributed to Truaxe:

"[Avestan] began in the presence of things decidedly unworthy of much admiration in the world of aromas... Coated clay vats filled with argan oil, earthly walls of a typical village abode and the mud that had formed on my bare feet having crossed the river that bordered the township of Asni in the Moroccan Atlas Mountains... Avestan is the embodiment of this pleasing unfamiliarity. It is a deviation from familiar notes that move us through the past. It is an exploration of the untried. It is a journey to create new meaning through scents. It is a departure from lavender and rose to an unfulfilled journey of unfamiliar notes: clays, stems, saps, places and moments."

As such, it seems like the unnamed scent is perhaps not from the original line, but rather, an attempt to capture the origins of the entire Avestan house with subsequent roll-outs following the original releases (Svalbard, Roofs of Beni Isguen and Tent in Mahale were all names that had been announced in 2018).

Fast forward to 2025, Avestan's London location has proven to be wildly successful, with plans to roll out additional stores in other cities. Apparently the scent itself has also gone viral on TikTok. Hopefully an Avestan location will be arriving in Toronto - I'd love to see Esfahan sold in this city which is home to the second largest Iranian diaspora outside of LA.

For now, thanks to Kijiji, I managed to obtain a bottle of the unnamed Avestan, which I'll just call Avestan from this point onward. While I don't normally do blind buys, given its extremely limited access, I thought I'd seize the chance while I had it. It was well worth the risk.

Avestan is a wearable contemporary niche scent that's urban but warm with a hint of the gourmand.

The opening is unusual. There's a brief, flinty flare of bitter grapefruit or yuzu, a bristle of aromatic pepper, and an almost creamy, lactonic accord with an earthy character, otherwise, I'd think synthetic sandalwood. As such, despite the overall fresh and aromatic character of the opening, the scent is more reminiscent of a gently sweetened turmeric latte, with all the earthy and spicy heat that turmeric brings. This is what comes to my mind rather than the clay Truaxe describes, but having said that, I do understand why so many people smell clay in the opening.

The drydown swings more gourmand to me as its edges and the citrus fades, softening into something more simple, sweet and starchy or milky. And it's this sweetness and lactonic creaminess that makes Avestan more cuddly than conceptual, more familiar than aloof. Despite its unusual opening, it's quite a pleasant, approachable wear with mainstream appeal. It's also surprisingly long lasting with projection. One spray lasts a work day on me and I find it wafts towards my nose in the first few hours.

I understand the common comparisons between Avestan with Comme des Garcon's Blackpepper, which also pairs a hot spice with a gentle cream. Both use synthetics well and their fresh openings, as well as their contrasts in texture and temperature, rely on a similar concept and structure. However, they are not in any way dupes, there's really no mistaking one for the other and I'd say the Avestan is definitely weirder. It's also less "urban" in the way that many Comme des Garcons can be.

Overall, I think Avestan is a strong start for the house, one that delivers a good quality, unusual but accessible scent at an excellent price point. Especially when Comme des Garcons perfumes are now starting at CA$170-180, Avestan is a steal at under half that price £38/US$48 so roughly CA$70. The trick of course is its sole distribution point.

I hope the entire line is eventually released. I'm curious about the "copper" in Budapest, the oud-saffron combo of Esfahan sounds right up my alley, and I do wonder if A Tannery in Tuscany was designed to dupe Tom Ford's Tuscan Leather in a move reminiscent of the way The Ordinary trolled Drunk Elephant's marula oil.