Shekor

Shekor is a niche perfume house from Bangladesh whose fragrances are built around specific Bangladeshi places, seasons and memories [12]. Its name is the Bangla word for "roots", and the brand presents itself under the line "From The Soil of Bangladesh". The house is the work of three people: creative director Al-Amin Abedin and the perfumers Antonio Gardoni and Sultan Pasha [11]. Its first two fragrances, Ashar and Sylhet, went on general release in 2025.

The brand's starting point is not a single date. According to the company, the project began as a conversation in 2022; Ashar was soft-launched in Florence in September 2023; and the fragrance database Fragrantica lists both perfumes as 2025 releases [2][13]. This article follows that sequence: conceived in 2022, previewed in 2023, commercially launched in 2025. Shekor remains active, with two further fragrances announced for 2026.

The company's own account opens in 2022 with a conversation between two people. One was Antonio Gardoni, the perfumer behind the niche house Bogue Profumo. The other was Abedin, whom the brand describes as a creative director with a deep attachment to his homeland, Bangladesh, and to perfume. Gardoni's original idea was modest in scale: a single fragrance that would capture something of Bangladesh, released under his own brand.

The project grew as the two worked on it. Shekor says they concluded that the country was too varied to fit into one fragrance, and the single composition turned into the plan for a separate brand devoted to Bangladesh as a whole. What had begun as one perfume for Bogue became a new house with a programme of several scents, each tied to a different part of the country.

To carry that out, Abedin looked for a second perfumer. In 2023 the project brought in Sultan Pasha, a perfumer of Bangladeshi roots. Pasha is known for his work in traditional attar-making under the name Sultan Pasha Attars, and had more recently released alcohol-based perfumes under his own name, Sultan Pasha Perfumes. In the brand's telling, Gardoni contributed his experience with resins and natural materials, while Pasha brought what the company calls a poetic approach to perfumery. The brand closes this part of its story with the line "And so, Shekor was born."

The fragrance blog ÇaFleureBon, reporting from Florence in 2023, described the house as the combination of three figures in perfumery and named all three: Al-Amin Abedin, Sultan Pasha and Antonio Gardoni. It also noted that both Abedin and Pasha have roots in Bangladesh, and that the project carried personal meaning for all three. The brand's own pages never use the word "founder", and they do not say whether Gardoni and Pasha are co-owners of the business or perfumers working on commission. Shekor's narrative instead presents them as a trio.

Shekor's first public appearance came in September 2023, in Florence, during the Pitti Fragranze fragrance fair. The company describes the event as the soft launch of Ashar, and a photograph on its About page is captioned as having been taken there. ÇaFleureBon's Danu Seith-Fyr attended with fellow writer Lauryn Beer and called it the soft launch of "a new brand for 2024" [11]. At that stage the perfumes did not yet have names. The writer tried the first composition over an aperitif, a monsoon-themed scent created by Sultan Pasha under the direction of Gardoni and Abedin, and reported that two perfumes would be launched initially.

The launch the report anticipated for early 2024 did not take place on that schedule. Ashar and Sylhet are dated to 2025 in Fragrantica's database, which describes Shekor as a new fragrance brand with two perfumes, both made with Sultan Pasha and Antonio Gardoni [13]. The brand's own website presents the same two scents.

In September 2025 the house returned to Pitti Fragranze in Florence, this time with both fragrances on its stand. The same edition marked Gardoni's first appearance as an exhibitor with his own house, Bogue, where he showed a new green fragrance called Come. Shekor's appearance drew coverage from Fragrantica and from at least one other reviewer, whose pieces the brand later reposted on its news page without naming the original outlets. One of those reviewers wrote that they first met Sultan Pasha at the Shekor booth during the fair.

Two further fragrances are announced on the company's About page, each marked "Tentative release in 2026". As of October 2026, neither appears among the products offered on the brand's website, which still lists two perfumes.

Shekor frames each of its perfumes as a portrait of a place. The company describes the brand as "an invitation to experience the soul of Bangladesh" and says that every fragrance is a story, a memory and "a piece of the land itself". The places it names include the tea gardens of Sylhet, the streets of Old Dhaka, the country's rivers and its monsoon rains. Its stated audience is broad: Bangladeshis who want a link to home, travellers curious about the country, and perfume enthusiasts in general.

That approach sets the house apart from brands organised around fragrance families or ingredients. Each scent is named after a season, a region, a city or a historical moment, and the descriptions dwell on landscape and memory more than on notes. The German retailer Parfinity summarised the idea in similar terms, writing that the brand treats Bangladesh as a lived place of memory and belonging rather than an exotic backdrop [14].

Although the house is Bangladeshi by origin and theme, its production is European. The company says every bottle is crafted in Spain and Italy, using traditional techniques, and that the glass bottle and packaging are designed to reflect Bangladesh [2]. No value claims such as vegan or cruelty-free status, and no third-party certifications, are documented.

The range consists of two fragrances on sale, both unisex, and two more announced.

Ashar is credited to Sultan Pasha. The company describes it as "the poetry that unfolds after the first drop of rain", built from an ozonic rain accord, the scent of kadam flowers and green bamboo. In the brand's wider description, it evokes rain on dry earth, wet soil and the start of the rainy season. Parfinity adds green tea to the list of materials and classifies the scent as a floral chypre. A review the brand reposted described Ashar as airy and layered, with notes of tangerine peel, green tea, bamboo and the soft, powdery character of rice, and wrote that kadamba, the plant behind its opening note, has unusual orange ball-like blossoms.

Sylhet is credited to Antonio Gardoni and takes its name from the tea-growing region in the north-east of Bangladesh. The brand calls it a "turbulent and earthy homage to the land of tea and precious oud", with crushed patchouli, vetiver and black tea. Its About page also mentions the citrus Shatkora, along with oud and a strong green character. The perfume's listed notes name agarwood by its botanical name, Aquilaria agallocha. Parfinity describes a progression from lemongrass, mint and black tea to patchouli, vetiver, leather and agarwood, and classifies it as green and woody.

The perfumer credits are consistent across sources. ÇaFleureBon reported in 2023 that the first composition was by Pasha, Fragrantica credits both perfumers for the house, and Parfinity states that Pasha made Ashar and Gardoni made Sylhet [11][13][14].

The two announced fragrances continue the theme of place and history. Dacca is intended to evoke the grandeur of Old Dhaka, with saffron, sandalwood and spices. Flag 1971 is described as a tribute to the country's independence struggle of 1971. The company says its colours refer to the national flag, with green for the landscape and red for the blood of the freedom fighters. Both carry a tentative 2026 release date.

Coverage of Shekor has come mainly from specialist fragrance media around the Florence fair. ÇaFleureBon introduced the house to its readers ahead of its launch in 2023 [11]. Two years later, Fragrantica's Miguel Matos, writing about Pitti Fragranze 2025, called Shekor "one of the best newcomers in the show" [12]. He described Ashar as a clean, fresh scent reminiscent of rain and Sylhet as a deep tea-and-oud scent with an unusual sweet, chocolate-like quality. No industry awards are documented.

Shekor is an active, young house. Its stockist page was last updated in September 2026 and names 16 independent niche perfumeries in Europe, North America, the Middle East and Asia [4]. The brand also sells through its own online shop, which offers worldwide shipping, and lists a Bangladeshi telephone number for orders. No city of headquarters is stated anywhere by the company.

The house's catalogue remains small: Ashar and Sylhet are the only fragrances on sale, while Dacca and Flag 1971 are still listed as planned. Its wider programme, as the company describes it, is to add further scents drawn from Bangladeshi places and history.