Take it anywhere.

To make it smell like you have a fireplace, especially when you don’t have a fireplace.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Fireside songs
Liner Notes

Nothing is cozier than a fireplace. The hearth brings us back to that ancient desire for warmth. The smell of a fireplace alone makes us think of the country, the holidays, the joys of cooler weather. Family gatherings, reading, romance, old world – associations are plentiful. In the speed of the modern world, especially in the city, it is rarer to have a working fireplace – or to take the time to light a fire. It’s a commitment. So we created the candle to give you the scent and feeling of a having a gentle fire roaring wherever you may be. It took a while to get the wood mix right; we use a particular blend of cedar, pine, and oak and add cade and birch for smoke and ash.

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D.S. & DURGA was founded by an architect and a musician. As pioneers in DIY Brooklyn, we started from scratch and did it our way (more Sid than Sinatra). We began by turning things we loved into scented stories of cowboys, open terrain, Russian novel characters, and folk songs. A perfume is a world you can return to

D.S. & Durga

Portable Fireplace

Size

Home Fragrance

Electric crackle, downpour, panic grass, sizzling asphalt steam.

Electric crackle, downpour, panic grass, sizzling asphalt steam. Respite on muggy summer days.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Hot city jams
Liner Notes

The scent after it rains is a favorite aromatic genre of mine – and many people as it turns out. Perfumers have a few tools to use in the category of ozone – or things that smell like water and air. Geosmin is the scent molecule released from bacteria in dirt after it rains. What’s lovely, is that the Geosmin blends with different aromatics in different environments. Whereas in the forest it smells dank yet fresh, in the city you get the scent of hot asphalt and concrete quickly cooled by rain. It is as if the whole city is boiling, overlapping in scent, and when rain and thunder come, all is released into the air in an instant. It smells fresh, unique and only of summer in the city. Concrete After Lightning is simple – you have the air, rain, steam, and some of the weeds that grow in the cracks of New York City.

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Concrete After Lightning

Where Orkney eagles carried Stoneage souls beyond the jagged cliffs

In the far north, where Orkney eagles carried Stoneage souls beyond the jagged cliffs, clover, sea pinks, sweet cicely, the sonorous sea.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Celtic Bostonian vibes
Liner Notes

The Tomb of the Eagles lays under a farm by the sea all the way up on the island of Orkney. The journey to get there is long and breathtaking. Though in Scotland, Orkney has its own culture with overtones of old Norse ways. It has the largest amount of Stone Age sites in all of Europe. It feels central to some ancient wisdom, in tune with the landscape, the sea, the standing stones, and countless ruins. The Tomb of the Eagles was discovered by a farmer digging on his own land in the 50s. He discovered people who were buried with eagle talons – perhaps so the eagles could carry their souls to heaven in the next world – no one knows for sure. I love this little mystery discovered in a hidden chamber – magic exists just around the corner of our everyday lives. The scent of the North Sea air is massive, spraying over damp lichen covered rocks. In the wind battered cracks I found tiny sea pinks clutching to the stones and smelling of narcotic carnation. Also sweet cicely fronds that smelled of orange and cinnamon! Again magic just under my feet in the cracks. And the green, green grass and the clover. That’s the scent of the Tomb of The Eagles.

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Tomb Of The Eagles

Rain water in eucalyptus groves off Highway 1.

Rain water in eucalyptus groves off Highway 1. Young green shoots, long spears, russet underbrush.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

California Dreamin’
Liner Notes

For breathtaking American vistas, I think Big Sur hovers somewhere at the top of the list. The river running down through the mountains hits the fog covered sea. Sunsets over the pacific are next level. You can feel the magnetic pull of Asia on the other side of the vast water. As you drive down highway 1 - top down, motorway music, the windswhipping - your car bends around each corner discovering a new jaw dropping bridge, private beach, or sonorous mountain. Poets and mystics populate the magic place. And the flora of the California coast is extremely varied. By Big Sur, you have a wonderful micro climate from the heat and the fog. Redwoods and other conifers hide groves off the side of the road.  Eucalyptus abounds. But it doesn’t yet smell medicinal like when you encounter the oil in a sauna. It is still thick with green shoots saturated with their perfumed freshness. The long spears of the Eucalyptus dart out from the branch, eventually falling to the floor creating a dry russet underbrush. When it rains, the earth is soaked and the scent of the eucalyptus combines with the fog to make an almost natural medicine lodge. Through the cracks in the trees you can see the sweeping waves.

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Big Sur After Rain

Frühstück with JSB at Café Zimmerman, 1723.

Frühstück with JSB at Café Zimmerman, 1723. Strong coffee, buttery almond pastries, pipe tobacco.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

German songs/songs about breakfast
Liner Notes

I wanted to create the scent of the café in Leipzig where Bach wrote his famous Java Cantata in the 1700s. I imagine tightly packed tables of people breakfasting over buttery almond pastries and strong coffee. Smoking pipes, reading newspapers, talking. Creamers of milk, kitchen steam, tobacco clouds, a hint of an old fireplace in the corner, and burgundy leather upholstery on the seats. I love breakfast. It’s really a passion of mine.  This candle is our first overtly gourmand scent. It’s light hearted. I love the idea that you can change your house into this legendary café at such a specific moment in time simply by lighting it.

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Breakfast Leipzig

Silently watch the flame for 7 hours and you may spy liberation.

The revered fig tree of Siddhartha and Lord KṚṢṆA. Silently watch the flame for 7 hours and you may spy liberation.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

East/West
Liner Notes

India is in our DNA.  It is Kavi’s motherland and it has always called to me.  It is a big source of inspiration for the brand.  The Bodhi – a holy fig tree - is revered in India for its association with Lord Krishna.  It is also the tree Gotama Buddha received enlightenment under.  You can still visit the place where the tree stood (and stands replanted) in the Bihar state.  Holy Ficus is a loose fantasy based on the this tree.  We took a classic fig accord and draped it in ginger, saffron, frankincense, and cardamom.  It fills the room with a Indian spices, wonderful fruit, and hopefully a faded memory of something larger.

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Holy Ficus

Tea service at the colonial parlor of Mme. Revere, topless psychic.

Tea service at the colonial parlor of Mme. Revere, topless psychic. Hot silver heated by open flame. Bohea vapours, radiant heat, milk.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Feel the spirit
Liner Notes

Spirit Lamp should smell like the flame on a silver tea service in a place of ill repute in colonial era Boston. The spirit lamp was used for light and heating fueled by alcohol or “spirit.” I can picture the teapot -- perhaps smithed by Paul Revere (he crushed silver when not shouting alarms on horseback). Inside the water boils with legendary bohea tea (an oolong probably from near the Wuyi Mountain preserve). The steam is peachy, airy, with touches of bleached ginger and coconut milk. The air of a colonial brothel given respite by the freshness of this rare tea drunk to stay up all night reading fortunes in a smoky den.

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Spirit Lamp

In clothes that look like rugs, singing “we must never break the chain.”

On saffron tanned leather seats, in clothes that look like rugs, singing “we must never break the chain”. Lacquered chestnut paneling with puffs of burning fuel.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

1985 Radio mix
Liner Notes

In the 80s my parents drove Toyotas and Hondas. They were cool. But around the corner an English woman drove the neighborhood kids to school in a 1985 300TD Benz. If it was cold, it would not start. I remember jamming into the back with 6 kids (no belts) and sitting on the springy saffron tan seat just freezing; the sweet smoke of diesel coming through the warming engine (and our color changing ski gloves). Driving around was big in my family. We would pile in wearing our Vision Street Wear (my parents in oddly shaped orange, white, yellow, and brown shag-rug looking cloths) with our hair looking like the E.T. cast, and drive around the seaside towns of New England with the radio blaring Fleetwood Mac, Duran Duran, and Bob Marley Legend. Life seemed careless and endless – as childhood often does. Most adults of that era found the 80s vapid and in poor taste, but man, how magic it seems to the children of the 80s.  When Kavi and I bought our first car in NYC we almost went safe with some terrible modern monstrosity. But then we answered an ad on craigslist and found a pristine ’85 300 turbo diesel Mercedes-Benz for cheap. The scent was the same as I remembered. It seemed fancy to own what was once an actual luxury.  It is a car of timeless elegance. It’s boxy look brings to mind all 80s movies, the Alps, and awkward fancy life that wasn’t attainable to anyone I knew in the 80s. This candle is an homage to that legend and smells of the air inside – so warm and dangerous.

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'85 Diesel

Welcome Rama into your home.

Welcome Rama into your home with North Indian forest tree flowers, tuberose, gardenia, and bastard teak.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Desi family festival
Liner Notes

Diwali is a major holiday in India and South Asia. The air all over is ripe with festivity. Families come together to clean, pray, and light candles welcoming Lord Rama and Sita back from exile in the forest, among other religious happenings for Hindus, Jains, and Sikhs. I love the sheer abundance of aromatics you encounter in India from food, flowers, and perfume – seemingly everywhere. Diwali candles called diyas, are usually oil or wax based in clay lamps.  Our candle recalls tree flowers and tropical woods from the forest where Rama and Sita were exiled, emboldened with a heart of opulent white flowers – tuberose and gardenia. Hopefully it can be part of the festivitiy, act as lovely reminder of joy throughout the whole year, or just let people catch a whiff of the festivity on the Subcontinent.

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Rama Won't You Please Come Home

Brooklyn flowering in the early aughts.

Brooklyn flowering in the early aughts where wild packs of dogs roamed free among savage weeds and anything seemed possible.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Early aughts Brooklyn magic
Liner Notes

I moved to Brooklyn in 2002 when I was 22. Almost everyone I knew was doing something interesting. Once I left a poker game at 3 am in Bushwick. As I stepped onto the street. I was shocked to encounter a wild pack of dogs–the alpha leader, the Lil’ scruff, the dame, etc. New York was wild; it seemed like anything was possible. You could study the weeds that grew out of the cracks in Brooklyn, and even start a perfume company out of nowhere.

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Wild Brooklyn Lavender

Handmade lacquered candle snuffer lid.

Handmade ceramic lacquered candle snuffer for putting out flames in a genteel manner—also keeps your candle surface immaculate when not in use. Candle not included.
SHOP CANDLES

Candle Lid/snuffer

Candles

The night queen’s suspended bulbs.

The night queen’s suspended bulbs in the hour of darkness, caked with spicy Ethiopian myrrh, cacao, currant, and dank Madagascar vanilla.

Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

Getting down, after hours, sexy time. Murdahruuuuruah!
Liner Notes

This is an intimate candle for tuberose lovers (like Kavi & I). It’s great for bedrooms, night rituals, or bathtime. A fantasy extracted from shadowy tuberose blooming at night. Deep red African myrrh to spice up a wonderfully realistic flower. It took many attempts to harmonize over 60 ingredients! Cacao, vanilla, ambers, currant, orris root concrete; all lead to a layered bouquet of white tuberose bulbs dangling in the dark of night.

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Tuberose Myrrhder

Our city of skyscrapers, subways, cyclists and skateboards.

Our city of skyscrapers, subways, cyclists and skateboards. Pothole avenues where cantankerous cab drivers honk through mysterious fumes. Where noise blares from night to morning coffee runs. Where only the toughest trees survive and thrive. Resilient as ever.
A limited edition candle made by New Yorkers Ruba Abu-Nimah, Phillip Lim, and D.S. & DURGA to bring you an aromatic vision of the resilient city that we love. 25% of net proceeds will go to the Ali Forney Center.
Playlist | Liner Notes

Spotify Playlist

New York cityscapes surviving through the years.
Liner Notes

New York City; the city of sirens, potholes, bikes and skateboards. The city of cantankerous cab drivers and gas fumes. The city of noise that keeps you awake at night and morning coffee runs. Noisy subways, clout chasing tourists on Canal Street and Hypebeasts in Soho. New York City is the city of two rivers and majestic bridges, of runners in Central Park and children scrambling through playgrounds. New York City is the city where only the toughest trees survive and thrive. It is often said that New York City is the best city in the world and if you want to live here you really have to believe that. - Ruba Abu-Nimah

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