Best Nishane Perfumes in the UAE

Original	Collection	UAE price	MOJ version	From (AED)
Hacivat	Shadow Play	AED 1,082 / 50ml	Hacivat	48
Hacivat X	X Collection	AED 1,082 / 50ml	-	-
Hacivat Oud	Flanker	AED 1,827	-	-
Ani	No Boundaries	AED 1,008 / 50ml	-	-
Hundred Silent Ways	Collection Rumi	AED 1,008 / 50ml	-	-
Wulong Cha	Miniature Art	From AED 1,008	-	-
Hacivat pairing	-	-	Hacivat + Swimming Pool set	87

Mert Guzel and Murat Katran founded Nishane in Istanbul in 2012 and put it in front of the world at Esxence Milan in 2015, with sixteen extraits and no hedging. The name is the Turkish word nisane, meaning a sign or a mark, and the house is widely described as Istanbul's first niche perfumery, a line worth attributing rather than asserting: Turkey has made fragrance for a very long time, but nobody had built a niche house there that the rest of the world queued for.

Two things separate it at the counter. The first is concentration: nearly everything Nishane makes is extrait de parfum rather than eau de parfum, which is why two sprays behave like four of something else, and why a UAE retailer listing one as an EDP has simply got the label wrong. The second is that the collections carry the ideas. Shadow Play is a trilogy drawn from Ottoman puppet theatre. Collection Rumi takes its names from the thirteenth-century poet. No Boundaries holds Ani. Collection of Miniature Art holds Wulong Cha. And the X Collection reworks the house's own classics rather than diluting them.

The usual rules apply. Every fact is verified against official pages and UAE retailer listings from September 2026, prices are as listed at time of writing, and where a bottle has gone scarce we say so. Nishane is carried here by Bloomingdale's, which has the deepest range, alongside Ounass and Faces.

The Best Nishane Perfumes and the MOJ Version

1. Hacivat

Hacivat (2017, perfumer Jorge Lee) is the bottle that carried this house out of Istanbul, and it is a pineapple chypre, which should not work and does: bergamot, pineapple and grapefruit over jasmine, patchouli and cedar, landing on oakmoss and dry timberwood. Fruit on top of moss is the oldest tension in perfumery and almost nobody attempts it any more. AED 1,082 per 50ml at Bloomingdale's, around AED 1,500 for the 100ml.

• Top: pineapple, grapefruit, bergamot
• Heart: cedar, patchouli, jasmine
• Base: oakmoss, woody notes

The MOJ version starts at AED 48. The most requested niche pineapple in the Gulf, and the reason this guide exists.

2. The Shadow Play Trilogy

Hacivat did not arrive alone. It launched at Esxence 2017 as one third of a trilogy named for the characters of Karagoz ve Hacivat, the Ottoman shadow-puppet theatre that entertained Turkey for centuries. Karagoz means black eye and plays the blunt, earthy everyman; Hacivat comes from Haci Ivaz, Ivaz the Pilgrim, and plays the educated, eloquent one; Zenne is the beautiful, flirtatious female character. The bottles keep the argument going, Hacivat in white and gold, Karagoz in black and gold.

Karagoz and Zenne are not carried by the UAE's approved retailers at time of writing, so treat them as the context that explains Hacivat rather than as a shopping list. The naming is not decoration: it tells you the house was built by people who wanted perfume to carry something Turkish into a market that had never asked for it.

3. Hacivat X

The X Collection is Nishane reworking its own hits, and Hacivat X (2023) is the clearest example of what that means. The pineapple stays, but pink pepper sharpens the opening, Tunisian orange blossom and lime lift the middle, and Haitian vetiver with cedar replaces the original's mossy floor. The result reads brighter and more floral where the 2017 version reads green and mossy; think of it as the same character in different clothes rather than a stronger dose. AED 1,082 per 50ml at Ounass.

There is also Hacivat Oud, at AED 1,827 at Bloomingdale's, which takes the pineapple somewhere darker and woodier again. Between the three, the original remains the one people mean when they say Hacivat.

4. Ani

Ani (2019, perfumer Cecile Zarokian) is the house at its warmest: ginger, bergamot and pink pepper over cardamom, blackcurrant and Turkish rose, on a base of vanilla, benzoin, sandalwood and ambergris. Ani means memory in Turkish, and the house has described it as a gesture of healing between Armenian and Turkish people, which is a heavier thing to put in a bottle than most brands would attempt. AED 1,008 per 50ml at Bloomingdale's.

We make no version of Ani. If you like the Hacivat style and want the same house with sweetness instead of moss, this is the counter's next suggestion.

5. Hundred Silent Ways

From Collection Rumi, and named for a line of the poet's: I closed my mouth and spoke to you in a hundred silent ways. The perfume is a white floral gourmand, tuberose, mandarin and peach over jasmine, gardenia and orris, on vanilla, sandalwood and vetiver. Nishane credits no perfumer for it publicly. AED 1,008 per 50ml at Bloomingdale's, with the 100ml scarce at Faces.

Its tuberose heart makes it a sibling to several picks in our tuberose guide.

6. Wulong Cha

The quiet one, from the Collection of Miniature Art: bergamot, orange, litsea and mandarin over oolong tea and nutmeg, on musk and fig. Oolong as a fragrance note is a difficult trick because tea reads as thin unless something holds it, and the fig here is what does. Nishane publishes no launch year or perfumer for it, which is consistent with how this house treats its quieter releases. From AED 1,008 at Bloomingdale's.

7. The Hacivat Pairing

Layering is how a lot of people in the Gulf actually wear perfume, and the pineapple in Hacivat has an obvious partner in the citrus-and-orange brightness of Swimming Pool. We box the two together, and the pairing turns the chypre into something that survives a daytime UAE summer rather than waiting for the evening.

• Hacivat side: pineapple, grapefruit, cedar, oakmoss
• Swimming Pool side: mandarin, Sicilian orange, ginger, ambergris
• Wear separately or layered

From AED 87 for the pair. More of this thinking sits in our fresh perfumes guide.

Nishane in the UAE

Bloomingdale's carries the deepest range, with more than twenty Nishane releases including Nefs, Tuberoza, Mana and the X versions; Ounass and Faces carry narrower selections and run out more often. The house has no boutique here yet, though its own store locator lists Abu Dhabi's Marina Mall as coming soon, which would make it the first Nishane boutique in the country.

That expansion is not accidental. BeautyMatter's Future50 2026 report names the UAE as one of Nishane's three key markets alongside Italy and Germany, which is a striking thing for an eleven-year-old Istanbul house to be able to say, and it explains why the range here keeps deepening while other niche brands stay thin. The company is also among the houses in our niche guide, alongside Xerjoff and the rest of the independents.

Original or Inspired: How to Decide

An extrait at AED 1,082 is not overpriced for what it is; concentration costs, and Nishane does not pad its formulas. If you want the object, the moss, the Istanbul story on the shelf, Bloomingdale's will sort you out this afternoon. If what you want is the pineapple chypre idea, the thing people actually stop you to ask about, the MOJ version starts at AED 48 and the layered pair at AED 87, and our inspired perfumes explainer covers exactly what a version does and does not promise. The rest of the men's range sits in our perfumes for men collection.