Heritage
A house, in its own words
The company was founded in 2019 in Kuwait by Bashar Al‑Ameer, a businessman with a long‑standing interest in the region’s aromatic heritage. Early on, Al‑Ameer assembled a small team of perfumers and fragrance consultants who shared a desire to translate Arab stories into scent. The first public release, Sava (2021), introduced a fresh take on oud‑based composition, pairing it with citrus and spice to appeal to both local and international noses. In 2022 the brand opened a flagship boutique in Kuwait City, providing a tactile space where customers could experience the full range. The following year saw the launch of Capri and The Jewel, two fragrances that quickly entered niche‑perfume discussion forums for their balanced modernity and respect for classic ingredients. 2024 proved prolific, with four new releases—Ellora, One & Only, Akoya and a refreshed bottle line that replaced the original packaging while keeping the scent formulas unchanged. By 2025 Gissah expanded into the United Kingdom, opening a dedicated retail corner in London’s perfume district and adding Vesta and Tango to its portfolio. Throughout its first six years, the house has remained privately held, reinvesting revenue into ingredient sourcing and limited‑edition collaborations that celebrate regional artisanship. Gissah frames each perfume as a narrative fragment, a belief rooted in the Arabic word for story that gives the brand its name. The creative brief for every launch starts with a cultural or historical vignette—whether a coastal town, a desert sunrise or a legendary figure—and translates that image into a scent structure. The house emphasizes authenticity, opting for ingredients that can be traced to their origin, such as Kuwaiti ambergris, Indian sandalwood or Turkish rose. Sustainability is addressed through selective sourcing; the company works with certified farms and prefers small‑batch distillation to preserve the integrity of volatile notes. Transparency is another pillar: product sheets list top, heart and base accords, and the brand publishes occasional notes on the provenance of key raw materials. Gissah’s values also include accessibility; while the fragrances sit in the niche segment, the pricing strategy aims to make high‑quality Arab perfume approachable for a broader audience.