Must Try Perfume Houses at FUMED Atlanta 2026 [KST SCENT]

We’re coming to FUMED Atlanta 2026 with KST SCENT.

If you haven’t smelled us before, KST SCENT is a queer owned Korean indie perfume house based in Los Angeles. We make fragrances around contemporary Korean culture, pop culture, food, nightlife, queer identity, and a lot of very specific references that somehow ended up becoming perfume.

KST SCENT was founded by James Nguyen, our Vietnamese American perfumer, and Kael Jeong, our Korean immigrant creative director.

A lot of the ideas start from Kael’s memories of growing up in Korea and then looking back at Korean culture after moving to the US.

We’re more interested in the Korea we actually know.

Convenience store drinks. Pocha nights. Street snacks. Cafe culture. Drinking games. Internet jokes. Queer culture. Things that were completely normal growing up, but suddenly feel very specific once you try to explain them to someone else.

And somehow, a lot of those things became perfume.

Contemporary Korean Culture in Perfume

KST SCENT is mostly about modern Korea.

Not just the traditional images people usually associate with Korean culture, but the random everyday things people actually grow up with.

Sometimes that means food.
Sometimes it means nightlife.
Sometimes it means a joke that probably needs too much explanation.

A few of the fragrances started as very nostalgic ideas, while others came directly from things happening in Korean pop culture at the time.

We like that mix.

The collection can go from something as familiar as hotteok or banana milk to something much louder and more unserious.

That has always been part of KST SCENT.

We want the fragrances to feel personal, but we also don’t think perfume has to act serious all the time.

Hotteok

Hotteok is one of the scents that probably explains KST SCENT best.

It was inspired by the Korean street pancake filled with brown sugar, cinnamon, and nuts, and it later became a finalist at the Art and Olfaction Awards.

Hotteok started from something incredibly ordinary and nostalgic. It’s the kind of food you buy hot on the street in winter, eat immediately, and almost definitely burn your mouth on.

Turning that into a perfume and then seeing it recognized by the Art and Olfaction Awards felt especially meaningful.

Gay Oppa

Gay Oppa was actually one of the very first ideas behind KST SCENT, and in a lot of ways, it still feels like the fragrance that best explains the DNA of the house.

Queer culture in Korea is still not something that is always openly visible or talked about, so the idea started from a very personal question.

What would the ideal Korean gay boyfriend smell like?

When the founders were visiting Korea, they stopped by gay bars and asked bartenders what kinds of fragrances they wore. A lot of the answers leaned toward warm, sensual profiles like amber and vanilla.

That became the starting point for Gay Oppa.

The fragrance takes that familiar, attractive, slightly idealized image of an “oppa” and filters it through Korean queer culture rather than the version of Korean masculinity usually seen through K pop or dramas.

It was one of the earliest fragrances created for KST SCENT, and it still represents a lot of what the brand is about: Korean culture, queer identity, humor, personal experience, and taking references that are rarely talked about openly and turning them into perfume.

Gay Oppa was also recognized by the AskMen Grooming Awards.

 

So maek

So maek is inspired by the Korean combination of soju and beer.
If you know Korean drinking culture, you probably already understand.
If you don’t, we can explain it at the booth.

Pocha Bar

Pocha Bar comes from Korean pocha(Korean BBQ) culture.

Late night food. Alcohol. Plastic tables. Loud conversations. Friends staying out longer than they planned.

That whole atmosphere was the starting point.

Banana Milk Coffee

Banana Milk Coffee is basically Korean convenience store nostalgia.

Banana milk is one of those things that almost every Korean person recognizes immediately, so turning it into a fragrance felt inevitable.

We mixed that idea with coffee with Banana Milk

Tang Hulu

Tang Hulu came from the candied fruit craze that seemed to be everywhere in Asia for a while.

Bright fruit, hard sugar, very glossy and very colorful.
Which obviously made us want to make a perfume out of it.

BPussy Power

And then there is BPussy Power.
We’ll let the name do some of the work here.

Queer identity has always been part of KST SCENT, not as a separate collection or a special Pride month thing, but just as part of who we are.

Princess, Main Character Energy, Happiest moment.

A Queer Owned Korean Indie Perfume House

KST SCENT is built by two immigrants with very different backgrounds.

James comes from a Vietnamese American perspective and works as the perfumer behind the collection. Kael grew up in Korea and leads the concepts, visual direction, and cultural references behind KST SCENT.

Being a queer owned house is also just part of the brand naturally.

We talk about Korea culture, immigrant identity, queer culture, humor, food, and pop culture into perfume.

Come Smell KST SCENT at FUMED Atlanta 2026

We’ll be bringing KST SCENT to FUMED Atlanta 2026, and we’re excited to finally share the collection with more people in person.

If you’re coming to FUMED looking for Korean American perfume, indie fragrance, queer owned perfume brands, or just something you probably haven’t smelled before, come find us.

You can smell our Art and Olfaction Awards finalist, our AskMen award winner, Korean street food, drinking culture, convenience store nostalgia, and some things that are harder to explain.