There is a particular kind of person who has decided that how their home smells is just as important as how it looks. If you are reading this, you are probably that person. And if you are that person, you already know that the incense burner sitting on your shelf is not a passive object. It is a choice. It communicates something about your aesthetic sensibility, your relationship to craft, your tolerance — or otherwise — for things that are merely functional.
The incense burner has existed in some form for as long as humans have burned things ceremonially, which is to say, for an extremely long time. What has changed is the design language available to us. Today a burner can be a sculptural brass object worthy of a gallery. It can be a ceramic form so considered it doubles as a reason to rearrange an entire shelf. It can be marble, cast iron, alabaster, hand-thrown stoneware, or polished nickel — each material telling a slightly different story about the space it inhabits.
What follows is a considered edit of the eleven best luxury incense burners currently available — from the boldly collectable to the quietly essential. Some you will burn incense in. Some you will simply look at. All of them will make you feel better about the surface they live on.
1. Fornasetti — Profumi d'Ambiente Incense Holder
Let us begin at the absolute top of the market, because that is where Fornasetti lives. The Italian house transfers its visual imagination — those obsessive, surrealist faces, those architectural flourishes — into incense holders that function primarily as objects of desire. The wooden box and ceramic lid combination is iconic by now, the lid doubling as your holder after the incense has been lit and the box repurposed however you see fit. It is a collectible before it is a burner. The price is substantial. The visual return on investment is likewise substantial. This is what you put in the centre of a coffee table when you want the room to have a conversation piece that doesn't require you to say anything. When you are buying something that is top shelf you will have to shell out the top price for it: AUD 290 onwards
2. Aesop — Aromatique Incense Holder
Aesop does not make a burner that merely holds a stick. It commissions a design studio — in this case Vienna's Vogel Studio — to produce something that earns the description of object in the fullest sense. The Bronze Incense Holder is asymmetrical in form, cast individually in bronze, and weighted at 684 grams in a way that communicates, immediately and without any need for explanation, that it was made seriously. The concave dish catches spent ash with the unhurried precision of something designed by people who thought about the ash. True to Aesop's premium pricing this one retails at AUD 210
3. Maison Balzac — Monsieur Escargot Incense Holder
Australians have a particularly fierce loyalty to Maison Balzac, and this holder is a good illustration of why. The Monsieur Escargot — a marble snail, because of course — is simultaneously tongue-in-cheek and deeply elegant, the kind of object that makes guests smile and then look twice. The marble is cool, heavy, and smooth, with natural variation in every piece. It holds your incense at an angle that ensures the ash falls onto the marble base rather than your furniture. Functional, beautiful, and possessed of a very dry sense of humour. The brand's broader incense holder range spans marble and ceramic in various iterations, each as considered as the next. This one is priced at AUD 249, higher compared to other options at the brand.
4. Amod Aromas — Funnel Solid Brass Incense Holder
Sydney's own Amod Aromas has approached the incense burner with the same rigor it brings to fragrance — which is to say, it has treated the object as a design problem worth solving properly. The Funnel holder is handcrafted in solid brass with an antique finish, a form that draws on traditional apothecary tools and lands somewhere between sculpture and utility. It is heavy in the hand, weighted in the way only solid brass can be, and functions as an ash collector as well as a holder — which is, when you think about it, exactly what a well-designed burner should do. The hexagonal geometry of the brand's companion pieces — available in polished nickel or antique brass — brings a similarly architectural sensibility to the collection. These are objects you display when the incense is not burning. They earn their place on any surface, indoors or out, and the kind of patina that develops on solid brass over time only makes them more interesting. At AUD 65– AUD 85, they sit at a price point that makes the decision remarkably easy. Shop now
5. Tom Dixon — Fog Incense Holder
Tom Dixon's incense holders are as sleek as his lighting and as industrial as his furniture, which makes them exactly right for a certain kind of interior — the one with poured concrete, clean lines, and an absence of sentiment. Available in shiny rose gold, yellow gold, and silver, the holders are designed to accompany Dixon's own incense cone range, and the pairing is intentional and tight. These are London-designed, globally covetable, and the kind of thing that appears on well-curated shelves from Surry Hills to Fitzroy without ever looking like it was trying. Suitable only for incense cones this one is priced at AUD 120
6. Cinnamon Projects — Apparatus Incense Holder
New York creative studio Cinnamon Projects — founded by architect and designer Andrew Cinnamon — treats incense as a conceptual medium, which means the holder had to be equally considered. The Apparatus series is minimal, architectural, and precise, a design that holds the incense as though framing it rather than merely catching it. It is the incense holder for people who find most burners too decorative and most ceramics too handmade-looking. The cool restraint of the object is its whole point. Price AUD 360
7. Corey Ashford — Sydney Rock Oyster Brass Holder
Melbourne-based Corey Ashford spent half a decade as Dinosaur Designs' Head of Retail before branching into his own world of considered luxury objects. His incense holders are cast from Sydney Rock oyster shells in solid brass — a decision that is simultaneously poetic and extremely Australian. The result is a form that is irregular, organic, and deeply beautiful, each holder slightly different from the last because the original object was. This is the burner for someone who wants provenance attached to their objects and a story to tell when someone asks where it came from. Price AUD 90
8. Shoyeido — Ceramic Incense Bowl
Shoyeido has been making incense in Kyoto since 1705. The ceramic incense bowl is the brand's most honest product — a deep, unglazed vessel filled with ash or fine sand, into which you place your stick at whatever angle you choose. It is a three-century-old design solution and it remains the best one for a particular kind of incense experience: unhurried, traditional, and entirely without fuss. There is nothing fashionable about a Shoyeido bowl. That is precisely why it endures. The most value purchase on the list, this one is priced modestly at AUD 21
9. L'Objet — Incense Holder
L'Objet has long been the brand for people who want their table to look like it was assembled by someone with both taste and significant resources. The incense holders are no different — clean, architectural, and designed to work in conversation with the brand's broader Parfums de Voyage collection. The holders feel expensive before you know the price and look correct from every angle, which is a harder thing to achieve than it sounds. Not only do they look expensive, they are truly on the higher end of the price scale. Prices start at AUD 175
10. Bodha — Brass Incense Holder
The Los Angeles brand's minimal brass holders are the quietest objects on this list, and deliberately so. Bodha was built around the intersection of scent and therapy, and the holders carry that sensibility without decoration or drama. Small, precise, and weighted just enough to feel deliberate, they sit on a meditation mat as naturally as they sit on a bathroom shelf. They come paired with smokeless incense, which makes them the considered choice for anyone who wants the ritual without the residue. Brass develops a patina over time that makes these holders look better the longer you own them. That feels right for something connected to a daily practice. Price AUD 70
A note before you buy: the best incense burner is not necessarily the most expensive one. It is the one that earns its place on your surface every day — that you reach for without thinking, that holds the room correctly, that feels right in the hand when you light it. Every object on this list does at least that. Most of them do considerably more.
The ritual is the point. The burner is just where it begins.
*Disclaimer:
This post is for informational and review purposes only. Amod Aromas is not affiliated with, sponsored by, or endorsed by the third-party brands mentioned herein. All trademarks and registered trademarks remain the property of their respective holders. While we strive for accuracy, product images and pricing are sourced from public information and may vary.
- All prices are in AUD. Price, burn time and number of sticks information is from the respective website or stockist website taken at the time the blog post was published.
- All images are sourced from Pinterest