“I consider fragrance a work of art.”
— Mok Young-kyo (founder and creative director)
Large blue lettering on cream-colored paper. Mid Mountain by pesade has a label like a book cover. Its black cap takes the horseshoe as its motif, offering a first encounter with the brand’s aesthetic simply by looking at the bottle.
This Seoul-based brand was founded by Mok Young-kyo, a graphic artist who has also worked as a photographer. He gathers memories of his travels into a single “chapter” and expresses them through three fragrances. Photography, writing, scent, and space: understanding his creative movement between these forms reveals another meaning in the bottle’s composed appearance.
Essential Information
- Founded: 2022
- Founder: Mok Young-kyo
- Base: Seoul, South Korea
- Founder’s role: Creative director, creating fragrances in collaboration with perfumers
- Main offerings: Perfume, hand care, and home fragrance
- Official websites: pesade / Official Japanese website
The brand name comes from the equestrian movement known as the pesade, in which a horse raises its forelegs and upper body. The strength to hold that position and its balanced form: Mok connected these two qualities with his aims in creating fragrance. This is a brand that considers a scent’s presence and the balance of its combinations together.
The Founder and the Brand’s Beginnings
From Graphics and Photography to a Brand of His Own
Born in Korea, Mok studied graphic design and creative consulting. He worked in design for many years, developing an eye for subtle differences in shapes and colors. In a 2026 interview in Italy, he recalled that perfume, too, was a means of expression close to this experience of his.
Earlier, he had worked freelance for clients in fashion and music. As he continued responding to commissions, his desire to have his own work and brand grew stronger. He also moved into photography and eventually began considering how to apply the visual expression he had developed to a business of his own.
It was not simply the opportunity to design containers that drew him to perfume. Scent has no shape, and there is work to be done in translating it into words and images to communicate it to others. Mok could put the forms of expression he had long practiced to work for fragrance. This was where the founder’s background and the brand’s work came together.
Collecting Perfume and Keeping Travel Memories
Mok was already a perfume collector before starting the brand. For him, collecting fragrances was a way to preserve memories of places and times he had experienced. Just as he photographed the scenery he saw, he understood scents as things he could bring home and take out again later.
The travels that inspire his work are not all planned as product-development trips from the outset. In a 2025 interview with QUI, he said that when an experience on a leisure trip seemed likely to lead to a fragrance, he would revisit the place to develop the image more fully. First he is moved as an individual; creation follows from there.
How can a fleeting encounter on a journey, or an impression of a place visited for the first time, be preserved? In photography, one chooses light and composition. In perfume, one considers which material to put at the center and what to layer over it. Rather than presenting travel information, pesade’s creative work seeks to move the sensations Mok has received into another medium.
Starting in 2022 with Three Fragrances and Care Products
pesade was born in Seoul in May 2022. At launch, it offered three eaux de parfum: Mid Mountain, The New Error, and In Hindsight. Three hand creams and one hand wash were also part of the range. With perfume at its center, the brand began by considering points of contact with scent extending into daily grooming and the time spent washing one’s hands.
These three fragrances lead into what is now Chapter I. Its theme is “Slow Beat, Dazzling Sunlight”, establishing a shared world of an unhurried rhythm and dazzling sunshine. The approach of placing three different scents within that world would also become the form of later collections.
Making the Brand’s World Experiential at the Hannam Flagship
After pop-ups in department stores and select shops, the first flagship opened in Hannam in August 2022. According to reports at the time of its opening and the records of NONTEXT, which designed the space, the store comprised a first floor where visitors could try the products, a second floor for exhibitions, and a rooftop garden. A place to choose perfume also incorporated time to see the brand’s visual expression and linger.
The large table on the first floor was a collaboration with artist Lee Kwangho. It was made by tying soft sponge and applying repeated coats of paint. Even the stand on which the perfumes were placed became part of a creative process considering materials and the appearance of their surfaces. Visitors could discover pesade through texture and form as well as scent.
The store also extended the founder’s visual expression into a space customers could enter. Rather than simply showing photographs and labels from one direction, it moved toward a form in which people could walk around and experience the scents themselves. In March 2024, a second flagship opened in Seongsu, increasing the number of places where people could encounter the perfumes.
From the 2025 Japanese Rollout to a Store in Milan
Full-scale expansion in Japan began in spring 2025, with a pop-up at RESTIR and the opening of the official Japanese online store. The brand is now also stocked at TOMORROWLAND, U NOSE SHOP, and other retailers. It has created points of contact with Japanese readers and users both through places to try the fragrances and through places to read the brand’s words.
In 2026, together with Italian distributor Calé, pesade opened its first store in Italy to coincide with Milan Design Week. In an interview that June, Mok spoke of Italians’ interest in the brand’s history and culture and of his pleasure at seeing their reactions firsthand. A store is both a place to introduce the brand and a place to learn how its users receive it.
As the brand moves overseas, Mok has said that Korean brands are sometimes expected to offer traditional or Eastern forms of expression. Yet what is worth looking at in pesade is not a tendency in scent grouped solely by country, but the work of choosing particular memories and giving them form. The individuality of this brand that began in Seoul emerges in those specific choices.
The Brand’s Approach
Collaborating with Perfumers through Writing about Travel
Before a fragrance is created, Mok writes its thematic story himself. He asks the perfumer to read this travel-essay-like text so they can share the image. It is a step toward connecting the people he encountered and the time he spent in a place, things difficult to convey through a single photograph or a material’s name, to the fragrance’s composition.
His role is to define the central combination of scents and set the direction for creation. He works with the perfumer on the formulation. In that dialogue, he accepts that the perfumer’s interpretation may change the destination he first imagined. Though the starting point is his own memory, he remains open to another maker’s experience.
Composing Three Fragrances for Each Chapter
Three fragrances within a single chapter. By expressing a shared story from different angles, pesade creates balance across the collection. Chapter II, “Strange Odyssey”, for example, takes foreign landscapes and encounters on a journey as its subjects and brings together An Unseen, De Nude, and Oud Blond.
In An Unseen, floral and leafy expressions of neroli and petitgrain are layered with musk and cashmeran. De Nude combines the warmth of benzoin and sandalwood with iris and leather. In Oud Blond, davana, flowers, and spices spread over oud and musk. The shared subject of travel is distributed among a bright garden, textures recalling cloth and skin, and expressions of woods and plants.
When trying pesade, then, it is interesting to consider the differences between the three compositions rather than understanding an entire chapter through a single note name. Will you choose the brightness of neroli, turn toward the texture of iris and leather, or be drawn to the plants and spices layered over oud? Within the same story, you can choose the angle you want to experience.
Layering Woods and Tea over Flowers and Orris
“Balance” at pesade does not mean making everything uniformly pale. Mid Mountain in Chapter I, for example, layers patchouli, cedarwood, and amber over lemon and floral expressions including rose and orchid. It is a composition that places the calm of woods and patchouli beneath the brightness of flowers.
Orris Cocoon in Chapter IV, “Night Ride”, centers on orris and Longjing tea, combined with coriander and woody expressions. It is a fragrance that reconsiders powdery orris through tea and spice. Paying attention to what is layered with the softness of orris reveals a reason to try this creation that its name and bottle alone cannot convey.
A Horseshoe-Inspired Cap and Analog Packaging
The equestrian inspiration appears not only in the fragrance philosophy but also in the bottle cap. According to Mok, its shape takes the horseshoe as its motif. On the Mid Mountain bottle, the rounded black cap and blue lettering on a cream-colored label are set against clear glass. The contrast of materials and colors creates an impression before one even picks up the perfume.
The packaging incorporates methods such as screen printing, letterpress printing, and applying stickers by hand. Campaigns are also photographed on film wherever possible, he says. The paper’s surface, the printing, and the appearance of the photographs are considered alongside the fragrance. In the work on these tangible elements, the founder’s experience in graphics and photography comes through.
Extending Perfume into Scents for Hands and Spaces
Hand creams and hand wash have been offered since the brand’s founding, with room sprays and fragrance tags added later. The horse-inspired tags are designed to hang in wardrobes, on doorknobs, and elsewhere. In addition to the time spent wearing perfume, washing one’s hands or returning to a room offers contact with the brand’s scents and design.
Chapter-based discovery sets are also available for getting to know all three fragrances in a chapter. The Chapter II set contains three 3ml bottles. Comparing the three allows one to explore their shared world and the differences one finds appealing. Here, reading a story connects with the actual choice of a fragrance.
An Aside…
In a 2025 FASHIONSNAP interview, Mok was asked about the relationship between the brand’s name and equestrianism. He replied that although he had experienced and watched some races, he had not been deeply involved in equestrian culture.
What he wanted to name the brand after was the pesade posture itself, with its simultaneous strength and elegance. A designer who had long attended to form and balance found a direction for his own creativity within a movement. That small choice became a word connecting everything from the fragrance compositions to the bottles.
References
- QUI: Interview with Mok Young-kyo, “Artful Fragrances with Travel Memories Deep Within” (November 19, 2025) — The opening words, travel, sharing through writing, collaboration with perfumers, and the cap — https://qui.tokyo/beauty/2510-fragrance-pesade
- FASHIONSNAP: Interview with the founder and creative director (2025, last updated September 10) — The desire for independence, scent and memory, his role, analog techniques, and the equestrian anecdote — https://www.fashionsnap.com/article/pesade-interview/
- pesade: About — Founder, founding year, name, and chapters composed of three fragrances — https://en.pesade.kr/shopinfo/company.html
- Beauty Pambianconews: Interview with Mok Young-kyo (June 15, 2026) — Origins and studies, opening the Milan store, and dialogue with customers — https://beauty.pambianconews.com/2026/06/mok-young-kyo-pesade-partiamo-da-milano-per-crescere-con-negozi-fisici/81097
- FASHION SEOUL: pesade launch announcement (May 16, 2022) — The first three perfumes and hand care — https://fashionseoul.com/214409
- heypop: Report on the Hannam flagship opening (August 12, 2022) — Opening date and the table made with Lee Kwangho — https://heypop.kr/n/38121/
- NONTEXT: pesade Hannam FSS (2022) — The designers’ account of the store’s layout and concept — https://nontext.kr/pesade
- THE BIGDATA: Seongsu flagship opening announcement (March 2024) — Opening the second store — https://www.thebigdata.co.kr/view.php?ud=2024032011104685099aeda69934_23
- MSY: Press release introducing Chapter II and the Japanese rollout (April 21, 2025) — Full-scale expansion in Japan and the chapter’s inspiration — https://prtimes.jp/main/html/rd/p/000000001.000161376.html
- pesade: Stockist — Current retailers in Japan — https://en.pesade.kr/shopinfo/stockist.html
- ELLE Korea: Interviews with K-beauty representatives (2026) — Mok on overseas expectations and the brand’s world — https://www.elle.co.kr/article/1905293
- NOSE SHOP: U NOSE SHOP brand introduction (2026) — Retail availability and the Chapter I theme — https://noseshop.jp/blogs/blog/u-noseshop-lineup
- pesade: An Unseen 100ml — Fragrance composition — https://pesade.jp/products/perfume-100ml-an-unseen
- pesade: De Nude 100ml — Fragrance composition — https://pesade.jp/products/parfum-100ml-de-nude
- pesade: Oud Blond 100ml — Fragrance composition — https://pesade.jp/products/parfum-100ml-oud-blond
- pesade: Mid Mountain 100ml — Fragrance composition and bottle — https://pesade.jp/products/eau-de-parfum-100ml-mid-moutain
- pesade: Orris Cocoon 100ml — Fragrance composition — https://pesade.jp/products/perfume-100ml-orris-cocoon
- pesade: Discovery Set Chapter II — Specifications of the chapter-based discovery set — https://pesade.jp/products/discovery-parfum-set-capter2
- MSY: Room spray launch press release (2025) — Expansion into home fragrance — https://prtimes.jp/main/html/rd/p/000000002.000161376.html
- MSY: Press release on participation in Salon de Parfum 2026 (September 30, 2026) — The shape and use of the fragrance tags — https://prtimes.jp/main/html/rd/p/000000011.000161376.html
