Comme des Garcons / Odeur Du Theatre Du Chatelet Acte 1

Hi. Remember me? I used to do perfume reviews, regular-like. Then I went on a great big goofing-off jag, and in the process misplaced my lust for hunting and gathering smell intel. But once a fumehead, never not a fumehead, because today I tried a brand new perfume and suddenly needed to talk to somebody about it. And who do I know who’s all ears when it comes to matters of the nose? You, dear fumies. And I’m really grateful you’re here.

Tonight I bumped into the new Comme des Garçons release, Odeur Du Théâtre Du Châtelet Acte 1, entirely by accident. I was all rubberized after yoga class and was floating through the jangle of Piccadilly Circus on my way home south of the Rio Thames, when I wafted towards Rei Kawakubo’s London emporium of aggressive avant-garde whimsy, Dover Street Market.

“Mmm!” I mmm’d to myself in a mellow stupor, “What I really need to maintain the cozy is a pair of those giant German wool socks they sell here.” 

Maintain the cozy with giant German wool socks.

I woo-wooed my way inside Dover Street Market, intending a beeline for the Labour and Wait kiosk, purveyor of socks made out of half a pound of wool per pair. Not quite as hardcore as having an actual sheep sit on your feet, but more or less in the same farmyard. (Labour and Wait specialize in olden days household goods likeliest found in the cottage of a 19th century longshoreman with exquisitely refined aesthetics.) But I was sidetracked by the pyramid of Comme perfumes just inside the front door, and dawdled to pay my respects to old friends Avignon and Comme des Garçons 2.

There at the top of the pyramid were the chunky glass bricks containing Odeur Du Théâtre Du Châtelet Acte 1, and up surged the ol’ insatiable quest for olfactory pleasure. Stella got her groove back, you guys! I came, I saw, I smelled—and these are my findings.

The bricky bottle and the “odeur” designation marks Théâtre Du Châtelet as part of the Odeur 53 and Odeur 71 gang, but it’s not as abstract and pleasingly weird as either of those. Instead, Théâtre Du Châtelet (perfumer Caroline Dumur) puffs forth in a diffuse musky billow of soapy rose, much in the manner of Le Labo’s Chicago City Exclusive, Baie Rose 26 (perfumer Frank Voekl).

Théâtre Du Châtelet's musk is airy and hot, the fuzzy way fresh-spun cotton candy feels when it’s dissolving on your tongue. Sweet pink heat, a little suffocating. The initial soapiness blurs and softens as the rose becomes more evident, but before it blooms fully, a powdery iris defocuses proceedings. Once I zero in on the iris, I get to thinking about that puffball Godzilla of a girly perfume: Love, Chloé (now discontinued, shame).

Théâtre Du Châtelet never blows up into the powder exhaust pipe mode of Love, Chloé, instead hovering in “hot laundry” territory. And even though it shares the musk, rose, pepper and cedar of Baie Rose 26, the CdG stays quieter than Le Labo’s shriller, denser, more metallic offering.

Comme’s latest is not anything I need to smell like, but good on CdG Parfums for venturing beyond their usual “woods, woods, and more woods” remit. Théâtre Du Châtelet is styled as “Acte 1”. I wonder what’s in store after the intermission?