Comme des Garcons - Avignon

The picture above shows the Popes´Palace in Avignon. Doesn´t look that cozy if you ask me, I guess hoem decorating wasn´t that big in the 14th century. But I´m sure the Popes´Palace have a lot of interesting rooms.

Space, greatness and a ceratin atmosphere you might find in churches. The biggest church I´ve visit is St Pauls cathedral in London, it´s quite a time ago, but the space under the big dome is impressing. A small countryside church doesn´t have the same space, but there is something special about the atmosphere in chuches even if the church isn´t so big. It would surprise me if that kind of atmosphere wouldn´t to be found in other holy buildings like temples, synagogues and mosques.

Comme des Garcon´s Insence-serie is probably CdG´s most popular line. It consists of five different perfumes; Kyoto, Jaisalmer, Zagorsk, Ouarzazate and Avignon, each of them representing one of the big world religions. Kyoto: buddhism and shintoism, Jaisalmer: hinduism, Zagorsk: christian orthodoxy, Ouarzazate, islam and Avignon: catholicism. The protestantism isn´t among them, because incense isn´t used in the protestantic rituals.

Avignon is said to smell like a catholic church, and I have nothing to say about that. But, what I really think it´s succeed with, is that it manage to smell like the space in a catholic church, or the space in any big, stone building. Avignon manage to be a perfume filled with both emptiness, space and atmosphere. The space in Avignon is filled with that kind of atmosphere created by thousands of candles being burned in that space trough the years. An atmosphere of golden carvings, mural painting with flake off medeival paint and wooden benches so weared down by all the butts sitting on them during the years. An atmosphere of cold and thick stonewalls that has experienced the seasons changing for hundreds of years. A scented atmosphere of a space where incense has trough it´s fragrance in to the smallest corner, where the wooden benches would smell of it for a long time if they where carried out in the sunshine. An atmosphere filled with prayers and holy singing. An atmosphere of holyness.

Yes, i find a greatness in Avignon that´s discouraging. Why should an agnostic like me go around and smell of magnificent holyness? I find myself to easy, on the border to profane something I don´t belive in. A beliving catholic maybe find comfort and ease in Avignon? I don´t really being comfortable with going around smelling like a magnificent and holy building either.

Well yes, I have an odd drawing towards Avignon. In almost the same way as I, raised in a not very religious home in a secular protestantic country still can feel an attraction to catholicism as a religion. The great and beautiful you doesn´t really encounter in protestantic churches and far less if you don´t even visit them. The secret chanting on latin. The saints. The greatness of Virgin Mary. The confession, oh, to be forgiven. But there is also doubble moral standards and hypocritic beliefs, questionable priests and modern people with one foot still left in medeival mysticism.

Well, you realise that people that think that perfume is only a scented experience, doesn´t smell the same way as I do. To me a perfume can be as throwing a stone i a calm lake, making rings on the surface. Of course, not all perfumes has that ability, but CdG´s Avignon sure has it.