Copper by Comme des Garcons

Perfume that didn’t turn out well; I don’t understand how they put it on sale. You can’t wear it—it’s unbearable for the person using it, a scent that makes life feel endless.

It gives me nausea because of how green it smells. Same reaction I get from seaweed during low tide. I guess it’s the galbanum. It leaves me with a sensation like matcha or tea.

Points for originality—I’ve never heard anything like this, and I’m glad I didn’t. It smells like gritty sand with a metallic sting. Rarely does this happen to me, but I can’t believe anyone would like it. I can’t comment on longevity because I rejected it so strongly that I removed it at Sephora in under five minutes with alcohol and sprayed something else over it.

People say Comme des Garçons has lost its way, that they’re no longer doing such experimental things and that the bottle names and aesthetics don’t match the scents (Concrete, for example). Here, they’ve redeemed themselves. Copper is an incredibly strange perfume. It’s less a fragrance and more an experience. It starts with a very realistic, intense galbanum—sharp, with a taste of sap and twisted green stems being squeezed. So green (is there anything greener than galbanum in perfumery?). That greenness gives it metallic sparks. After five minutes, a dirty, dry tobacco enters, making that greenness super earthy; in my mind, I see peeling metal oxides. Not bloody iron rust, but the earthy rust of old swings almost no one uses, the metal bars that bend. That scent that stings when you smell the red deformities of hands after swinging on frozen chains. Abruptly, a reddish amber appears, swallowing and canceling everything for 10 minutes. Then it yields, and the dirty, earthy tobacco returns, for hours: effluvia of amber and tobaccoed vanilla, dirty and earthy, pumped by the pulse of the wrist and releasing welding sparks that hit you without warning. This phase overwhelms me so much; it eats me up and leaves no room to breathe. It’s too sweet and potent, with no respite to seek out the dirtiness of the tobacco, which feels like the cure is worse than the disease. The finish is a balsamic myrrh, playing between warmth and marble-like, and I find a lot of sense in it. The longevity on me is enormous, easily 12 hours, with good projection. Copper plays with brutal contrasts, from warm tones to metallic, and I think it’s right for recreating that cold, reddish metal. I didn’t like it at all. The phases have abrupt changes, poorly assembled; it’s a scent that disturbs me, angsts me, and puts me on guard. I’ve read it’s similar to Grand Soir by MFK (maybe a vibe) and some Amouage I haven’t tried. Those are two perfumes that seem to be loved a lot. So, for those who like oriental perfumes, dirty amber, and lots of personality, give this experiment that CdesG pulled out of its sleeve a try.