Colette (Paris)

213 r. St-Honoré 75001 Paris.
Tel.: 33 (0)1 55 35 33 90. Fax: 33 (0)1 55 35 33 99

In March 1997, a new contemporary-style fashion and design boutique opened in rue St-Honoré. Just a few months later, Colette, named after its founder, had become a byword with the Paris in-crowd. What's behind its success?  

Colette is neither a fashion creator nor a designer but simply a lady of taste and her idea was to share her good taste with others by proposing a selection of everything she likes in every domain. With its mixture of clothes, contemporary-design objects, make-up, music and literature, Parisians who have not yet visited this boutique are in the minority.
Colette's selection would not have been complete if she had not added a nutritive element. At a time when wine bars were ten-a-penny, she needed an original concept in keeping with the general atmosphere of the boutique. The capital's first and only (at least for the moment) water bar rose to the surface.
In a sober décor designed by Arnaud Montigny and furnished by the Belgian designer, Marteen Van Seeveren, simple vegetarian or international dishes are available at any time, including high-quality desserts such as Mulot's tarte Tatin and chocolate macaroons from Ladurée, not forgetting a plunge into the thousand and one secrets of Adam's Ale!  

Ninety different types of water, displayed almost as works of art, have been selected for the design of the bottle (some are exclusive items), particular properties (with or without sodium, degree of oxygenation, sparkling or still, etc.) or their originality (Cloud Juice, for instance, is composed of 7,800 drops of rainwater collected in Tasmania).
The bar also serves Fruit Water (water with the addition of natural fruit extracts), which has since become a popular supermarket item, water-based fruit juices presented like small bottles of wine, and a few organic products and rare condiments including some from OAO (with packaging designed by Starck) and Harvey Nichols.
Located in the boutique's basement, the water bar has quickly earned itself a reputation and has become a favourite meeting-place for the area's in-crowd.

Source: Grégory Bacou, Via Michelin