Christophe Roussel

The Camélias case, chocolate and macarons

Colour-blocked pâtisseries, boxed chocolates and rows of macarons: the Camélias case is arranged to be looked at before it is bought from, and this is Maison Roussel’s main address. Christophe Roussel, chocolatier and pastry chef, signs the house, and the stated intention is to bousculer les codes, revisiting French classics with precisely dosed flavours and a designer’s finish. The chocolates took the Tablette d’Or from the Club des Croqueurs de Chocolat in 2024. The maison runs seven points of sale, across La Baule, Pornichet, Guérande and Paris Montmartre, with this one at the centre.

A counter, not a salon

Service is retail. You come in, look along the display of pastries, chocolates and macarons, and buy with help from the counter; there is no seating, no table service and no daytime café format. It is quick, and it is not somewhere to settle with a drink. Boxes are made up at the counter, and the packaging is part of the product, because a Roussel box is built to be handed over.

The distinction matters because the same name appears elsewhere in La Baule in a different shape. Yummy par Christophe Roussel is the maison’s separate bakery and snack concept, and it works nothing like this. Camélias is the boutique version, built around the chocolate and pâtisserie programme.

Let the case decide

The best approach is to take the day’s case at face value: pâtisseries, chocolates, macarons and whatever seasonal creation is current. Finish and colour are half of what the house is selling, so the pieces reward being chosen on sight.

Beyond the everyday case, the same vocabulary extends to occasion work, wedding cakes, grand-format pastries and personalised chocolates, and to a range built to travel, including macarons and the Nantais cake. Staff are attentive and the presentation is careful, which suits a boutique where the sweets are treated as objects. Macarons are the easiest thing to carry any distance, and the Nantais cake the sturdiest.

Two house habits fill in the picture. The maison’s first book gathers fifty of its emblematic recipes, and its anti-waste practice, Sauvez les gâteaux, puts the previous day’s pastries out for collection at the end of the day instead of binning them. For La Baule Escoublac, this is the polished stop, anchored by Roussel’s chocolates and his macaron programme.