“Fashion is a sector that feeds off everything that surrounds it” – interview with the founders of Laperruque – Déclic #7

(Cover photo and article credit: Aurélie S. - From left to right: Robin Hureau, Robin Nozay)

Our guests of the month, you may already know them. They are not that far away from the BonneGueule universe : same path (from enthusiast blog to business creation), same love for fashion, know-how and artisanal spirit . Their names are Robin Nozay and Robin Hureau. If we had to distribute the roles, we would say that the first "manages" and the second "manufactures": the two imagine and work together on the world of leather goods through their brand Laperruque since 2015.

It's an autumn morning. It's gray and a little cool. We are soon approaching the Laperruque boutique located a few steps from the Parisian metro Temple. The interior is minimalist and white, with beautiful leather products whose history and hidden treasures we are about to discover.

We can see rolls of leather at the bottom, a probable workshop in the basement. It's not very big, but the main thing is elsewhere: the two men we are going to meet are generous, educational and of course passionate about their profession . It's Robin Nozay who welcomes us and it's hard not to notice his very beautiful corduroy pants and turtleneck .

We then discover the shop, we visit the workshop, we take a few photos and we learn a thousand things about the leather trades. The meeting continues on a corner of the table, between a cup of coffee and a few customer visits.

DO YOU BOTH WORK ON MACHINERY?

Robin Hureau - It happens. But when Robin comes to work with us on sewing, it's a very bad sign: it means we're underwater! He knows exactly our techniques and the general operation of the machines. He helps out a lot when things are a little hot or there is a repetitive task to do.

It's mainly me who is in the manufacturing and has been since the beginning. Robin takes care of the brand in the broad sense. He tends to present himself as someone who does a lot of management but he is also the one who takes a lot of responsibility for aesthetic and creative choices. In general, we design the products together , we also talk a lot about the design and then I manufacture.

WHAT ATTRACTED YOU TO EACH OTHER?

Robin Nozay - We had our respective blogs. We had a somewhat similar approach to men's fashion , we talked about the same subjects.

We met through a mutual friend Laurent Laporte. We got along well. We had this thing that was a little humble, not ultra-extroverted on the subject. In fashion, and in men's fashion too, you can quickly find yourself surrounded by rather extroverted personalities, with a lot of confidence, who will assert truths.

We were more in restraint, discovery, curiosity . We very quickly had the idea of ​​merging our two blogs. So four of us ended up creating this blog called Redingote.fr .

This was the time when blogs were much like today's Instagram influencers . We were courted by brands to do product trials, events, that kind of thing. That’s how we met Geoffrey and Benoît at blogging events.

At the time, we were either students or in careers that didn't really appeal to us. Basically, I was a computer engineer, I had just finished my studies and I was working in finance in London, which I didn't really like. I had this passion for fashion. Writing articles, doing research, everything like meeting designers, it was something I was really passionate about.

We professionalized the blog a little. That is to say, we tried to publish one article per week. We had discussions even though Robin lived in Orléans, me in London. We had Skype evenings where we talked about all the subjects that interested us. We had a good time, it was pretty cool and we also talked about the articles that we had obviously just released.

WHY A PARTICULAR FASHION BLOG?

Robin Hureau - I started to ask myself questions about the way I dressed in college. When you arrive at law school, you project yourself, you wonder what you should be like when you are a law student.

That’s how the interest in fashion came. At first, it was to understand how we dress , why certain things cost more than others. You also try to unravel the mystery: why is there all this fuss around fashion weeks and why is it such a serious subject in the end?

For me, it became an obsession quite quickly. It was right at the time when brands were starting to communicate a lot about their heritage, their know-how, etc. That’s when I really became obsessed with craftsmanship. I started tinkering in my corner. In fact, I had never done manual labor until I was 22.

Robin Nozay - It's perhaps a nerd 's approach, not wanting to stop at the surface of a subject, to go deeper, to understand how things are done...

Robin Hureau - And the real question too: when do you get value for your money? When you start to engage in these questions, you say to yourself "I have this budget for a pair of pants, which is the best?" Quickly, you come to questions of quality and durability .

I wasn't too interested in the silhouettes. What mattered to me was more the questions of know-how. On the other hand, thanks to this, I had the opportunity to leave law school and become a ready-to-wear salesman.

I then became interested in questions of silhouettes to meet the needs of my clients: sizing, knowing when a shirt is well worn or even what is interesting to say to the person leaving the cabin fitting. They need an opinion. As a seller, that’s what we’re for.

HOW DID YOU GO FROM MEN’S FASHION BLOG TO LEATHER GOODS?

Robin Hureau - At that time, I had migrated from Orléans to Paris to become a ready-to-wear salesman. I was with Célia Granger who now does tailor-made products in the 7th arrondissement of Paris.

Very beautiful craftsmanship, an incredible woman, who let me be curious. I came back to see her often, I asked her questions, she gave me comments, etc... And then one day she said to me "Listen Robin, you come a little too often so why don't you come one day a week at home? "She didn't give me any goals, it was just to be there, to try things.

She started by giving me an exercise: cutting a rectangle out of cardboard. This is where you realize that it is very demanding: 1.5mm is not 1.2mm. From there, I tried making cardboard rectangles for several weeks, until it was perfect, with right angles, etc.

It sounds simple like that, but cutting thick cardboard to make a perfect rectangle is very demanding. It requires a lot of precision. I was hooked pretty quickly and precision became an obsession . Cut straight. It's so demanding that I felt quite challenged and at the same time I saw that I was achieving a rather credible result.

I made my first wallet there, cutting cardboard for three weeks at first because you make your cardboard templates before you cut leather. In general, when it works in cardboard or paper, it will work in leather because paper is much more demanding than leather, it tears, you can't pull on it, it leaves much less room for blurring artistic.

WOULD YOU SAY HE IS YOUR MENTOR?

Robin Hureau - Yes completely, whom I thank from time to time but not enough. She was a construction engineer before. She wanted to return to something that she could really control from A to Z. She became a leatherworker.

She offers tailor-made products so she really starts from nothing to arrive at something very beautiful. She has all the constraints of her previous job, but in addition she has the luxury of choosing the means of production and really having an impact on her work .

She had attended a school called the Ateliers Grégoire and which is now called the Fabrique . I did the same training. Participating in this workshop with Célia showed me that it was possible to retrain if you wanted . I saw that she was doing this full time and that she had time to do great things. Basically, it opened a door for me: “oh hey, we can do that too”. I said to myself why not.

I could see that it was becoming more than a hobby. There's really this thing of obsession, of precision, of achieving quality things in the end. We can feed this obsession and make a career out of it . I decided to go to this school.

At the same time as all this, we started an online store with Robin, La Belle Echoppe, which only sold We Can Doo things and it was a hit.

YOU WORK WITH LIVING LIFE. HOW DO YOU SITUATE YOURSELF IN RESPECT TO THIS?

Robin Hureau - We explain a lot to customers that we only work with by-products from the food industry . We don't go looking for beavers or reptiles, like a lot of luxury brands. These animals were bred mainly for their skins. For us, what we work with as skin is waste .

During confinement, manufacturers were forced to throw away a lot of it because people continued to eat meat. There are animals that have been slaughtered and if we don't transform it into leather, we don't do anything with the skin. It is one of the first forms of recycling.

Robin Nozay - When we started using animal furs, it was the rest of the animals that we had hunted for meat that we used for clothing. It was a first recycling. The leather comes from there. It's really relevant today except that it's not very innovative.

There is also a durability aspect with leather which is important. Today we do not yet have an alternative material, which has the characteristics that make leather something truly exceptional .

ARE YOU ALLUING VEGAN LEATHER FOR EXAMPLE?

Robin Nozay - Yes, we do. But with vegan leather, we are more faced with a kind of non-woven material, like Tyvek or that kind of thing, these materials that are used to make gowns in hospitals. They are covered with a sort of somewhat plastic membrane, often a polyurethane derivative.

It is less durable because it is less strong than leather. And what's more, it's plastic which gives this leather appearance. It doesn't have the aging and attachment characteristics we're looking for . I think that “faux leather” or these plant-based alternatives to leather are not necessarily good solutions.

Robin Hureau - It's coated in plastic! It starts to crack pretty quickly...

Robin Nozay - And it releases lots of micro-residue into nature too. More prosaically, cotton canvas or linen canvas is a great plant-based alternative to leather . It's not innovative so we don't talk about it too much. Even Louis Vuitton, with its coated canvas, is a great alternative to leather. It's a real answer to this problem, for people looking for vegan alternatives to leather.

Robin Hureau - “It’s apple so it’s sustainable”, that doesn’t work for me. It's not intellectually satisfying because it's a lie. Vegan leather is not yet sufficiently advanced for it to be satisfactory. We have some in stock but we don't offer it. When you are a craftsman, one of your first duties when you want to continue trying to be good is to experiment. In truth, if I want to be complete, I have no right not to know how to work with material .

IS THE SECOND HAND SOMETHING THAT SPEAKS TO YOU?

Robin Nozay - Since the blog days, and even before, we were always hanging out in thrift stores . When I met Robin, I gave him an M-65 . It's an American military jacket that I had in duplicate. I bought one that was pretty good and in the end, I found another one that was more in my size. I was thinking of reselling it and then finally, I gave it to Robin.

Robin Hureau - The first time I met him! We were off to an extremely good start. It was right my size.

Robin Nozay - We go to thrift stores and flea markets a lot. The objects that we see in these environments, which are resold, are a bit of the best of the past , what has survived, what is still there, what still has a certain current value. We want to make objects like that. It is the opposite of waste and fast fashion . An object which in 20-30 years can be resold at the Vanves or Clignancourt flea markets, it is a truly durable object. It's not going to be pollution.

Robin Hureau - It will last a long time, you will be able to pass it on. We forget at the moment that sustainable means “to last a long time” .

What is certain is that faux leather, whether it is apple or pineapple covered in plastic, does not last long because it does not age well. You stop loving your object. If you're unlucky, it's not functional either because a flexible material that cracks, the slightly resistant layer of which falls away, it will get holes. In short, it is not satisfactory.

Robin Nozay - This is a real question in design too. It's true that we've been talking more about crafts lately, but we also have to choose and understand what we draw . From the start, we wanted to be in a sort of claimed sobriety. This is a way for us to achieve sustainability.

You have a real responsibility when you create something , produce it and sell it. We must ensure that this product can last as long as possible. We never talk about planned obsolescence in fashion, but intrinsically fashion is planned obsolescence .

It comes from style, from the fact that one day we liked a pair of floral patterned pants and that two years later we say to ourselves "but why did I buy that? I hardly wore it and I don't even have it worn". It will no longer interest anyone because it will be out of fashion, we will give it away, it will be resold at Guerrisol or elsewhere but no one will want it. It's pollution. We suspect when drawing it that no one is going to use it until it is completely worn out.

There is a kind of responsibility in design that is important: you have to make objects that will still have meaning in 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 years . It's a real effort. It can be tempting to make stylish effects to be in tune with the times and this actually makes objects easy to sell but you have to resist!

Robin Hureau - Slowness, sobriety, it's pretty good to resist that. As I told you, we still remain very curious about new materials . We must not close ourselves off, if one day something satisfactory appears. Some designers are now trying to learn to work circularly, on something that will disappear, will have no impact in the long term, it will not even be waste. Why not ? This is an interesting avenue but in the current state of our knowledge, we have not succeeded in finding a more interesting material than leather.

Robin Nozay - What is important to us is really the solidity and durability of the product . For me, today all the brands that claim to be eco-friendly because they manufacture locally, with things labeled GOTS are great, so much the better except that in my opinion it is a shift in attention and attention is not shouldn't be about how it's done. You need to see the product life cycle in its entirety .

All this aims to remove the customer's feeling of guilt so that they can enjoy their little purchasing pleasure, this linked to all the marketing engines to sell and make people fall in love on a whim. That's what's harmful. If you make something organic and you do a promotion for Black Friday to sell it, there's no point. The person will buy it because there is a promotion. She will lose her reason to buy, and in the end she may not wear it the way and for as long as she should.

Robin Hureau - It resonates well with what we do. We have a lot of customers who hesitate for a long time. That is to say, they think and allow themselves to be convinced. We are not at all “ pushy ” in sales.

Robin Nozay - We have lots of products on order. Customers wait 2 months to have an item from us. It's not an irrational impulse when you buy a product from us.

Robin Hureau - I felt quite guilty at one point. There was a lot of waiting, always lots of problems to resolve, especially when you make so many types of objects at the same time in the same small workshop. But when people receive their order, they are delighted and they love these items. Now that you can shop on Amazon with delivery within the hour etc., it's pretty crazy that someone is willing to wait two months for a glasses case , which is ultimately just a leather rectangle.

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THE TERM “ACCESSORIES” ABOUT LEATHER GOODS?

Robin Nozay - We're not here to save the world. We try to offer an interesting alternative to what exists, but the object that has the least impact is the object that already exists . We must not forget it. We projected ourselves into an ideal, futuristic world where we would be aware of all the pollution we produce.

What would be left? Second-hand, and from craftsmen who would do their work in the most qualitative way possible, a bit like us. That's what we tell ourselves. Proximity too. People come to see us. It’s a real cool experience to see how it’s made. We try to nourish the product with lots of emotional things which also mean that it will be loved for longer by the person who buys it.

Robin Hureau - We don't really try in the sense that we don't need to force ourselves to do that. We're just happy to share what we do.

Robin Nozay - We also have customers who buy online on the other side of the world. The other day we shipped a purse to Honolulu! We sell quite a bit abroad. We have resellers in Japan for example. They don't really have the village look when they use a Laperruque product but they have this quality, sober, durable side and so much the better. If the world were ideal, there would only be quality objects left, made responsibly and locally . When the world is like this, we will still be here because we will have planned this from the beginning!

Robin Hureau - Frankly, I would really like to walk around a city center where there are only artisans, food shops, etc. Anything that involves opticians, large chains, etc., you don't really want to pass by in a city center. Afterwards, it of course corresponds to the needs of many people, it must exist but the more artisans there are, the more it will become a consumption habit, the closer we will be to the objects with which we live .

Buying crafts means showing real respect for the objects you have and it creates real pleasure in use. When you have a beautiful ceramic bowl that you go to have your coffee in every day, you think about the artisan, how it was made, all those beautiful little irregularities.

We come back to somewhat Japanese things, wabi-sabi, perfection in imperfection, etc. All this creates something very strong on the object. It’s the opposite of disposable. I think we need a new materialism today which would consist of loving objects and knowing how to appreciate them in the long term and make them last. It could be a solution to current problems.

IT CAN ALSO HELP LIVING TOGETHER...

Robin Hureau - Yes, because you don't have to buy an object: you can make it too. This is also why we do discovery workshops. You convey a message about craftsmanship . Instead of watching a series on Netflix, you can get the stuff you need. You will learn a lot about yourself, the material, the tools, a whole heritage of cultures around manufacturing . But once again: a lot on yourself.

I remember the first times I made objects that I was happy with (it took a long time eh) but it gave me self-confidence. “I can do this,” even though I had no idea before. It was even a bit of magic, “how things are made”.

ARE YOU “CONSUMERS” OF CLOTHING?

Robin Hureau - I still often dress the same way. I really like cargo pants , anything that is workwear. I really like a brand called Camber USA which makes t-shirts and jersey. I also decided to stop buying sneakers. I bought second-hand sneakers which all ended up failing. Normal: they were glued soles. Mostly I bought them vintage, so the glue had a lot of years behind it. Now I buy Paraboot , beautiful leather shoes that can be repaired. It's super comfortable. I like to always wear the same things.

Robin Nozay - He really always dresses the same! We have this great white blouse from Brut Clothing . These are old painter's coats, we bought quite a few because we can get stains in the workshop, etc. It's practical for the pockets too. We have a recurring joke: as soon as we look for something in the workshop, it is inevitably found in one of Robin's pockets . When we have this approach, we are completely the opposite of Nike for example. We can no longer buy Nikes. It is not possible.

Robin Hureau - And yet the shapes make me really want them sometimes. They are very strong. But when I think about the manufacturing process, the future of these objects, it doesn't age well. So no.

Robin Nozay - My velvet pants come from De Bonne Facture . Robin and I don't buy many new things. For my part, when I do it, I make sure that it is things that correspond to our values ​​and what we do too. Lots of vintage too. I have a very particular delusion about vintage shirts.

In my previous career I had access to bespoke artisan shirts that I had made at Turnbull & Asser in London, which were beautiful. I wore them for 10 years until they were completely torn, smashed, then I made rags from them... Nice little anecdote: we have rags in the workshop which are made of Sea Island cotton with my initials on it. The level of the cloth is rather high!

When you start entrepreneurship, you suddenly lower your income and your standard of living. I'm a little out of consumption . I tend to go to thrift stores where you find piles of clothes for €1 and I find that quite cool. Sometimes also quite selective thrift stores.

For example, I have a collection of handmade shirts that were made for other people. I find it quite beautiful because you have the artisanal side of the shirt, you have very beautiful, very luxurious, very soft, very durable materials with the initials of someone unknown. It brings a little touch of poetry to this garment : you can imagine lots of things, try to guess the name of the person who wore it. In particular, I have a Charvet shirt with MP embroidery and Paul de Brut always says that it's Matt Pokora's shirt.

I haven't bought much in a while, but what we like are the manufacturer's brands. Camber is an example. They have their own workshop, they make their clothes. John Smedley is a brand that I also really appreciate. These are brands that are attached to know-how, a factory, a workshop or products that they have mastered for decades . This is the example of Paraboot too, Weston . It's what we find beautiful in clothing, things that have history. So John Smedley, GlenMac type knits, William Lockie, Inis Meáin , etc. Or Charvet for shirts.

Robin Hureau - Robin also gave me a vintage Charvet shirt with my initials, which he found on Ebay, in my size. Quite early in our relationship. He can't help it. He has something of an obsession. He sees it, “it’s magnificent, it doesn’t cost much, I’m here”. He's a bit of a fisherman: he goes fishing for fleas.

Robin Nozay - I find it pretty cool to hang out at the Montreuil flea market with this angle. As a former buyer for a department store, I've seen so many clothes and brands that I can sort through them. I can see an unknown brand of a weird blouse and notice that the buttons are mother-of-pearl, that it's English seam on the side, that it's a beautiful shirt with a beautiful finish and real know-how behind it.

What is beautiful is extracting quality by knowing how to recognize it . By touching, by looking. I often find the substance more interesting than the shape of a garment. I can wear shirts that are way too big or that don't necessarily fit me, just because the story behind it or the material is too beautiful. It brings important sentimental value that means you will cherish the object.

Robin Hureau - Silhouettes are something that quickly faded into the background for us. But what's great about when you start getting interested in fashion and clothes is that it has so many underlying things: books, films, art. It's an excuse to watch lots of things.

Robin Nozay - What remains interesting in the more trendy fashion sector, and this is perhaps what attracted us when we were younger, is that it is a sector which aspires and which feeds on everything that surrounds it . Fashion is an applied art. It opens up to photography, directing, painting, etc. All these elements are found in the designers' inspirations and in the universe that they will create around the clothes or accessories that they will sell.

It's beautiful, it's super rich. People regularly push us towards creative worlds and that allows us to discover lots of very beautiful and very interesting things. It is important. Even if we are going to do rather refined, rather simple things, we try to animate these objects from a communication point of view through the images that we create and that we will publish, with things that are a little more creative.

We work with a photographer we really like: Audrey Corregan. She did our last lookbook. This trend side, we think that it can be turned towards the image and what will surround the object rather than on the object itself, which must remain lasting. Our point of view is also a creative point of view. It deserves to be highlighted.

We are very inspired by everything we call the vernacular . It is everything that is created in a rather spontaneous way by what surrounds people. For example, all that we call vernacular architecture are traditional ways of building a house in a defined territory.

For example, in Greece, in the vernacular way, they will make rather low, closed houses, using lime, white walls, etc. because with hundreds of years of process, they realized that this local stone was more practical for making well-insulated houses, that lime was good for keeping cool, etc. It gives something that is part of its territory, respects the environment in a fairly natural way because it is made with the objects that are around.

It's something that interests us a lot because it's a kind of creation without the spirit of creation . It is not the designer who wonders what he will be able to invent. Finding vernacular around us, forms that are pure and functional, is something that interests us a lot and which will nourish us. We do it naturally in our design because we are very vernacular in our approach but if we have to take photos, window displays, we will work with things that are quite spontaneous, natural, which surround us.

The typical example is our latest showcase. We have some sort of metal installations. It was a metalworker customer who made them for us in a large factory in the Paris suburbs, which makes large metal things for the building industry. His boss lets him use his machines and scrap metal in the evening in his free time. He makes furniture for his friends, sculptures. He made some custom furniture and these structures that we use in windows. This is called wig work .

It is work carried out in a workshop or factory, which has always existed but which is not necessarily very documented, not necessarily official. Namely: how the worker or craftsman makes things for himself with the means of his business , which will be used to offer. These are often things that are done when the boss isn't looking. That’s why we’re called that: Laperruque.

We find that these objects which have been made in wigs are unique objects, which are outside the commercial framework, made with the taste and know-how of the artisan with a certain abstraction in relation to the designers and the needs of the market. These are magnificent objects, which have real poetry in them . It’s vernacular too. Everything is a bit linked to that. Something we would like to develop is an editorial section where we present objects made in wigs.

Robin Hureau - We don't really measure it because we work a lot in the office now but there is always some. There are lots of people who are always doing stuff. In the heyday of the working-class wig, it was something you did on networks. Traditionally, workers made pots or things like that for their homes, in Renault factories or others. To come up with a pan or a waffle iron, it was necessary to call on five different trades in the workshop. So you had to negotiate: “make one for your family too”, etc. You then find yourself with a set of kitchen utensils!

Robin Nozay - There are some pretty funny stories. One day, there was a boss of a metal parts factory who was contacted by a potential customer who came to him and asked "I would like you to sell me these coffee grinders that come out of your workshop and which are very good. And the boss says: “oh no no, we don’t make coffee grinders!”. In fact, there was a parallel chain that had been created which made coffee grinders, which had irrigated the entire sector! The anecdote has it that the boss said “no, it can’t be our workshop that did that, they’re too stupid!”.

Robin Hureau - There is a poetic, subversive side... We are resisting, in fact!

Robin Nozay - This is also done in graphic design today. Someone who is going to print flyers or catalogs for one of their clients, if the format is a little special, it has margins. If he adds personal things in his margins, the printing is the same price. So he can stick his own stuff in the margins. It's called a wig in graphic design. We had another photographer who told us that when he was a photo assistant, he developed his own photos at the same time as those of his boss. He called it a wig. It still exists and it's very interesting.

Robin Hureau - It also refers a lot to the unofficial tools that you create to make your job easier. There are lots of workers who would bend a key a little to make it easier to access a bolt on a car, etc. It's wig work. There's a real thing about crafting too, it's making your tools . This is another thing that stands out from an industrial chain where everything is done perfectly, with design offices and engineers working on templates, etc. There is a real pride in craftsmanship in doing your own things to help you carry out an operation more quickly or in a more qualitative way.

Robin Nozay - We hid a bit with our minimal design but in the end, after five years, we made a lot of creative choices. We're going to build on all that, create visuals using the vernacular, wig work, popular art , all these things which are the basis of our inspirations, our common tastes and which nourish the brand. This is the next step!