When you only see well-worn bags that have had their day, she sees great potential. Apron around the waist, in a workshop that smells of leather, Lise Harribey, 42, sorts with an expert eye pieces of leather, buckles, clasps and zippers intended for a second life.
It looks like she’s been doing this all her life, but this communicator has recently matured a retraining project that has led to the creation of a business, Mutane, in February 2021 in Lapouyade in Gironde. She manufactures satchels and small leather goods (pouches, wallets, card holders, purses, etc.) exclusively from second-hand leather, recovered from the Relay Gironde, individuals or in the recycling center. This leather, if not recovered, ends up buried or incinerated. It is not recyclable.
Creations based on findings
“I only work with genuine, post-consumer leather; I don’t buy new leather or off-cuts”, she specifies from the outset, very attentive to the sobriety of her project. “I dismantle the bags (sometimes collected from the Relais) for the buckles (magnetic buttons, zippers, etc.) and I also have a partnership with the Smicval, mixed Intercommunal union of Collection and Valorization of Libournais and Haute -Gironde, to recover sofa leather”. Until now, it was his father, who assiduously frequented the recycling centers like any good handyman, who found him leather sofas to carve up.
“On the sofas, we manage to recover the back and the sides, sometimes the backrest and the cushions too”, explains Lise Harribey. Once the sofas have been scalped, she cleans the most beautiful pieces with soapy water, administers a renovating balm to them if necessary, and can even re-dye them in certain places. “The challenge is to know how to manufacture in series to optimize both time and the economic model, but with the constraint of the resource” she delivers. Her creations are conditioned by her finds because she compels herself not to acquire any new piece. She only buys her yarn on end of stock or empty workshops. “With this sofa, she shows, I told myself that I could make a satchel or two and finally there is a scratch in the wrong place and I can only make one. »
Made in France, artisanal
Once the materials have been identified, it’s classic leather goods, understand “cutting, patronage and assembly” but with already worn leather. It takes him an average of four to five hours to make a satchel, the flagship piece of his collection. It was designed for the end-of-study project for her leather goods CAP, for her son’s return to school. Matching pencil cases, pouches, notebook covers are also made by the leather goods maker for its “back to school” range.
“There may be two but not three identical bags, these are very small series”, explains Lise Harribey. To those who are nervous about the price, 160 euros for a satchel, she replies that it is made in France by craftsmen and that “a plain satchel can be transformed into a handbag after having had its time at school. » Robust, the items can also be repaired with Mutane, if necessary. Trials were carried out with an ESAT (employing people with disabilities) in Mérignac and an adapted company in Charente to assign them some of the tasks. “This SSE (social and solidarity economy) cost has also been integrated into the price of the products”, she specifies.
Lise Harribey hopes to soon offer bananas and tote bags, using very soft jacket leather. Among its first customers, some of the 106 co-owners of the Possibility, a third place in which she set up her workshop and which has existed for four years. Word of mouth and events in the third place have already given it initial visibility. Her site will become a retailer in the coming months and will make “the next leather goods” even more accessible, as she likes to call it.