Elodie Michaud & Rebecca Fezard The renewal of forms and materials

They drew inspiration from the Loire Valley’s tufa stone to create Tufo, a coffee table that seems to have just emerged from a block of stone, embodying the work in progress with a unique, powerful aesthetic. The pair combined this rare creative gesture with ambitious innovation. Contrary to appearances, the table is not in tufa but Leatherstone^©, a new material made of leather scraps mixed with a natural, biodegradable binder free of petrochemicals.

Leatherstone^© is the result of five years of research and experimentation conducted jointly by Elodie and Rebecca, who also work with chemists on producing natural, biodegradable binders. This new material has all the technical and mechanical properties necessary for creating custom-made furniture. Here, it is used to wrap the very structure of the work, a salvaged wooden table. The project is challenging on two counts: recycling leather scraps, which account for some 15,000 tons of waste in France each year, and breathing new life into furniture that would otherwise become landfill. Tufo is not only a ground-breaking technological feat, but also a work of extraordinary craftsmanship.

Leatherstone^© uses traditional modelling techniques, as it is worked when the material is ductile (still soft). After drying, it gets very hard and can be worked like stone, a technique Elodie and Rebecca are exploring with undeniable success.

In 2016, they developed Leatherstone^© at hors-studio, a multidisciplinary agency where design, craftsmanship and research meet. It is now used to create furniture and interior design features (countertops, cladding, etc.). All of these projects reflect Elodie and Rebecca’s convictions: “Waste is a 21st-century resource. It has a place in a new cycle where innovation dialogues with craftsmanship and creativity with ecology."

Our goal is to create a continuous back-and-forth between our artisanal, cultural, and decorative heritage and the environmental challenges of our time.