Zèta is a french sustainable shoe brand created with the goal to "make beautiful with waste".
Our shoes are made from recycled materials and waste in Portugal within a family workshop, complying with working conditions and fair remuneration.
Our new project is to create the first French Workshop only devoted on : "Fashion and Circularity".
By collaborating with different local/national/international actors, our objective is to make people aware of ecologic consequences of fashion industry
Zeta is a French fashion sustainable brand based in Bordeaux. Our goal is to "make beautiful with waste".
Our shoes are made from recycled, recyclable and vegan materials : grape waste from local winemakers, corn waste, plastic recycled from Mediterranean sea, recycled cork and rubber. They are made in Portugal in a family workshop, respecting working conditions and offering fair remuneration.
Reusing, upgrading, recycling, working in a short circuit, respecting working conditions and offering fair remuneration are the key words of our company.
Since 2020, our shoes have been available on our website and through 10 european retailers. It allowed us to sell near 7000 pairs of shoes in one year and allowed to save 21 tons of waste from the garbage !
We are really convinced that fashion can be sustainable if we rebuild consumption habits.
In the future, our wish is to allow people to dress responsibly, with recycled, recovered and natural materials, in order to put an end to the excesses of fast fashion while educating people and raising environmental consciousness.
By creating the first French Workshop only devoted to "Fashion and Circularity", we want to create a beautiful alternative place in Bordeaux where people can learn about the ecologic impact of their consumption on each step of the fashion product lifecycle : a place where they can practice circularity with exchanges, repair corner, conferences and workshop. A place where everybody can have access to a quality product with second hand and new corners. A place who simply promotes circularity of fashion industry.
By collaborating with different local/national/international actors, our objective is to make people aware of ecologic consequences of fashion industry.
The name of this alternative place will be "Zetatelier”.
Please highlight how the concept/idea can be exemplary in this context
According to the latest ADEME report "Fashion upside down", the textile industry today is:
- 2% of greenhouse gas emissions in the world
- 4 billion tons of clothing waste thrown away every year in Europe alone
- 9 kg of textiles purchased by a French person during the year
- 70% of the clothes in our wardrobe are unworn
- 285 showers for the manufacture of jeans
According to the same conclusions of ADEME, clothing production will have increased by 63% by 2030.
It is therefore imperative to change both consumer behavior and manufacturing methods.
We would like to allow people to have access to information, to experience and to see the solutions for reducing their fashion consumption impact on environment with this unique place as mentioned below :
- Repair their shoes and clothes with a shoemaker and a repair corner.
- Buy secondhand Zeta products and exchange their old models with another second hand one.
- Learn for free about fashion industry and his consequences on the environment with pedagogic and interactive contents in all the place (interactive maps, raw materials, playful objects...)
- Play with waste and create new objects from waste you can find in the street with a "Precious Plastic" machine, for free.
- Learn about speakers experiences who will talk about their own experiences in sustainable production, for free.
- Buy beautiful products only made from recycled materials and save waste.
- Resell plastics through an interactive terminal and get a voucher
- Return old shoes to recycle them.
To complete the project, we will organize conferences days in schools to raise awareness from young people regarding their consumption habits, hold garbage collection days in collaboration with local authorities, associations, and workshops in the place to teach to people how to repair and reuse their clothes.
This unique place will be devoted to Fashion Circularity solutions for Environment.
Please highlight how the concept/idea can be exemplary in this context
Key objectives of our workshop concept are :
1. Immersive project & experience :
The idea is to create a course around product lifecycle divided in 3 phases.
- The first area will be devote to raw materials. Infographies and interactives walls will explain to the visitors, where come from main materials used in Fashion industry and the impact of production and transport of them on the environment including Zeta products. Also, visitor will learn about how they can reduce their impact.
- Second area will be devoted to transformation of the products, with a plastic transformation machine which visitor can use to create new objects from waste for free. You can also find in this area the Zeta corner shop with our products and videos which explain the production process for shoes and clothes.
- Third area will be devoted to reuse and end of product lifecycle. There is the secondhand corner, where visitor can buy but also, exchange pairs for others secondhand ones, as well a repairing corner with a shoemaker. Finally you will find here two terminals, one collecting old shoes to bring them to our partner Gebetex in charge of recycling, a second one where you can earn money with counterpart of plastic deposit.
2. Geographic :
Create a unique place in an old area of Bordeaux, registered on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1998. This area is still in development and we would like to reuse a whole building to create this project.
3. Aesthetics :
All of the project will take place according to Zeta identity codes : pure, industrial, timeless, universal and minimalist design.
The target is to teach people that waste can be beautiful and make people want to try this alternative place and finish the experience with the conviction that less is more.
These key objectives can be reach with the creation of this new alternative place between a shop, a museum and a workshop.
Please highlight how the concept/idea can be exemplary in this context
This project will be inclusive and accessible for every kind of purchase power, from people who want to earn money with selling plastics and with the secondhand corner to people who want to learn more about fashion industry and want an experience, to people who want to repair or buy clothes and shoes.
All our product are unisex and size choice is huge to be available for all people.
We will include lot of partners in EU, France but also locally to organize days devoted to explaining and raise awareness on people consumption, with a free participation for everybody.
In collaboration with local authorities we would like also to promote sustainable fashion consumption in schools.
Please highlight how this approach can be exemplary
Sustainability, inclusion and aesthetic dimensions are fully included together in this project because we propose to promote in an original and nice place an access to everyone to a place where people can experience and learn about fashion industry consequences on environnement with conferences, workshops, DIY, interactive playful and pedagogic contents for free.
We also propose in this place our beautiful fashion unisex products made with waste and recycled materials instead of creating new materials. They are both available in the secondhand corner or in the new corner.
We give so the possibility to everyone to understand that we can make beautiful with waste and preserve environment if we consume carefully.
Finally, to make sure that this core message can be heard by everybody we would like to promote these values in collaboration with local authorities in schools, because they are the future of our generation !
This place is different from classic shops where you can buy brand new products. Here we want to share the story and values of our brand but also transmist a real ecologic message. We don't want to overproduce and oversell : we want people to learn about how to consume better as well as the consequences of their consumption and choices.
This place will have a really pedagogic impact for everybody.
Also we already share theses values with other actors, so the idea is here to create a place where all actors (international/national/local) involved in this movement can explain to people how it is important to consume responsively also in fashion.
To develop this project we will :
Finance it :
- Ask for fundings from local authorities, EU and national government
- We will contract a loan with our bank
- Use our own equity
Find our building in Bordeaux : currently in progress with local authorities
Find our suppliers to create all pedagogic and interactive contents and furniture we need
Find an agreement with local authorities for our schools interventions
To promote this projects we will :
Use our reputation in the fashion sector with social medias, local and national press...
Our goal in the future is to duplicate this model in other cities in EU !
If we have the chance to be awarded,
We will start working with designers specialized in the development of interactive and educational content, as well as with an architect at the end of 2022. The price will be helpful for starting collaboration with these partners.
We plan to start negotiations with the local authorities at the end of 2022, in order to find our future building in the center of Bordeaux and to have our pedagogical project validated in collaboration with the schools.
The goal is to find the building by the beginning of 2023 in order to begin work for an opening in September 2024.
The recruitment phases of the staff dedicated to the place will start in the middle of 2023.
@Laure Babin, 2022
Content licensed to the European Union.