FAMAE Community stories: L’increvable, a French washing machine to fight against planned obsolescence.
Created as as response to the planned obsolescence drift, L’Increvable was one project that caught our attention during our last challenge “Don’t trash your cash”. Discover this company with the words of its founder: Christophe Santerre.
Can you introduce yourself in a few words?
My name is Christopher Santerre, I am an industrial designer and co-founder of the company L’Increvable that I created with my partner Julien Phedyaeff in 2016.
Why did you become interested in waste?
It’s not really the waste that interests me, but rather the fact of imagining ways of life where even the very concept of waste would not exist. As is the case in natural environments which remind us that waste is a purely human invention.
I passed a bachelor’s degree in economics and social sciences in 2006. I was literally passionate about philosophy, social studies and the study of different ways of thinking in economics, especially at the origin of the main principles of globalization. These years of high school gave me many tools to understand and analyse our contemporary societies. This theoretical background still influences the way I address a project.
I joined the French national institute for advanced studies in industrial design, ENSCI — Les Ateliers, from 2008 to 2014, six years, rich in projects and encounters during which I had the opportunity to approach the practice of design in a very broad way, from the design of industrial products to that of user interfaces or services. At the end I refocused on product design during my degree project by suggesting a modern version of the erstwhile pantry and a home server to securely store emails. These two projects with issues that seem very distant are related by a dual intention: to suggest an alternative to objects that seem obvious to us and that we no longer question, and to suggest usages that raise our level of awareness of the relation we have with objects and our everyday environment.
In 2015, I get in touch with a classmate, Julien Phedyaeff, who in his graduation had designed a model of a sustainable washing machine as it was easily repairable. Both of us were convinced that it is possible to offer another way to build home appliances, we decided to team up in 2016 to create a company to develop sustainable products, starting with the washing machine.
Can you present your project more in detail?
“L’Increvable” (The Unburstable) is a washing machine conceived to last for decades thanks to a design entirely conceptualized to facilitate its repair and allow its refurbishment over time. This project began with a simple observation. Currently, home appliances are designed according to specifications that aim to increase their performance by constantly adding new, not always useful features, while reducing the production cost as much as possible. The repairability and scalability aren’t taken at all or very poorly into consideration. The result is that a growing part of home appliances sold today are very complicated or even impossible to repair. The main consequence of this situation is that we no longer repair these products, which has the effect of generating huge amounts of waste. More than 20 kg of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) are produced per year by each French.
With “L’Increvable” we want to reverse this trend by offering products with extended life cycles because designed in order to be easily repaired.
How will it change the world?
Before changing the world, we want to begin by trying to change the world of the washing machine, in which there is a huge potential of progress in terms of environmental impact!
With “L’Increvable” we want to demonstrate that it is possible to conceive, produce and consume differently household appliances such as a washing machine, and that it does not require years and years of R&D, but simply to reconsider our design methods and our consumption patterns. In this way, we want to bring up to date the repairable products in order to encourage the keeping of an object rather than getting rid of it at the slightest breakdown.
A simple action to put in place to reduce our quantities of waste in your opinion?
Before buying a new object, ask yourself a simple question: do I really need it?
What is the personality that inspires you and why?
Dave Hakkens! For his capacity to make design serve ideas that outline a desirable future, but also for the talent with which he communicates to the greatest number. This positive energy, through which he manages to gather many people around his different projects, is very inspiring and motivating for all those who wish to contribute to the appearance of more sustainable lifestyles.
**15 days left to apply to our PRECIOUS WATER! challenge!
Apply here https://famae.earth/fr/
