Hermès’s New Collection of Upcycled Delights Has Landed—Just in Time for Gifting Season

Above: Artist Shinsuke Kawahara’s landscape box in porcelain and leather depicting the New York City skyline.

In 2010, Pascale Mussard, a sixth-generation member of the family behind the French luxury brand Hermès, had an idea. As a child, she visited the Hermès workshop in Paris where saddles were made and noticed an uncle pluck a leather scrap out of the trash. He worked with an artisan to turn it into a wallet, then placed it in a store window the next day as an experiment. Sure enough, the orders started rolling in, and the wallet went into production.

A brand devoted to craftsmanship at the highest level will inevitably generate some detritus in its pursuit of perfection. Mussard’s inspired idea was to found an atelier within Hermès, Petit h, where leftovers from the production of everything from Kelly bags to Carré silk scarves to porcelain tableware can be used in new and unexpected ways.

The Petit h workshop, in the Paris suburb of Pantin, is “like a laboratory” within Hermès, says Godefroy de Virieu, creative director of Petit h. Fifty designers and artists sift through the library of materials and work with 10 staff artisans to devise new objects that are whimsical but always functional. Those concoctions—a teapot turned clock, a shelf with an umbrella handle for a hook—have become a hit with collectors.

While a limited number are sold in Hermès boutiques and online, the Petit h line is also presented in curated exhibitions that travel from city to city. After a sojourn in Hong Kong, the collection next lands in New York City for an October 11 through 26 stint at the Hermès flagship, Maison Madison, accompanied by Gotham-themed scenography and a store window designed by artist Lucia Hierro.

“Wherever we go, we always visit in advance for inspiration,” de Virieu says. “We came and walked the streets all over New York, from Central Park to Union Square market. The exhibition will feel like a stroll through New York City, and you can visit little shops for hardware, groceries, and pets, filled with the kind of inventions that you would find in those stores.”

The offerings will include bento boxes topped with leather motifs of hot dogs and hamburgers and a table with a mosaic top made of broken plates. “We’re using the pieces left behind to create new stories,” de Virieu says. “It’s like being a child in a toy store.”

Keys Key Ring

Bride Silk Necklace PM

Visor

Compact Mirror

Snowflake Charm

Pleated Plant Pot Cover 16cm

This story originally appeared in the October 2024 issue of ELLE DECOR. SUBSCRIBE

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