A Private Jet Decked Out in Hermès Leather? This Workshop Will Make It Happen
In a suburb outside Paris, a little-known group of artisans are making Hermès surfboards, motorcycles, boxing gloves, and more fantastical creations.
Axel de Beaufort, design director of the Hermès Sur-mesure atelier.
Photographer: Céline Clanet for Bloomberg Businessweek
In a suburb outside Paris, past a locked metal gate, two security guards, and a pair of key-card doors, there is a large, simple white room. Inside, more than a dozen elite artisans work quietly at messy desks covered with swatches of pebbled leather. Their skills are so highly sought-after that photographs of their faces aren’t allowed, and publicizing their names is strictly forbidden.
This is the Sur-mesure atelier at Hermès, where the wildest luxury fantasy can become an exquisite reality. Here, car interiors and motorcycles are decked out in Hermès calfskin. Fishing poles are made to order, plus boxing gloves and polo bags, all with the signature subtle handiwork of the French fashion house. A nearby showroom has a foosball table, a surfboard, and a range of door handles, should a client desire to clutch Hermès leather at every turn. Don’t look for heavy branding, though; a $2,975 Sur-mesure skateboard is splashed with seemingly every color but the company’s trademark orange.