Aire continues its meetings! Discover the story of Bruce Ribay, co-founder of NOMA édition. He details his journey to creating this furniture company. He explains why eco-design is at the heart of their activity.
Can you introduce yourself in a few words?
I’m Bruce Ribay, co-founder of Noma édition with Guillaume Galloy. I’m an architect by training. I worked in the luxury sector for about twenty years. I was at Louis Vuitton. That’s where I met Guillaume, who was an engineer. I handled concepts for the boutiques. I also founded a consulting firm.
I left my old company to start Noma with the idea of leveraging our expertise, namely high-end furniture. Guillaume and I try to attach the values we think are important: responsibility and the ability to create a virtuous circle.
How did you enter the world of furniture and eco-design?
It’s something Guillaume and I had in mind for a long time. We worked a lot on furniture when we were at luxury houses like Louis Vuitton. We wanted to create our own furniture brand.
Is Guillaume Galloy a childhood or work friend? Why did you decide to partner to combine luxury and eco-design?
We worked together for several years and became friends. We had different paths. I left Louis Vuitton to become the architecture director at Céline, part of the LVMH group. Then, I founded the consulting firm MADnetwork. I did customer experience consulting for high-end and luxury brands. Guillaume went to Philips. He worked in lighting for almost ten years. I left my company, and we started talking about our project again. We created our brand two years ago and launched our first collection in January 2020.
What does NOMA mean and why did you choose this name?
NOMA stands for Noble Materials. It is a contraction of these two words. Today, recycled materials are considered the most noble. They should be valued and used by everyone. These materials are right outside our door, and we need to think about how to use them.
Can you describe your creative process and way of working?
We are like a publishing house, conductors. We do not design or manufacture; we distribute our products and sell directly. For the creative process, we call on talented and fairly well-known designers. We give them a brief to explain what we want (types of furniture, usage, constraints, and materials). After that, they are free to propose whatever they want. We have an artistic direction role, maintaining coherence to create collections.
Then, we also work with a consulting firm specializing in eco-design (Mu), which analyzes the designers’ initial sketches. Once we have a finalized version, we conduct a life cycle analysis of the product. This allows us to measure all the impacts our product will have on the environment. Then, we adapt the design to have the least possible impact on our planet. We collaborate with a manufacturer who gives us technical feedback on the product. 80% of environmental impacts occur during the design phase. The goal is to have as little impact as possible.
How do you design furniture within a circular economy?
The term circular economy can be very broad. The goal is to measure the impact of the furniture, from raw material extraction to the end of the product’s life. We identify the stages in the product’s life that have the greatest environmental impact. We integrated this notion of circular economy from the start. However, in a circular economy, we must go as far as product reuse. We do not control the complete end of life of our products because we do not take them back. However, we try to make our products easily disassemblable. This allows materials to be separated and makes our products recyclable. Hence the eco-design.
Can you explain your environmental approach? And why did you choose to undertake this eco-design of furniture?
Guillaume and I had already developed these concepts in our past lives. At Louis Vuitton, more than fifteen years ago, we were already conducting a life cycle analysis of the store concept. At that time, environmental issues were not at the center of discussions in luxury houses.
Today, we cannot produce a chair like we used to. For us, it was obvious that we could not continue this way. Moreover, when we studied the furniture market in the high-end and luxury segment, we realized that no one was addressing these issues. We are the first in this market segment to offer a range where eco-responsibility is at the heart of the approach.
We put design and environmental respect on the same level. For us, beauty is a driver of change. We don’t buy a table or an object just because it contains recycled materials, but first because we like it. If we want to change mindsets about how to consume decoration, on our scale, we have to offer beautiful objects. This combination of strong design and responsible materials is important. The recycled material part really corresponds to the visible part of the iceberg.
We try to manufacture in France and avoid using chemicals. We make sure our products are disassemblable so they can be repaired and recycled at the end of their life. On our website, you’ll find the product name and a number indicating the percentage of recycled materials it contains.
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And where are your material sources located?
Not all our sources come from France. We don’t find all our materials there. But we try to stay as European as possible. For example, we don’t find recycled screws or bolts. I did a lot of research on this. So, we have to source differently. In selecting our materials within our material library, we apply several different filters to make a choice. This can include the origin of the material. For the wool chair, we use virgin wool. We do not use recycled fabric.
We wanted a natural and renewable product. However, we were only offered virgin wool from New Zealand. All suppliers say it’s the best wool. We eventually found sheep in France and a fabric supplier who manufactures in France. We are very happy to work with him. To date, no customer has complained about the quality of our fabric. So, it’s important to assess the quality and durability of the material for furniture. We also focus on aesthetics, price, and the possibility of transformation. We have several criteria. All our materials are analyzed to understand their impact.
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Interview conducted by Clara Didier
Layout by Coralie Mottu
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