Plus que cuir, leather jewellery

MEETING

Hello Victoria,

Delighted to open the pages of the Art de Vivre section to you.

Can you tell us about the origins of Plus que cuir? When did you get started and what were you doing before you started your own business?

As an experienced, self-taught DIY enthusiast, I've had a passion for handicrafts ever since I was very young, from painting to working with leather and wood.

I discovered leatherwork in Spain, my home country. I learnt traditional saddle-stitch sewing without a machine, and for years I made leather bags and accessories for my friends and family.

Years later, as the mother of a daughter who had grown up too quickly, I wanted to go back to work, while reconciling family life and work. Then one day a friend gave me a few scraps of leather, small pieces, sometimes just a tiny square.

For me, leather is a noble material that deserves to be sublimated. So these small pieces couldn't be thrown away. Too small to make bags or accessories, they could find a new life in the creation of jewellery. So I started making earrings and necklaces... And Plus que cuir was born, in January 2019.

You design jewellery. How is leather the perfect material for your creations? What other materials do you combine it with? We see, for example, that you also use wood...

Leatherworkers and designers of leather clothes only use this material in its entirety. So their offcuts are very useful for my creations, which are always designed in small series, or even as one-off pieces.

In my workshop, just over ten kilometres from Uzès, I design my models, cut out the leather and combine it with other materials, such as wooden beads, stainless steel or brass gilded with fine gold for jewellery. What's more, as I'm concerned about the environment and resource management, I also like to use recycled materials,such as fabric, beads or ribbons.

Good to know: Plus que cuir has lots of surprises in store for you over the coming months.

You adapt the cut-outs to the future piece of jewellery, or the cut-out directs you to a very specific model. You also customise you told us...

Each piece of jewellery is designed, cut and assembled with the utmost care, making it unique. All the models we create can be personalised to suit your needs.

Everyone can choose the colours of the leather to find the perfect combination. Adapting creations to customers' tastes is very important to the brand.

Plus que cuir, it's also the possibility of having the jewellery or you imagined, with the guarantee that it won't be reproduced.

Thanks to Victoria Garcia for her collaboration on this article.

The right address: @Plus que cuir, 06 23 11 25 47, plusquecuir@outlook.com.