Changemakers in France

The selection

• AlenviParis, France“Small teams of caregivers who own their work. It gives dignity to everyone in the room.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Amélie NothombParis, France“Amélie Nothomb, writer and extraordinary woman. Because her presence in the world of writing is a constant source of inspiration, as is the idea that one can write every single day, each day at dawn, and deliver readers a new book every year, for the sole reason that inspiration never runs dry. Her very existence is a constant reminder of my own laziness.”Recommended by Ilaria Gaspari
• Atelier Berger MilàParis, France“A young Franco-Spanish duo who treat architecture as the tissue between people and their territory. A quiet, exacting practice, from a single room to the fabric of a city.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Atelier PaysanRenage, France“A cooperative born in Isère, L'Atelier Paysan helps farmers design and build their own tools, with open-source plans and training courses, towards technological sovereignty for peasant farming.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• Audrey BourolleauLévis-Saint-Nom, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Bernard StieglerParis, France“A philosopher of technology (1952-2020), Bernard Stiegler saw every tool as both remedy and poison. He championed an economy of contribution in which everyone becomes a producer of knowledge again.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• BiltokiAnglet, France“They bring a covered market back to life by trusting the small producers who already feed the town.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Café JoyeuxParis, France“A café run by people with disabilities, with real hospitality. Inclusion becomes ordinary, and warm.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Charles-Edouard NotredameLille, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Etienne JarrierParis, France“Finding new ways to resist. Music emerged as one of them.”Recommended by Coralie Custos Quatreville
• EurasantéLille, France“A health-innovation cluster gave a whole region a future after heavy industry.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Florence RizzoParis, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Fonds ExploreConcarneau, France“They fund the expeditions that help us understand a world we are still learning to protect.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• François MarchesseauChampdenier, France“An organic farmer since the 1980s, François Marchesseau chose to take charge of processing his own harvests.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• FratriesNantes, France“Sharing an ordinary city flat turns out to be the most dignified support you can offer.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Grain de SailConcarneau, France“A company that runs decarbonised freight for real, out of Saint-Malo, across the Atlantic.”Recommended by Simon Bernard
• InovaYaLyon, FranceRecommended by Simon Bernard
• Institut Océanographique Paul Ricardîle des Embiez, France“Fifty years of independent science on the Mediterranean, open to the public for free. A gift.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• La ChartreuseAiguenoire, France“They chose to make less so as to stay what they are. That takes courage, and I admire it.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• La Ferme des VolonteuxBeaumont-lès-Valence, France“A collective farm run as a worker cooperative in the Drôme, La Ferme des Volonteux pools land, tools and know-how around organic market gardening, direct sales and the training of future farmers.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• La MaestraParis, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• La maison perchéeParis, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• La Preuve par 7Paris, France“They prove an idea by doing it, with the people who live there. That is urbanism I trust.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• LazareNantes, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Les Beaux MetsMarseille, France“A Marseille kitchen where excellence and second chances grow together. And the food is good.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Les Invités au FestinBesançon, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Low-Tech LabConcarneau, France“Every solution they test is published open source. The knowledge belongs to everyone, and that is what stays with me.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Lucas Davaze, Médiation ClimatGRENOBLE, France“He takes people to stand on a dying glacier. Climate stops being an idea and becomes a memory they keep.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Léna BlouPointe-à-Pitre, France“Léna Blou invites us to reflect on the colonial legacy and on how the body can become a space of emancipation, capable of transforming both an individual and an entire society.”Recommended by Coralie Custos Quatreville
• makesenseParis, France“They put collective intelligence to work for changemakers, two hours at a time.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• My Human KitNantes, France“Nicolas lost his hand and turned that into an open lab, where people design their own solutions.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• NightlineParis, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Olivier RoellingerCancale, FranceRecommended by Katy Foraz
• Paul Emilieu StudioParis, France“He starts every project from what already exists. Craft and conscience, working together.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Philippe AlbanelLyon, FranceRecommended by Constance Albanel
• Philippe MeirieuLyon, France“An educationalist and a figure of progressive education, Philippe Meirieu defends a school where pupils search, experiment and build their own knowledge, and he always ties learning to democracy.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• PhytobokazPetit-Bourg, Guadeloupe, France“Dr Joseph puts Caribbean plant knowledge on the scientific footing it always deserved.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Pierre RosanvallonParis, France“Because he built an entire intellectual project around making democracy work better rather than just critiquing it, and because he showed that rigorous scholarship and public engagement are not just compatible but necessary complements.”Recommended by Alberto Alemanno
• Plastic OdysseyMarseille, France“Simon's ship goes from port to port and shows coastal towns how to turn their plastic into something they can use locally.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Plateau UrbainParis, France“They keep empty buildings alive between two projects, and make room for people who could never afford the rent.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Raphaël HaumontParis-Saclay, FranceRecommended by Katy Foraz
• Refettorio ParisParis, France“Bottura turns surplus food into beautiful meals, served with dignity. The beauty is part of it.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Refugee Food FestivalParis, France“Refugee chefs in great kitchens. They arrive as talent, with stories you can taste.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• SailcoopVannes, France“They make crossing the Atlantic by sail a real option again. I like that.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Sweet OmLamentin (Guadeloupe), France“Therese grows wellbeing out of a Creole garden. The care in it is real.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• Under The PoleConcarneau, France“They dive where science cannot easily reach, and they share everything they find.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• VelaParis, FranceRecommended by Simon Bernard
• Village AlzheimerDax, France“People with Alzheimer's keep an ordinary life, with a real shop and a bistro. Deeply humane.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• We Are SistaParis, France“Tatiana and her collective turned the gender funding gap into a movement, then built the fund to close it.”Recommended by Florian Guillaume
• WindcoopLorient, FranceRecommended by Simon Bernard
• Yves CittonParis, France“A professor at Université Paris 8, Yves Citton thinks of attention as an ecology: a scarce resource, captured by the media, that we must cultivate together as a shared environment.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• Éditions WildprojectMarseille, France“Founded in Marseille in 2008, the publishing house Wildproject brought the great texts of ecological thought into French and laid the foundations of the French environmental humanities.”Recommended by Paul Emilieu Marchesseau
• Édouard LouisParis, France“Constantly proving that telling intimate stories, bringing the ordinary to the fore, is an immensely political act.”Recommended by Coralie Custos Quatreville