Collectivo, a collective upcycled fashion studio, would inaugurate on 24 September 2026 a post-waste fashion laboratory at the Marché Dauphine flea market, at 140 rue des Rosiers in Saint-Ouen. The venue would occupy a total surface area of one hundred square metres, according to information relayed by FashionUnited France.
This surface area would be divided into several spaces: twenty square metres devoted to sorting, laundry and storage; forty square metres dedicated to the shop and a collaborative space; and forty square metres reserved for the design studio, the shared workshop and offices.
A founder from the luxury sector
Collectivo was created in Saint-Ouen around Samia Boukbir, a chemical engineer by training, who settled at the Puces de Saint-Ouen in 2021. She worked in product development at L'Oréal Luxe and then at Dior Parfums, within the LVMH group. She now shares her expertise through workshops at the Institut Français de la Mode and advises groups on their circularity strategies.
Collectivo's principle consists of taking post-consumer and post-industrial textile waste as raw material, then transforming it into clothing. Contrairement to many young designers who work from dormant stock, the studio uses items that have already been made up, gone out of fashion, damaged or discarded, along with industrial waste and unconventional materials.
Moving to industrial scale
The main objection made against upcycling is that this production system cannot fit into an economy of scale. Collectivo precisely claims the ambition of turning it into an industrial sector, capable of producing in volume and of constituting an alternative to manufacturing from new material.
Since 2022, the studio says it has supported 22 young designers, from design and prototyping through to product development. Tous work under their own name, which appears on the label of their garment. According to Collectivo's press release, as of the publication date, eight tonnes of materials would have been transformed, 500 pieces per year manufactured in local workshops and 70 models sold.
The new laboratory is meant to host both designers and the public, train designers in industrial upcycling, and organise showrooms, conferences, upcycling workshops, exhibitions and events during fashion weeks. Collectivo products are sold online and on the fourth floor of the Printemps Haussmann, in addition to the Puces de Saint-Ouen.
From 24 September, the laboratory would also sell the autumn-winter 2026 collection, titled « Refonte ». Its creative concept is that of « redoux »: a frozen material that melts and takes on a new shape. Concrètement, the collection transforms denim, leather, knitwear and bicycle inner tubes.
