French flax revives its industry
A handful of pioneers believe in the viability of a complete French linen industry, from spinning to garment making. A virtuous adventure for the planet and employment, but with many challenges!
Flax is a French national treasure. Yes, but...while 85% of this fiber is produced in France, in the Normandy and Hauts-de-France regions, over 90% is also exported to China and India, and 8% to Eastern Europe, to be transformed into thread, then fabric, then clothing. Less than 1% remains in France.
Or, some have made a dream come true: that of a linen garment 100% traced in France. While the game is far from easy in a clothing market at half-mast, they've shown that this relocalization model is possible.
Three bold players
Embedded in the adventure are a linen spinning mill, born in 2022, the French Filature, under the impetus of the agro-industrial cooperative group NatUp; an almost two-hundred-year-old weaver, Lemaître Demeestere and a garment making start-up, christened Mijuin.
Upstream, NatUp wanted to add value to a fiber produced by 70% of the 5,000 cooperators it supports "for sustainable, quality production". As of 2015, it has set itself the goal of recreating a French flax industry.
In 2020, its NatUp Fibres division takes a majority stake in weaver Lemaitre Demeestere. Since 1835, this specialist in natural fibers has worked in particular with linen. But after its takeover in 2008, Olivier Ducatillion refocused it on this fiber alone, sensing ahead of time its buoyant nature, as both stemming "from the terroir" and offering an"exceptional carbon footprint".
The next step for NatUp Fibres is to reassemble a flax spinning mill in France. Named the French Filature, it will be inaugurated in 2022, in Saint-Martin-du-Tilleul, Normandy, the fiber's birthplace.
It is one of the three pioneers of this French rebirth of linen spinning, with, from 2019, the unit of Alsatian weaver Emmanuel Lang (sadly now deceased) and Safilin in 2022, in Hauts-de- France.
The third player in this virtuous circle is the Mijuin brand.
A workshop dedicated 100% to linen and short circuits
Behind her, a 28-year-old from Normandy, Pauline Beuzelin, who, after starting her career in IT, wanted to undertake social and environmental projects. During confinement, while reading the press, she discovered the virtues of flax and went out into the field to meet people involved in the flax and textile industries. Her idea took shape: that of a garment making workshop "100% dedicated to linen in a short circuit"
Created in early 2022, in Malaunay, north of Rouen, Mijuin, which works "within a limited radius, in Normandy and Hauts-de-France", took off thanks to honor loans and two participatory campaigns. For the first, she makes and sells a linen blazer using fabrics by Emmanuel Lang, and for the second, she approaches Lemaitre Demeestere, itself powered by French Filature, to make an offer with finer fabrics (shirts, dresses, accessories...). "We want to work only with French fabrics" explains Pauline Beuzelin.
This relocation of the linen sector has required the reconstitution of specific savoir-faire or the deployment of new ones.
To equip itself, noting the disappearance of flax spinning machines in Europe, French Filature had to look for its own in China and bring in a technician from the Middle Kingdom to train its teams. As the envoy didn't speak English, we had to go through a phone translation app to exchange!
In-house training
La French Filature was then fortunately able to rely on a linen engineer close to retirement, who passed on his knowledge to a freshly graduated "binomial". Together, they trained the new structure's fifteen or so employees in-house.
In weaving, Lemaitre Demeestere has gone beyond its comfort zone to differentiate itself from an overly basic linen market. "To set ourselves apart, I asked my teams to push the machines upmarket and get away from dependence on too-basic commodity markets in furnishings, where price was the priority criterion. While we weren't doing anything over 600 g per m2, we've managed to get the weight of our fabrics down to 1.5 kg per m2, while retaining a very pleasant feel"explains Olivier Ducatillion.
This differentiated offering has enabled the weaver to successfully tackle new premium markets, among higher-end fabric publishers and sofa manufacturers, in France and the USA.
Lemaitre Demeestere also presented its first fabric collection for ready-to-wear in 2022 at Première Vision.
In garment making, too, you have to adapt."Linen requires real expertise during the technical fashion design phase,explains Pauline Beuzelin (Mijuin). Patterns have to be adapted, as linen shrinks in the first wash. For our part, we wash all our products, thus stabilized, before selling them."
The virtues of Made in France linen
This game -complicated to play- was well worth the candle for the three actors, now inexhaustible about the virtues of 100% Made in France linen clothing.
First of all, Pauline Beuzelin (Mijuin) praises the material's "aesthetics", its "nice to wear" thanks in particular to its "ultra-breathable (thermo-regulating)" character, "ideal in the current context of global warming,"
Everyone also appreciates its environmental and social benefits.
Pauline Beuzelin (Mijuin) emphasizes the ecological character of flax which, "contrary to cotton, requires few inputs, no irrigation water, making do with rain". The fact that it is spun, woven and then made up in France significantly improves its environmental footprint. "What has the biggest impact in clothing production is the energy needed to run the machines, which accounts for 70% of CO2 emissions. In Asia and Eastern Europe, which use coal in their energy mix, CO2 emissions are much higher than in France's very low-carbon mix, thanks to nuclear power." And while linen is certainly more expensive to work with in France, "the quality of our production makes it possible to envisage a later resale second-hand".
Olivier Ducatillion (Lemaître Demeestere) thus invites us to "make a clear distinction between linen garments from a complete French production chain -from harvesting the fiber to garment making-, and linen garments that have circumnavigated the globe three times! The environmental footprint of a linen garment can vary from one to ten, depending on where the stages following manufacture take place!"
Social model
Finally, all emphasize the social nature of French production, "creating jobs at every level of the industry".
"We need local employment and to consume Made in France products, the only ones to incorporate the contributions of our social model, which the French hold dear" stresses Karim Behlouli, director of NatUp Fibres.
Certainly, the battle for hexagonal linen, which still accounts for less than 1% of materials made in France and 0.4% worldwide, still has a long way to go.
After an already profitable first year, Pauline Beuzelin (Mijuin) would like to further develop her contract manufacturer activity (today 30% of her sales) on behalf of eco-responsible brands and help them relocalize "whereas today they have their linen shirts made in Portugal or Eastern Europe with linen certainly grown in France but spun and woven at the ends of the earth".
For two post-covid years "a little crazy", in 2021 and 2022, "we were no longer able to meet quite exceptional demand", explains Olivier Ducatillion (Lemaitre Demeestere) for his part. There has been a real shift in consumers wanting to stop buying from the other side of the planet. All segments, from mass retail to luxury, approached us to have 100% French traced linen."
Demand at half-mast
But since 2023, the weaver has observed a"demand, rather at half-mast with unfortunately a lot of brakes: the war in Ukraine, purchasing power, inflation, energy costs...Even if they say they love Made in France, it's no longer consumers' priority."
The phenomenon has been exacerbated by the doubling of flax prices, linked to three years of poor harvests, in 2021, 2022 and 2023. Fortunately, 2024 promises to be better.
For all that, all say they are convinced of the relevance of their approach and preach the good news.
NatUp Fibres, which had succeeded in obtaining financial support for the French Filature from the State and the Normandy region, intends "to bring about the emergence of a community of linen lovers and communicate with partner brands around a common umbrella",dixit Karim Behlouli.
In 2023, as part of its natural fibers cluster, the Union des Industries Textiles (UIT) launched Bleu Blanc Lin, and, with Interchanvre, Bleu Blanc Chanvre, an open-source collaborative exchange platform. "All players in the 100% French linen and hemp value chain, from producers to consumer associations to brands are working together to "equip themselves with the right tools to promote 100% linen and Made in France products." She will also be responsible for carrying out an LCA of the two fibers and launching a traceability pilot with Textil'IA.
Two NatUp Fibres partners have thus been selected for the major Fabriqué en France Exhibition, scheduled for October 25-27 at the Elysée, namely Lordson (linen dresses) and...Mijuin.
Raise awareness among public players and consumers
Pauline Beuzelin intends to use this opportunity to make her voice heard. Last June, she became a board member of the Association Lin et Chanvre, which brings together players in the industry, and is heavily involved in promoting these fibers. Recently, French Filature and Lemaitre Demeestere have also opened up their business to hemp, and Mijuin will be working with it as soon as possible.
"We take part in numerous events to raise awareness of our approach among the general public and politicians, she explains. We tell them that it's possible to process flax in a short circuit, and I'm confident that this will motivate public action. I insist on the advantage it represents in economic, ecological and social terms."
For Olivier Ducatillion (Lemaître Demeestere), we also need to restore the desire "to 10 to 20% of the population to consume French linen", another challenge for the industry being to enable consumers to"properly differentiate between the different types of origin for linen garments so that they are not misled".
From this point of view, he has high hopes for the forthcoming introduction of environmental labelling at the point of sale. "By displaying the locations of the various stages of production, this will help convince people to consume 100% French. This will help virtuous processes, and linen will benefit from this."
Still in its infancy, 100% Made in France linen is not lacking in assets to make its mark on the market. And the crusade of a few pioneers ready to look beyond the cyclical brakes could well bear fruit.
For more information:
French Filature company fact sheet
