For Studio CoPain, no two days are quite the same. The collective’s work moves between bread workshops, set design, catering for events, sculpture making, object design and teaching. Still, they have certain rituals. “We like to make a huge shared pot of tea that we drink together the whole day,” says Léa Bardin, one of the trio. “Of course, because we’re friends before being colleagues, our days are also punctuated by personal conversations naturally dropping in from time to time.”
Studio CoPain is composed of Sidonie Lepetit, Lucile Barbier and Léa Bardin, who met in their first year at the Design Academy Eindhoven. In third year, Léa explains, they were given the chance to choose their team and topic for a semester-long project. “We decided to team up, it worked very well, and after that we never separated,” she says. “We even did our graduation project as a trio.” Their paths were already aligned. “Prior to our education in the Netherlands, the three of us had studied arts and design for two years in French prep schools, so we actually have very similar backgrounds,” Lucile says.
Their work is grounded in friendship and a shared approach to making. “Before anything, we’re very close friends, so we thought it would probably be super interesting to work together,” says Sidonie. “We share a lot of values, visions, aesthetic statements and creative methods.” Their studies at the Design Academy gave them time to develop that dynamic. “Having this time within our studies really gave us the opportunity to learn how to work together properly, and how to communicate efficiently,” Léa adds.
Bread became their focus because it could bring research, material enquiry and daily life to the same table. “Studio CoPain was born from our common wish to work on a very wide topic,” Léa says. “Lucile came up with bread and we were all on board instinctively.” For Léa, bread is associated with both history and ritual. “Bread carries deep symbolism; it’s embedded in cultures and rituals,” she says. “Globally, it’s been a staple food for humans since the dawn of time… it's political, social, artistic.” Plus, it helps that “bread is fun”, Lucile adds.
Their research began at a particular moment. Léa recalls that the baguette was being added to UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list as Europe was facing an energy crisis due to the war in Ukraine, and in France many bakers were struggling with rising costs. “What started as a research-based investigation into bread gradually became a material exploration,” Léa says. “We learned how to make sourdough and began experimenting with bread as a ceramicist would with clay. We created bread sculptures, testing its limits in form, texture and durability.”
Sidonie speaks about sourdough as a collaborator as much as an ingredient. “Working with sourdough is working with living matter,” she says. “Our sourdough starter, Suzy, has been with us since the very beginning of the creation of Studio CoPain. She’s part of our team, and has taught us a lot about patience and that good things take time, that learning is made through failing and trying again.” Sidonie moves easily between the technical and the intuitive, describing fermentation as “a beautiful and captivating ancient process” that “connects people across time, cultures and generations.” In practice, it becomes a language learned through the senses. “How your starter smells can tell you if it needs to be fed again or not,” she says. “How the crumb of the baked bread looks can tell you about whether your loaf has been over- or under-fermented.”
The trio are currently based between France, Belgium and the Netherlands, and travel is naturally folded into their way of working. Lucile describes the “nomadic” aspect of their practice, which allows them “to meet people all over the globe, sharing with us very different yet very similar bread culture.” Each place brings its own knowledge. “Each time we go to a different location, we learn so much from the people we meet,” she says. “We see this as an exchange of knowledge, especially during the bread workshops we host.”
Workshops have been a part of Studio CoPain from the outset. “We initially started CoPain with a practice anchored in social design, valuing bread making as a tool for community building,” Lucile says. Bread, in their hands, becomes a way to gather and to listen. “Bread holds the power to bring people together which we believe can be one of the most powerful of all ecological acts: creating social bonds, taking care of each other,” Lucile says. Léa speaks about the workshop table as a place where personal histories surface naturally. “Each workshop is a unique and special experience,” she says, “because most of what makes the workshop exist is the people joining and the stories they share around the table.”
Easy collaboration is integral to their work. “There’s no leader at Studio CoPain,” Sidonie says. The point, she explains, is shared responsibility and shared interest in every part of the process. “The three of us can do any part of the job, and that’s how we maintain a fun and ever-changing workflow.” For Sidonie, there is a “real poetry in learning to read the dough, getting more comfortable with it as you grow on your bread-baking journey.”
Sidonie wears the Gelato Check Linen Dress. Lucile wears the Contrast Smocked Cotton Top and Garment Dyed Linen Barrel Leg Trousers. Léa wears the Cotton Linen Poplin Sleeveless Top and Pleated Raised Stripe Cotton Skirt.
Words by Alice Simkins Vyce.
Photography by Billy Barraclough.
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