terr-estre, a ~1500m² shared workshops focused on circular economy to build the futur of production!
Terr-estre is a inclusive project in France dedicated primarly to circular economy and partnerships for sustainability..
We act through 3 pilars:
- A fabrication workshop (La Fabrique), to support makers in circular economy transition.
- A partnerships space (Le Conseil), to foster collaboration through design methods and partnership brokering practical technics.
- A place for citizen and schools (La Place), to explore circular economy, resilience, democracy though debate and workshops.
Local
France
Communauté de Commune du Grésivaudan, département de l'Isère, région Auvergne Rhône Alpes.
Mainly urban
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)
No
No
Yes
As a representative of an organisation
Name of the organisation(s): terr-estre Type of organisation: For-profit company First name of representative: Johanna Last name of representative: Rowe Calvi Gender: Female Nationality: France If relevant, please select your other nationality: United Kingdom Function: Founder and President Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: 473 chemin du ballois Town: Bernin Postal code: 38190 Country: France Direct Tel:+33620512333 E-mail:johanna.rowecalvi@terr-estre.com Website:https://terr-estre.com/
Solve local sustainability issues by creating perennial ecosystems and employment on Isère territory (France) is our mission at terr-estre.
The lack of collaboration between the various actors and the short-term state of mind are slowing down or even blocking the resolution of the major challenges of sustainable development.
So, we propose to tackle this challenge through 3 pillars:
First: Le Conseil
We created a method based on Partnership Brokering and Strategic Design in order to support local multifactor partnerships.
Second: La Place
Where we concretely experiment what is circular economy, citizenship and sustainability with schools and citizens. Learning, doing, and shared knowledge is our goal at La Place.
Third: La Fabrique
Where we'll host and support designers, craftspeople, and engineers with a full range of services like access to a large machine park and local resources. Where the waste for some become the "raw" material for others.
We started the project in 2022 and we are currently working on the financial plan of the old factory we want to buy.
We didn't wait for our building to start acting! So, we are currently doing initiatives in 4 different locations on our territory.
Circular economy
New skills
Partnerships for good
Diversity
knowledge and know-how
Our initiative is focused primarily on 3 main sustainability issues:
Reduction of the extraction of new resources and "popular" education on circular economy (SDG 12 and 4)
Promote and support health and efficiency of partnerships for sustainability (SDG 17)
Support and include displaced talents and gender equality (SDG 5, 8 and 10)
We are currently into discussions with local public sector and elected officials to identify how to redirect local waste towards our future building to get them reused by local craftspeople, designers, and engineers. This specific objective needs the development of a large network including public, private, and non-profit organizations. Our objective is to support the transition of 50 to 70 craftspeople, designer and engineer small organizations into reusing local available resources (waste). In 2022 we organized 8 workshops about circularity during the last Motor Show in Paris.
We already organized several business workshops for the private sector, dedicated to multiple directors and VP sustainability / CSR. During those we had conferences from an expert in circular economy and regenerative businesses certified by the ADEME. We are currently building a new offer of cross organization co-development dedicated to CSR decision makers. Our objective is to follow, connect and support the ~70 local decision maker CSR specialists and propose complementary initiatives to existing ones.
Inclusivity is part of our core values, one of the explanations is visible directly in our current team composition which regroup LGBT+, people of 55+ years old, and neuroatypical functioning members. Two of the members are involved in associations for Women or LGBT rights. Our objective is to welcome 50% of women in our workshops and host and support the business settlement and development of 15 to 25% of displaced people with existing craft experience. We also want to propose a free co-working spot to ~10 inclusion and diversity associations.
As you may have understood, in our initiative we want to host professionals' makers. One of our goals is to mix in the same space: designers with engineers and craftspeople because we believe in cross knowledge sharing but also in design methods, and we want to spread them in an organic way.
In addition, in our "monthly subscription" offer to craftspeople and engineers we have planned for design expertise and visual communication included in all packages. In addition to what, a photographer will regularly take picture of their work and them working, those will be published in a newspaper and available for them to communicate.
As we want to develop, and relocate know-hows on our territory, we need to promote production. That’s why we are currently prototyping a newspaper dedicated to local know-hows, interviews, and pictures. Distribution will be limited to reduce carbon footprint and the distribution strategy is currently already in progress.
On a completely different level, we’ve been working hard on the visual identity of terr-estre. Our name is inspired from the sociologist and philosopher Bruno Latour, we wanted the name to carry the idea of earth and humanity and our big ambition for the planet. The logo has been built to make the reader feel our authenticity and unpretentiousness. As you’ll see on the visuals, we used only lowercase. We also conducted an illustration study within order to determine the style of illustration that will be part of terr-estre's visual identity.
We are currently finalizing the financial plan to purchase an old factory that we'll rehabilitate with local craftpeople, designers, and artists.
In terms of internal aesthetic skills and sensitivity, in the team we have one visual designer with more than 20 years of experience and an industrial designer with 15 years’ experience mainly in user experience.
We have 4 ways to do inclusion at terr-estre:
- Firstly, we integrated shared governance directly in the legal statutes of terr-estre. We work daily in shared or distributed governance. All topics are worked in during workshop (called “circles”) in which everyone can participate. As we will grow, we plan on having an HR circle to allow develop an inclusive and transparent way to determine salaries and hirings. terr-estre will be composed of several legal entities, mostly in “cooperative mode” (each employee, stakeholder has 1 voice and can participate to important decisions). We rely also on Frederic Laloux’s work and his book Reinventing Organization.
- Secondly, we are inclusive in our working methods. Co-designing with users and public services. For instance, we started this month the discussions with the local waste managers to co-design initiatives for citizen and kids, about circular economy.
- Thirdly, the size of the building we plan on having includes a co-working space free for non-profits that tackles topics we support such as (but not limited to) gender equality, reduction of inequalities, supporting displaced persons and democracy. We planned of having at least 15 desks dedicated.
- Also, we think inclusion as part of the partnership method used, inclusive and balanced partnerships is our goal. Our methods are based on the work of the Partnership Broker Association and design strategy methods, both promoting inclusion and collaboration.
- And last, we plan on hosting professional activities of 50/70 craftpeople, designers, engineers. On this total, we have a goal of hosting and supporting 10% to 25% of displaced talents in their professional settlement in the years following the grand opening of our shared workshop.
- Citizen will benefit from a large variety of free or very cheap activities. Although the details of some of the activities will depend on the needs and interest of the local community, we already plan on organizing workshops, tips for resilience workshops, debates. We plan on organizing co-construction workshops with citizens and the civil society as soon as we bought the building.
- The building we are currently negotiating, WAS a beautiful industrial building from end of 19th century. However, the building has deteriorated over the years. Some of the neighbors used to work in the factory in mid-20th, it’s an heartbreak for them to see this building in the current state. By renovating and rehabilitating it, this would benefit to the local inhabitants living or passing by the building every day. The history of this building is rich, and we would like to make sure this history will stay in memories.
- Pupils from local schools will benefit from new learning expeditions and unique workshops with craftspeople and debates about circular economy and citizenship.
- Citizens living next to the building could be affected by the work on the building that will last more than one year. The use of van to transport produced goods will also increase as the factory is closed since many years. We'll keep this in mind as the project move forward.
Our panel of stakeholders is very large.
- Some of them, such as citizen and civil society are not yet included in the project but will be soon to co-construct the next steps.
- Elected officials are aware of the project and some of them support us. We have regular discussions about the blocking points of the project. They also connect us with the right people in their organization depending on the topic we need to move forward. They are engaged in helping us to identify building, support the implementation of soft mobility around the identified location.
- We are in constant discussions with CSR from 20 local companies. We co-design our offers with them, get feedback to measure the level of usefulness and impact each can have.
- At a local level we got support from the GrenobLe Lab, a Social Lab and Luzin a fabrication lab. We went to visit and present terr-estre to all the Tiers-Lieux and similar initiatives (in some aspects) of Isère, our department.
- At a national level we got support by HEC incubator.
- At an international level by the Women Forum and Penn University. We were laureate of the Women Entrepreneur 4 Good Program in 2022 and Penn University Global Impact House Program in 2023.
The knowledge fields essential to the projects are:
For the buidling / location: analyzing the territory, transportation possibilities, local urban plans, approximate cost of work for rehabilitation of a building. And identifying all professionals who can support the rehabilitation. Learning how to hold a meeting with a mayor or other elected officials. Basics of architecture, to map possibilities.
To launch our website: sustainable digital design knowledge was super important. We needed to use UX design skills, UI and typographer skills, project management with our partner who developed the website. As we wanted our website to be light and inclusive, we built the UI/UX with this in mind. We also had to reflect a lot on the environmental impact of the website and improve the performance and accessibility to the maximum without deteriorating our brand identity (visual of impact attached).
For the shared workshop (La Fabrique), analyzing the offer on the territory, competition matrices, identify the main machines we would need and the cost associated. Interviews with the other owners of shared workshops and makers. Project management to launch our first project of Newspaper for the promotion of know-how.
And for the project in a more global way: facilitation, coordination, collective intelligence methods, design thinking, value ecosystem mapping, strategic network development, community building, partnership brokering, be a Swiss Knife.
Our main differences are:
- Our goal to increase partnership and multiple connections between civil society, citizen, makers, companies, students. And especially our mission to increase diversity in partnerships.
- To have in the same place Know-hows and strategic knowledges. The idea to reconcile those who think up the businesses strategies and those who think up and produce solutions. Adding to that mix, citizens, and schools.
- To have the goal of transforming the production pipeline with ressources coming from the waste of other companies accessible to many small businesses on our territory
- Some people say we are kind of an incubator for makers because we add to our workshop services, business, and communication coaching. But, contrary to incubators, we don’t limit the time people can stay with us nore limiting the access to young companies. We do not evaluate their growth capacity. Our goal is to support their activity and help them to be more circular and sustainable (for themselves and the planet).
- Building a demonstrator of our vision by the rehabilitating of a local industrial heritage.
- Create a strong link between students, young pupils, and makers (design, crafts, engineering) with this idea of productive city and revalorization of the professions of “doing sustainably”.
- Our events and training are replicable by finding a person with the same background/ knowledge in another location. Or by making our trainers come to a location if it’s not too far.
- Our Sustainability Debathon® will be very easily replicable. It’s a method of debate and content for debate that can be transferred. Even though it’s a trademark, we can see how to transfer the possibility to use it for free to non-lucrative organizations. (this method is based on the research work of Max Mollon).
- Our methodology, process and governance are open and transparent, and we can share those with anyone having similar goals for our world.
- Specific event due to local needs: such as water resilience, could work less (for now) in areas without water restrictions (for instance).
- The training that will be proposed by the makers hosted in our workshop will be less replicable, as it’s based on their specific skills and know-how. Maybe we can reflect on how to give access virtually.
- I think, most of the knowledge and learnings could be transferred or communicated in papers or videos.
We work in a participative way; all our plenary meetings are open to everyone. We follow participatory, shared governance methods. We work in a transparent way with different tools of collective intelligence.
Our project management methods are a mix of agile, design thinking and codevelopment technics. Each person who joins the initiative express: what they want to learn, what they can bring to the table and what they don’t want to do.
This is a non-exhaustive list
- For education (starting in May 2023)
o Creation of workshops to experiment circular economy for pupils with their schools.
o Workshops about resilience: learning how to build a solar oven, build a rain water collector, hydroponics for families or small communities,…
o Conferences about identification of plants, non-native plants. Basics about how to grow plants for food.
o Transmission of knowledge and know-how from craftpeople to students, professional retraining, …
- About climate action and sustainable production (meetings with craftspeople and local authority in progress):
o Reduction of waste by increasing circularity locally
o Reduction of use of raw material, by using waste of other industries
o Reduction of carbon footprint due to importation of foreign raw material and treatment of local waste.
- About gender equality and reduced inequalities (ongoing):
o Smart society integration of displaced persons by welcoming and coaching them for their business settlement.
o At La Fabrique we want to welcome makers in a gender balanced way.
o In recruitment we’re looking at balancing gender, neurodiversity and other factors of exclusion (keeping in mind the current legal limits in France).
o Hosting for free non-profit associations dedicated to those topics.
- Increase the quality of local partnership for sustainability (ongoing, started in November 22):
o through our collective workshops for CSR business representatives.
o Between makers and local businesses
o Between schools and makers
o Between civil society and citizens, schools through our debates and workshops
o Between citizens through our workshops and debates
o …
You'll find attached a roadmap explaining in a macro way the coming steps of the project.
What we've been achieving until now is:
- developing the local network: with elected officials (~10 meetings), department, region and cities, 50 local companies and CSR directors, makers, Tiers-Lieux. Always in progress, started in 2021
- identifying the building and cost of the rehabilitation 2022
- financial plan and negotiation in progress 2023
- workshops about circularity (x8) and about regenerative business models 2022
- Laureate of Women Entrepreneur 4 Good Program (Women's Forum) 2022
- Laureate of the Impact House Program for Impact Projects (Penn University USA) 2023
- Democracy tool co-construct with 2 other non-profit association (Democratie Ouverte and Les CRD) 2022
- Tests of the democracy tool during OIDP event in Grenoble
- We are currently working on our logic model to determine the impact measurement strategy within Penn University Global Impact House Program.
Our initiative tackles the idea of developing new competencies as we plan on opening a place dedicated to sustainability in the Alps. Here’s few specific examples.
- Knowledge about circular economy, reuse and revalorization across citizen and pupils. This with our workshops dedicated to water and energy resilience (2023).
- Co-development of CSR directors of local companies to develop cross shared knowledge that spreads in the different organizations. Specifically about sustainability and circular economy practical challenges, does and don’t, tips.
- We strongly believe in debate to develop knowledge through argument and critical thinking. Our debathon® can be used in schools, public or private organization, and with citizen, in our future space or any other relevant location.
- Know-how transmission from local craftspeople to future generation, schools, and people in retraining.
- We need to get moving, eco-anxiety is very high and more and more of citizen we talk to are in burnout due to dissonance between their lives and the global situation. Our plan is to make people “do” things with their hands and mind.
