Brush makers return

Shift to luxury and niche markets to survive competition from cheaper goods.

- Hermes

QUALITY: FRENCH MANUFACTURERS STAGE COMEBACK FROM BRINK

French brush makers are shifting to luxury and niche markets to survive rising costs and redundancy, as they see their craft - handed down through the generations - threatened with extinction.

"We've been making brushes here for six generations," said Daniel Desjardins, standing in his family workshop, which has been turning out brushes made from horsehair or boar bristles since 1834. Now, "it's becoming a lost craft," Desjardins said, citing fierce competition from cheaper goods made in Eastern Europe and China.

Synthetic materials replacing natural bristles and struggling to find young people interested in the trade also threaten the industry, leaving its future uncertain.

But brush makers in France's northern Oise valley are "refocusing" their efforts to revive the craft, said Desjardins, by turning towards the luxury sector.