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Jean Marie Massaud

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Interview with Jean Marie Massaud

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2008.10

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Jean Marie Massaud : Born in 1966 in Toulouse, France, Jean-Marie Massaud graduated in 1990 from Les Ateliers, Ecole Nationale Superieure de Creation Industrielle. His work spans a wide range of design, from furniture to architecture.

Which project are you most proud of? Can you also tell us about its concept?

JMM : I like all projects which are or have been thoughts and works about new life experiences and economic scenarios. I could quote the Volcano Stadium which has been designed as an extended collective territory. I also like the Life Reef towers which are superposed private territories taking into account collective stakes…

We read about “manned cloud”. Is this a concept design (idea), or will it be produced sometime soon? Can you also explain a bit about this design?

JMM : It is initially a conceptual idea, looking at alternative ways around leisure and travel. How can we conciliate mass tourism and the preservation of sites? Manned Cloud ought to be a solution. By freeing from gravity and infrastructures, the airship hotel would give access to sites without traces and intrusion. The production of the airship as such is not for anytime soon due to the important budget and all the research that remains to be done on the topic. But we work with the ONERA (Office National d’Etudes et Recherches Aérospatiales) to adapt the concept. More generally, there is a growing interest worldwide for blimps. Therefore, I am confident that the concept will eventually be produced one day.

I heard that as a child, you wanted to be an inventor. Now as an adult, do you see yourself as one?

JMM : It is true that when I was a kid, I was fascinated by encyclopaedias. Some children dream of becoming an astronaut or a fire fighter – well, I wanted to become an inventor. Today, my dreams and life project are the same. I just modify the kind of inventions I want to create. Technology and materials are only means. Today, I work on life scenarios. I try to develop alternative ways that reconcile desires and responsibilities taking into account the new stakes. What are these stakes? 1. Self achievement/blooming, 2. Collective harmony and 3. Symbiosis (relation between technosphere and ecosphere).

In design, it seems that it is getting more and more difficult to do something which no one has ever done. Some people say that all the possible forms have been tried already. What do you think is necessary to be a designer who can make something new?

JMM : I don’t consider design as being just a stylistic approach. It is much more a question of human innovation, while the form (symbol) only provides information on the content. As a result, I believe everything is still to be done.

What do you think is, if any, the most important development in design and architecture in the past 10 years?

JMM : I would say it is the global and systemic approach, the increasing number of information sources and the birth of a “world” brain/conscience. New economic models appear, based on intelligence and sensitivity, such as developed by Apple for instance.

Can you tell us what you imagine design & architecture to be in the next 10 years?

JMM : I hope that the development will move toward research and symbiosis between the humanity and the world, going further than a simple esthetic trend.

Whenever we speak to producers from different countries, they tell us how difficult it is to penetrate the French market. They say that the French have different kinds of tastes in terms of design. Do you agree? Can you also tell us the reason why you agree or disagree?

JMM : There is a kind of schizophrenia in France. French are innovative in many conceptual and theoretical fields. But they turn out to be very conservative when it comes to practice and reality. It’s a French paradox.

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