The MIF Expo 2025 brings together, from November 6 to 9 in Paris, nearly 1,000 exhibitors and a massive audience. You will find knitters, seamstresses, watchmakers, spinners, and a promise: to make here, to last long. Behind the materials and prices, a question runs through the aisles: how to reconcile the desire for proximity, local employment, and purchasing power constraints?
MIF Expo: a hive of concrete stories
The smell of polished wood mingles with the scents of essential oils. Under Pavilion 3 of the Parc des expositions de la porte de Versailles, precise gestures are repeated. Stitch after stitch and point after point, the process continues. Voices respond to each other: a choir of provinces and workshops. You move between stands that resemble train station counters: they talk about materials, prices, sizes, deadlines, but above all duration.
The 2025 edition of the MIF Expo took place from 11/06/2025 to 11/09/2025. Nearly 1,000 exhibitors displayed their discoveries, transmissions, and trials, for a loyal audience of more than 110,000 visitors in recent editions. Here, the argument is not shouted: it is woven. The artisans defend quality and repairability. Aware that purchasing power and price differentials influence every decision. They bet on the honesty of the demonstration: to show, to let touch, to explain.
It all starts with encounters. A merino hat that you crumple. A cape that captures the light. A hat is personalized in a minute. Moreover, a workshop jacket whose fabric has the thickness of a memory. The gestures, they tell the same thing: here, we still make.
Blanc Bonnet: a knit anchored in Saint-Didier-en-Velay
In front of piles of hats sorted by gauge and wool, Arnaud Perrier-Gustin smiles: the brand Blanc Bonnet changed hands "three years ago," and the trajectory has been corrected. "Brand born in Saint-Didier-en-Velay… we now have more than 200 references: merino, alpaca, recycled denim, recycled wool," he summarizes.
On the stand, prices start around €25. "There is no Black Friday," the manager slips in. "I position myself as the cheapest on the market, otherwise I don’t sell." The frankness speaks to the difficulty of balance: aligning with a desire to buy French, without denying the reality of budgets. Above the cones, a sleek logo catches the eye: "Redesign thought for embroidery and to modernize the brand."
Here, the hat becomes a mood marker as much as a technical accessory. Customers ask for the material first, then the fit. They run their hand over it, compare the suppleness, put it down, come back. The seller explains the fibers and their uses: the breathable merino, the insulating alpaca, the recycled that rethinks the industry.
Belotsi Paris: capes and couture, the sober look
Under the rack, the Belotsi Paris line stands out in clear silhouettes. Fabienne Belotsi speaks softly but gets straight to the point: "Thirty years in the business and more… I make winter and summer collections. My favorite materials: wool and cotton." The capes reign, fluid, ready to swirl on the shoulders. All models are made in Paris.
The average price for a jacket or a coat is around €250. At this price, the cut and the drape must convince. Customers try on, feel the interlining, seek ease. You hear "it holds," "it doesn’t itch," "it will follow me for a long time." The designer accompanies, sometimes pins, adjusts a hem, etc. There is something of the workshop boutique: sewing is not a secret, it’s a conversation.
Van Palma: felt and the Marseille gesture
A hat takes on the character of the wearer. At Van Palma, the demonstration is immediate. Justine Coli grabs a leather strap and, with a gesture, personalizes a crown. The service is charged €15 to €20. The Phocaean brand is ten years old, it makes its felt hats in France and assumes a clear style: sharp edges, sometimes mineral, sometimes vibrant tones, and always the elegance of a simple line.
On the table, the choice is wide. The fittings trigger knowing looks, selfies, hesitations. The hat, as we know, is not a neutral accessory. A customer returns: the size is right, but she wants a bolder ribbon. We change, cut, tie. She leaves with an object that belongs to her.
Kiplay Vintage: heritage at work
A few aisles away, a work blue hangs like a banner. Kiplay Vintage tells a story that began in 1921. "We celebrated our 100th anniversary," recalls Marc Pradal, "with our Miss Normandy and the Umbrellas of Cherbourg." The revival took place "in my own city," in Normandy.
The jackets and pants take on the workshop colors, but the pattern has shifted towards the city: widened pockets, better-turned shoulders, tightened hems. The fabric retains its density. The logos, discreet, leave room for topstitching. We talk about durability, repairs, spare parts. Young customers love the story as much as the cut. Moreover, the older ones recognize the hand that sewed the jackets of their beginnings.
Fées en Provence: the Aix laboratory, scent of craftsmanship
Among the scents, the Fées en Provence stand installs its white clarity. Jazz Drymon Fontani summarizes: "Created in 2010, everything is made in Aix-en-Provence in our laboratories." The clientele is "rather urban," she notes, "and is expanding as the brand becomes more known."
The bottles parade, textures are tested, compositions displayed are compared. The discussion shifts to the supply chains: where does the vegetable oil come from, which supplier for which hydrosol, what certifications? The team answers effortlessly. Craftsmanship is not a slogan here: it’s a process and a place.
Workshops, territories: a geography of making
Below the main aisles, stands like stations map out a country of gestures.
In Romans-sur-Isère, the Atelier Made in Romans and the Cité de la Chaussure have reopened the page of the factory town. The workshops can be visited, the shop assembles brands 100% Romans. A shared vocabulary is heard here: cutting, stitching, assembly, shank, sole. The teams talk about the patient relocation, the cooperation between houses, and the bet on a living anchorage.
In Lorraine, Bergère de France holds the line of a last industrial spinning mill for knitting yarn. On the stand, massive cones assert their gravity. We talk about carding, twisting, dyeing. Customers knit in memory: such a stitch learned with a grandmother, such a sweater reworked at the collar. The yarn here is not just a material: it’s a link between generations.
In Châteauroux, Les Petites Maries make stuffed animals with embroidered iris eyes. The EPV label discreetly adorns a corner of the stand. The teddy bears sit effortlessly, evoking hospital gifts, first nights without a nightlight. The seams are tight, the labels explicit: you know where the object was made, by whom, with what.
On the side of Puy-en-Velay, So France is Co is experienced as a workshop-boutique. The jeans are cut and assembled behind the shop. You choose the fabric, discuss a hem, talk about inseam length and waist height. The argument for custom-made becomes concrete: you see the machine, hear the needle, understand the gesture.
Le Petit Dormeur, Atelier Caradant: two stories, two speeds
Around a corner, we meet Michel de Vasselot and Brieuc Izenic, managers of the manufacturer Le Petit Dormeur, whom we had already interviewed a few years earlier. Their story is summed up in a few words and a lot of determination: taken over in September 2022, the brand sold out its stocks in four days at MIF 2023. Since then, growth has been displayed, with up to x5 in turnover. A short range, the travel pillow as a discreet companion, and a care for comfort that immediately speaks to travelers.
A few meters away, Atelier Caradant assembles automatic watches with some dials made of paper. The proposal is unique: co-design with the client, assembly in France, fine-tuning to perfection. You look at these slightly fibrous surfaces that catch the light differently. The mechanism beats, regular. Time seems both slower and more embodied.
Montebourg, the shadow of politics
In this popular fair, people sell and discuss. Moreover, the figure of Arnaud Montebourg, former Minister of the Economy, crosses the aisles as a reminder. He is no longer in government, but his fight for industrial sovereignty continues to fuel conversations. Here, the argument is not a poster: it’s a presence.
Simple words are heard: jobs, skills, supply chains, prices. Some demand more demanding public orders, others insist on the transparency of materials and workshops. Politics, in the end, boils down to a question of time: how much time is given to an industry to rebuild? how many seasons to a workshop to balance its accounts?
What the MIF Expo tells about the France that makes
The MIF Expo 2025 shows a France that does not want to relegate manufacturing to the past. Behind every hat, cape, or hat, there are people, machines, a territory. "Made in France" appears less as a slogan than as a sum of strategic decisions: accepting to pay a little more to keep workshops, skills, and jobs here.
Sustainability as practice, not as a slogan
The fair highlights a lived sustainability: reinforced seams, repairability, service reachable, products that are kept and passed on. The criterion becomes not only "how much does it cost?" but "what does it allow to keep alive?" Leaving Pavilion 3, you understand that if buying is an economic act, it is above all a vote, for the world in which you want to live tomorrow.