Cynthia in the Atelier des Filaos specializing in furniture recycling in Prayssac in the Lot on June 5, 2024 (AFP/Valentine CHAPUIS)
Bent over her work, Cynthia, employee of a recycling plant in the Lot whose objective is to bring women back to work, applies herself to sanding the drawers of a chest of drawers which really needs it.
With her blue work overalls and her anti-dust mask, Cynthia N’Diaye, 24, is one of the twelve employees undergoing reintegration at the Atelier des Filaos, located in Prayssac, near Cahors.
Her technical supervisor, Sandra Warnet, 39, guides her gently. After using an electric sander, the young woman uses sandpaper and hand to remove the last paint residue to reveal the wood grain of this piece of furniture that a customer entrusted to her.
As with the other employees, Cynthia’s time on this integration project is only fleeting. Two years maximum, then each will have to use the skills and certainties gleaned here to pursue their professional path.
– “The most precarious” –
The recycling center was created in 2022 by an association which helps victims of domestic violence in the Lot department and offers them emergency accommodation. The idea came naturally from the primary mission of this association: to give women their autonomy.
In the Atelier des Filaos specializing in furniture recycling in Prayssac in the Lot on June 5, 2024 (AFP/Valentine CHAPUIS)
Who says autonomy, in fact says financial independence, and therefore a return to employment. “The most precarious of the precarious are women,” underlines Lisette Calderan, volunteer and president.
In the workshop, employees learn to repair and restyle furniture, but also to keep accounts, take inventory and manage the store. They accumulate skills, from customer relations to IT tasks.
But the main objective “is self-confidence, really”, explains Adeline Déhais, director of the association. “When you have confidence in yourself to succeed in interviews, for me, this is the first axis. Afterwards, it is also to remove all the obstacles to employment, whether it be mobility, childcare children…”
In the Lot, one of the most rural departments in France, these last two issues are crucial. In Prayssac, a town with some 2,400 inhabitants, “there is a crèche, but it is always full”, says Fanny Victor, coordinator of the structure, over morning coffee. “And in the other villages, there is nothing.”
– “That’s life” –
L’Atelier des Filaos specializes in furniture recycling in Prayssac in the Lot on June 5, 2024 (AFP/Valentine CHAPUIS)
At the end of the morning, Nadège Heitzmann, 47, takes the wheel of the association’s van to collect furniture donated by a former volunteer.
This forty-year-old with tattoos that pay homage to her family, worked for a long time on construction sites, then health problems thwarted a career change, before arriving at the recycling plant on the advice of a social worker.
“I was already doing a lot of tinkering, but on my own, so on a social level, human contact, it helped me a lot. And I also made friends,” she confides.
In the workshop, Marie-Ange Mendy, 41, is putting the final touches on a dressing table that she completely dismantled to restore it, then decorated it by painting the face of a woman wearing makeup on the top, speckled with touches of color.
The hairdresser “still has her experience, her story, but is leaving for another life”. For Marie-Ange, the renovation process “is an outlet, it allows us to release our emotions and start fresh.”
L’Atelier des Filaos specializes in furniture recycling in Prayssac in the Lot on June 5, 2024 (AFP/Valentine CHAPUIS)
“That’s why I use lots of colors, that’s life.”
Under the supervision of the supervisor, she refines her work with a smile. The piece of furniture, like her, emerges transfigured. She’s only been here a month but has already started to regain her confidence.
With small setbacks, sometimes: “Is it going to sell?”, she worries.
© 2024 AFP
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