Photo Credits: Photography by Denis Boulze for Milk Magazine
My name is Amélie Pichard, and I introduce myself as a designer, but not just a designer of bags and shoes. Over the past few years, I’ve started to open up to a lot of different things. Today, my work as a designer isn’t about making beautiful things just for the sake of beauty; it’s about finding artisans and forms of craftsmanship that still exist and creating from that. Fashion tends to work the opposite way—having a desire first, and then finding someone who can fulfill that desire. I want to first find the know-how, and then come up with an idea, whether it’s based on ancestral craftsmanship or innovations. My goal is to bridge tradition and innovation. This process might lead me to work on all kinds of objects other than bags and shoes, which I generally work on in a fairly traditional way. I think of objects for the home or soaps, for example, when I moved to the countryside... Wherever I go, I try to find artisans and meet them.
Choosing digital for responsible consumption
Not everything I produce is made in large quantities. Typically, we release only one bag per color, and once it’s sold, we work on a pre-order system to avoid creating excess stock. However, for consumer products, I don’t mind having a little more quantity.
I’ve always been quite digital, even though I initially worked mainly with resellers when I first started the brand. In 2017, I stopped working with resellers for several reasons. First, because they take a margin, but also because it created a lot of stress for me as I was stuck between the factory, which always delivered late, and the reseller, who was always in a rush to receive their merchandise. Additionally, resellers always wanted new products and discounted my products after just two weeks. This model no longer made sense to me.
At that time, customers wanted to see the products in person. When you launch a brand, that’s important. I had this fantasy of becoming the neighborhood shopkeeper, someone people enjoy visiting. But I didn’t want to open a traditional commercial store.
I opened my store on my street, a street that was quiet during the day but very busy at night. I wanted to be alone like a UFO on this street and have people come to me. During the day, it was very pleasant, a bit like the countryside with cobblestones. The shop was called “Chez Pichard.”
This store lasted for 4 years (including the Covid period, which really shook things up). We first started with salespeople, and then the team ended up managing it. Little by little, it became a store where customers had to call us in advance for us to open for them. Moreover, they didn’t always understand that the store was only open 3 days a week. There was a bit of an expectation to be like a traditional shop, which bothered me a little because I don’t like to do things traditionally.
Then there was this change of life that had been on my mind for a while. For years, I’d been saying that I wanted to live primarily in the countryside. Not just to have a weekend house, but for Paris to become my weekend home, not the other way around. Everyone told me it was impossible, “You’re a business owner, how are you going to handle your employees?” There was also this guilt; I didn’t want to be the type of boss who goes wherever she wants, whenever she wants, all the time, living wherever she wants while her employees are stuck in Paris working from 9am to 7pm.
At that point, people told me my dream was impossible. Despite that, I began my search for houses, which took 5 years. We were searching with a real concern about the consumption and energy of the house. It was tough. We were looking in the Perche region, but there, all the houses were made of stone, which was disastrous in terms of energy efficiency.
In the meantime, Covid happened, and mentalities changed a lot. I saw, for example, people in the United States who could work in beautiful and remote places and still work in fashion, communications, etc. I thought to myself, “In 10 years, we’ll be able to do that in France.”
Photo Credits: Amélie Pichard for baserange
Calmdecampagne
Calmdecampagne is currently the Instagram account for the house. I hope it will become something more; I have other projects in mind to work on in the countryside. But for that, I need to simplify my daily life and that of my team as much as possible, to stabilize the brand and also give myself more time for future projects and the arrival of the baby. I didn’t have a baby at 39 years old just to not enjoy it and keep my head buried in work. In any case, I know I will remain connected to the brand. I manage the Instagram account and the entire company; I’m not going to abandon everything. I just no longer want it to be a source of stress like it has been for the past 10 years.
IVF
It took me as long to find a house as it did to have a child—five years. I had stopped taking the pill a long time ago; we thought, "let fate play out." There was no pressure at all. It started to become a subject when I kept joking that I wanted a Taurus baby. Maybe because I am a Taurus myself and have always liked bulls, I thought they might be calmer! In September, I hoped I wouldn’t have my period, so I could have that Taurus baby. We fantasized about the conception—thinking it could be a baby made in a van, on a beach... There’s always this fantasy, which turns into something you have to grieve when you do IVF, about where your baby was conceived. Every year, September was always a bit of a disappointment. After a few years, when there were tears, I thought, "There are too many tears, even almost every time I get my period." We decided that maybe we should see someone. I was already 36 at that time.
We went for fertility tests, which took some time. I was immediately met with a rather cold reception. I didn’t like the way I was treated in general. There was a lot of pressure. I was told, "You don’t seem to have many follicles, so we won’t know the quality of the eggs until we harvest them," "You have some now, but maybe in six months, you won’t have any." They didn’t spare me. I started to really worry. They made comments about my age, saying I wasn’t getting any younger. The worst part was that most of these comments came from women.
We left the maternity clinic thinking we wouldn’t do IVF. We weren’t ready. It was so overwhelming, so stressful, and we are usually more into alternative medicine. Plus, I thought that if more and more couples couldn’t have children, it was probably for a reason—for the planet. I wondered, why force things?
We started seeing naturopaths, hypnotists, energy healers, acupuncturists... It took time, but all these things were essential. I learned to take care of myself. We live in a society where we study, work, and that’s it. We never think about ourselves first, even before becoming parents. This entire journey was essential, and I don’t see how anyone could go through IVF without this whole process of support. I felt like there were things I needed to unlock. This parallel journey took two years. During this time, I always had the sword of Damocles hanging over me because I was told that in six months, I wouldn’t have any more follicles.
One day, one of my acupuncturists asked me to send her the old results on the number of follicles I had. She told me it was very few. The fact that it was her who told me made something click inside me. I realized I had to stop being so stubborn and open up a little. I was already doing a lot of things in parallel, and trying IVF was probably a good thing. At least I couldn’t regret not doing it. I remember sending my partner a text saying, “Let’s do IVF.”
We began the first appointments in March 2021. The egg retrieval happened in June, and the transfer was in September. Due to the hormones, things didn’t go well with one ovary, and they couldn’t retrieve anything. I found out in a rather brutal way; they told me just before entering the operating room. In fact, I had been strongly discouraged from having general anesthesia because it didn’t suit them for the retrieval—it would take too long. When I finally decided to go for the general anesthesia, they asked me, "Why? It’ll be quick; there’s only one ovary to retrieve." That’s how I found out. I was then told that the catheter for anesthesia would be the worst part. At that moment, I just wanted to shrink and leave quickly. I eventually accepted local anesthesia.
They only retrieved 4 follicles, 3 of which contained eggs. It wasn’t much. At the same time, I had decided to focus on naturopathy for nutrition and internal osteopathy to realign and reposition my uterus. This session reminded me of a feeling I had when I was a child when a boy hit me in the groin. She thinks my uterus may have been stuck since that day. In addition to all that, I saw an acupuncturist very regularly. Luckily, they were there because I could talk to them about my doubts and struggles, which I couldn’t do at the maternity clinic.
We were happy to have those 3 eggs, but the maternity doctor made it clear that it wasn’t a great result. At that point, we knew the sperm and eggs were meeting, but we didn’t know what would happen. A few days later, we were called to hear that all 3 eggs had fertilized.
The day before the retrieval, they thought I had polyps. I wanted to tell them, "You’ve been in my uterus for two months; couldn’t you have seen that earlier?"
It was decided that if an embryo formed, they would freeze it and check in July if I had polyps. In the end, I didn’t have polyps, and of the 3 embryos, only one was viable to be frozen.
So, I had just one chance. If that didn’t work, I would have to start IVF all over again. Like many women. It takes so much time. I felt lucky to be my own boss. Between the blood tests in the morning and checking the follicles... It’s crazy. Another stroke of luck was that I lived in Paris, just 15 minutes by metro. Many women have to drive for hours every other day for their IVF.
In the end, in September, the transfer held. I was incredibly lucky.
The beginning of the pregnancy
I felt like a diamond had been transferred into my belly. I no longer dared sneeze, laugh, or do any sports... I didn’t dare do anything! I kept thinking, "It has to stay, it has to hold." I also read a lot of things online, and it was advised not to lie down all the time, so I still had to go about my life and keep busy.
When we got the results 12 days after the blood test, we didn’t even know how to read them. That’s when we realized how crazy it was that the doctors didn’t call to explain or announce the results. For 10 days, I had to get blood tests every day, with no one telling me that everything was okay. We lost the joy of peeing on a test and seeing that we were expecting a baby, of announcing it to my partner and my family. All my loved ones knew I was doing IVF, so the element of surprise was no longer there.
At the second blood test, I called my partner to announce the news because he was at work. I was at the museum with colleagues. We all cried at the museum. It was nice, but it wasn’t what I had imagined.
I think this is also part of life. Women tend to want to control so many things. This journey teaches you to let go, to release control. After a while, you start letting go of all the little things you had built up in your mind, maybe since forever. Even though my desire to become a mother was quite recent, these are things that you start embodying from a very young age.
The first weeks were stressful; we couldn’t breathe. The first three months were also hard because all they talk about are these miscarriage stories... You don’t feel at ease. I’m just starting to feel at ease now because the baby is well-formed, starting to gain weight, and will soon be born… I can feel him inside me.
Afterwards
I plan to continue seeing my naturopath and osteopath until the birth, and even after. I will even take my baby to the osteopath; I think it’s important to pamper him. Generally, I do all these things by following people’s advice and my own needs. For example, I haven’t seen my acupuncturist in a while because I feel good and don’t necessarily feel the need. As for the midwife, it will be more traditional, especially since I will be in the countryside, at least for the first few months.
Advice for women going through IVF
After my post on social media, many women told me how difficult it was for them. They asked me how I made it work for me. Honestly, I don't know.
In an IVF journey, they never explain why it doesn’t work, but they explain even less why it works. What I can advise is to think about yourself, for once. Don’t put pressure on yourself. Especially, even though it’s really hard in the beginning, don’t listen to people who tell you, “You need to go on vacation, you need to think about something else.” In fact, there are no miracles. You need to start getting in touch with your inner self and ask yourself what’s good and what’s not good for you.
I think there are many things that sometimes need to leave our lives in order to free us and help us move on, as long as there’s no major pathology, of course. But there are even so many cases of women with major health issues who managed to get pregnant. I believe you have to let go. You can’t force anything, even with the best IVF treatments and the best doctors. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. I really feel like you have to be able to say, “Maybe it will work, maybe it won’t, but at least everything I’ve done will have been helpful for me.” I think that’s the moment when you have to be selfish, actually. You need to take care of both your body and mind; you can’t do one without the other. They say that childbirth is also a moment when you face all your fears and blockages, which is why it’s important to start getting rid of them beforehand, if possible.
