Isaac, 15, died on a Friday in February 2023, in a tragic car accident, on an ordinary road towards Savigny, in the canton of Vaud. Five teenagers, all minors, got into a car stolen from the driver’s parents. The latter lost control of the vehicle which went into the ditch. Four boys escaped unhurt, the fifth died next to the damaged car, accompanied by a witness who stopped at the scene of the accident. A youthful mischief ends in a terrible tragedy.
Isaac loved life, rap, skateboarding, he drew, wanted to become a graphic designer or stylist, or something like that, we have so many dreams at that age. His mother is initially crushed by grief. “Losing a child,” Fariba De Francesco Greuter tells us at one point in the interview, “is equivalent to living in a permanent split.”
“We are moving forward, but always with despair. The most difficult thing is this crossing, this solitude. We have to relearn everything. Even to breathe.”
Then later again: “I told myself that if I stayed with my anger, I was not going to survive.”
A mark for memory
So there you have it, that’s why we’re with her, in this boutique on rue Caroline in Lausanne, to discuss the project she launched to offer a tribute to her missing son, a sort of second life, which helps him get through his. When Fariba welcomes us, we are struck by her smile, by the solar energy she gives off. Petite, wrapped in a sweatshirt from the collection, she looks like a very young girl ready to take on the world. His generosity is infectious, it permeates the place.
The brand opened in June 2024 and is in its image: light is everywhere. There is a corner for the shelves, a space for fittings, another also for drinking coffee, eating, chatting. “The store had been closed for eight years,” says Fariba. It is Retraites Populaires which makes the place available with an affordable lease. We sold graffiti cans there, so we kept the spirit street. Isaac’s friends accompanied me to launch this project, repainted the walls, laid the carpet, imagined the brand, the store. This brand wants to live, we feel that there is a driveI believe in it!”
Friends, relatives, there are everywhere in this story. They stop by the store the day we are there, participate in the discussion, like Alexandre Pointet, the designer of the brand, whom Fariba wanted by his side. The basic graph is a flower that Isaac had drawn and which unfolds along the entire line. We find t-shirts, sweatshirts, caps, beanies. It’s beautiful, it’s eco-responsible, it suits girls and boys, young people, but not only that.
Fariba goes back to the source, that of her tears. “We buried Isaac and then we went to the hotel. I opened my computer and started on this project, it saved my life. I do a lot of photography alongside my work and my son liked a black and white print that I made of Château-d’Œx. I suggested to Alex that we work on this image.” On a sweatshirt, we also see the silhouette of a young boy on a skateboard, concentrated, his head tilted. We guess that it is Isaac, who flies into the slopes of the city. Fariba:
“I see this collection as a reverse inheritance: it is Isaac who leaves me something.
Friends come by every week
The brand is cheerful, cool “because Isaac was a cool kid”, the boy’s name is written with two A’s and pronounced twice. “For the moments spent with him and for the moments to come.” We still note the subtitle “for the good times”, and we understand that it speaks of resilience, of love, of the respect that Isaac lacked, by dying without his friends in the crashed car. Fariba distributes, each time she sells a piece of clothing, a text which explains the approach, and allows people to share the project.
Because it’s also about that for Fariba and for these young people who launched the brand and opened the store: creating a community, giving strength to commit to the future. Every week, around fifteen teenagers, friends or not of Isaac, come to eat, stop for a moment at the store, a breakdance group practices in the basement every Thursday. For Alexandre Pointet, the graphic designer, this transmission gives meaning to his creations. The team is also thinking of launching a capsule, which would be called Friends.
The feeling of pride
These “friends” are the ambassadors of the project.
Agathe, 17 years old: “I feel proud to see the brand evolve little by little for him.”
For Romain, “it’s a bit like having Isaac always a little by my side, as if he was always present, it reminds me of the good memories I had with him when we were little. Wearing your brand or seeing a t-shirt, all these little details come back to my mind.” For others, clothes give them courage.
The young people who pass through the store to buy something confirm, like Inès, 19 years old: “Isaac is in each of those who wear one of the clothes.” As we leave the place, with a sweatshirt and a t-shirt under our arm, we also say to ourselves that there is something beautiful in imagining that somewhere, in the streets, in a room, on a sports field, a park, on the edge of a lake, Isaac continues to exist, his dreams displayed on our silhouettes, carried by the love of his mother and those close to him.
Did you like this content? Subscribe to our newsletter to receive all our new articles!
