Cis “the Swiss army knife of the car”. And whether you’re 21 or 90, it seems unthinkable to part with it. To measure the popularity of the Citroën C15, a utility vehicle produced between 1984 and 2006, all you had to do was go to the parking lot of the Intermarché in Creysse (Dordogne) on Sunday October 6. The gathering, organized by France Bleu Périgord and the automobile club Les Chevaliers de l’arbre à camés, accustomed to this type of Sunday meeting, attracted around a hundred participants, coming from all over the region and even all of France.
For Jacques, the C15 is the “Swiss army knife of the car”.
Nancy Ladde/SO
“As soon as I got my license, I wanted a C15 as my first car,” says Eliot, 21, who came all the way from Loubéjac. With his beret screwed on his head, the young man doesn’t care about the gentle mockery of his friends. “My car doesn’t cost much, it’s practical,” he notes. In the back, he converted the huge trunk into a cozy bed for traveling.
“It goes everywhere”
As for Kevin, it took him a year and a half before finding the rare gem: an old EDF C15. “But they didn’t leave the flashing light, just the button to activate it,” confides, amused, this resident of Lunas, who came with his son. He didn’t want “a big, expensive car” either. “The C15 is easy to repair and doesn’t consume much,” Kevin appreciates. And above all, “it goes everywhere”, as all the drivers we met in Creysse affirm.
Stéphane Klein/SO
Some sleep inside, others prefer to sleep outside.
“The C15 is easy to repair and doesn’t consume much”
While more than a million examples have been produced, the Citroën C15 has above all become a symbol of assumed rurality. Besides, Jacques never goes to big cities. “Here, you can’t do anything on foot: for the eye doctor or the swimming pool, you have to walk for miles,” estimates this resident of Port-Sainte-Foy-et-Ponchapt.
Noé, for his part, didn’t even imagine having another model as his first car: “And I will never sell it, at least not until my feet go through the floor! “. He uses it to go hunting as well as to work and still remembers when his father took him to school with this now legendary car. “It’s the people’s car,” sums up Kevin. A C15 sells for between 500 and 2,500 euros.
Emblem of rurality
The vehicle has even become a phenomenon on social networks, popularized in particular with the TikTok account of Flooz flooz la fripouille, a Franche-Comté defender of rurality.
It was also through the magic of the networks that Killian bought his C15 on a “whim”. “I made a challenge: if I had 200,000 comments on my post, I would buy one,” says the young man who made the nine-hour drive from Troyes. For two years, he has taken his C15 to different countries in Europe. “As we ride, we fall in love. And there is an incredible community around this model. »
Stéphane Klein/SO
Some had also planned the picnic this Sunday morning, in Creysse.
A model designed by Jean-Claude Bouvier, who traveled to Creysse to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the C15. “I had just joined the Citroën design office after leaving the Boulle school,” says the designer. I had never drawn a car. My idea was to make a utility vehicle with the primary purpose of serving. I didn’t intend to make it pretty. It was simple, basic and effective. »
Forty years later, the designer, welcomed like a star by C15 drivers, was able to measure the success.
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