Vache à lait

On the occasion of the exhibition “Milk LAB, designers reinvent milk” 5.5 design studio designed the milk dispenser The Domestic Cow and the small container The Milking Glass.

The two object are part of the Vache à Lait project, which aims to reconnect consumers with producers to short-circuit the production process and return to the real taste of natural products. In an age when we are used to shopping in supermarkets, this return to basics imagines a new scenario of consumption and products.

A fusion of two basics of umpteen past generations – the milk jug and milk urn – the project reminds us that before becoming an industrial product, milk is the product of a living animal. It encourages us to go meet producers and create new social links.

In the designers’ idea the consumer uses raw milk from The Domestic Cow udder using the Milking Glass. The dispenser is topped up every morning by a local producer. In addition to streamlining the buying process, the absence of intermediaries results in a win-win system: the consumer gets a fresh product, at a reasonable price, and knows where it comes from. The producer reduces their transport costs and gets paid immediately. This system contributes to the development of sustainable and responsible consumption, and to supporting and promoting eco-beneficial practices.

The Vache à Lait project also raises the question of the agri-food industry’s influence on forming our tastes, our relationship with nature, and consequently our ability to appreciate natural products. Compared to pasteurised milk, which is usually skimmed with vitamins re-added, raw milk directly from the udder has a powerful taste that most of us now find unusual. Can we come to appreciate it again?

Vache à Lait
Design: 5.5 design studio

designed for the exhibiton
Milk LAB, designers reinvent milk
curated by Claire Fayolle
Milk Factory

5 Rue Paul Bert, Paris