The creation of a new car model requires many different trades. Designers, modellers and engineers work together to ensure that the objects imagined by one can take shape in the hands of the others. The Colors, Materials and Finishes (CMF) designer is a central link in the chain. Explore the career of Maud Rondot, Head of Peugeot's CMF studio.

Maud Rondot's background is somewhat atypical. A lifelong enthusiast for design, attracted by creativity and clothing, she began her career in the fashion industry. It was during an internship at the Première Vision textile trade show that something clicked: what fascinates her in clothing, far more than volumes and the relationship to the body, is the material. She went on to specialise in textiles, earning a bachelor's and then a master's degree in textile and material design.

A recent Arts Déco graduate, she joined the automotive sector in 2015 with her first position as CMF designer for a supplier that designed and manufactured complete modular interior systems. "When I joined the automotive industry, I was like a child, says Maud Rondot. It's a sector that offers a wide variety of transformation processes and materials, from soft to hard materials... Working for a supplier allowed me to discover the industry from the ground up, to understand how everything worked. I had to adapt a lot, but if you love your job, you can adapt very quickly." As the first CMF designer in the supplier's department, she learned to develop neat strategies. "What interested me most were research, processes, materials and how to orchestrate all that to create a unique experience." In 2019, she joined the Peugeot team as Project Manager in the CMF design department.

For Maud Rondot, each new project brings new challenges. "We design differently, depending on the experience we want to provide for a given segment or target. For example, the B segment (city cars) is very interesting, as the models are aimed at both young and older customers." The materials chosen must also be able to withstand extreme weather conditions, depending on the country. What's more, we need to imagine a durable object that can be projected into the future. "An automotive project takes 2 to 3 years to complete. And with electric cars, the vehicle has a longer lifecycle. The automotive industry is very demanding, but for me, being a good designer today means succeeding in moving the lines a little by proposing things that break new ground."

Staying abreast of trends is essential. "Watching is an essential part of the job," explains Maud Rondot, "It takes up a big chunk of my time." Furniture, interior architecture, and aeronautics are all sources of inspiration. Like sports shoes. "For a seat, Peugeot was one of the first brands to come out with a material that was a mix of Alcantara with a 2.0 mesh inspired by sneakers." Sometimes yesterday's trends feed into today's. "Velvet used to be very fashionable, then lost its appeal for a few years. Now it's back with a vengeance. We borrow from the past and the future. Yesterday's designers already asked themselves the questions we're asking today. They just didn't have the same tools to answer them."

The CMF designer is at the heart of the reactor. They work hand in hand with the exterior and interior design teams, marketing, and technical professionals like engineers. For Maud Rondot, good coordination between these three families is essential to a project's success, especially these days. "When we propose a material, it has to be able to meet design, technical and marketing expectations. We like to combine function with aesthetics, which results in highly innovative and attractive products. Today, we're also looking at all materials in terms of their lifecycle and carbon footprint. This is a new creative vector. At Peugeot, there's no such thing as a gratuitous gesture."

To this day, Maud Rondot's proudest achievement remains her work on the concept car  Inception, for which she imagined, tested, and explored the future in order to get off the beaten track. "We took a holistic approach. For example, what would tomorrow's exterior CMF signature look like for Peugeot? We questioned what already existed, such as glazing and paintwork. Instead of opting for neutral glazing and colored body tint, we reversed the proportions. We put colour in the glazing and developed a single-coat body tint for the bodywork, which consumes less CO2. The glazing received a treatment used in architecture, initiated by NASA to protect astronauts from the sun. It has become a living material that plays with light, reflecting warm, sunny colours on the outside and transmitting cool, soothing colours on the inside."

Several years' work culminated in the finished, life-sized object. It was a very intense moment for Maud Rondot: "At each reveal, the emotion is indescribable. And when it gives us such a strong emotion, even those of us who already know the object, then we say to ourselves that we've reached our goal."