Why I Created Minuit d’Orsay, My Web Design Studio in Paris

Minuit d’Orsay is three months old now, and I finally wanted to sit down and tell you how it began. The studio is still new, but I am realising that it brings together so many things that have been part of my life for years.

It began at Christmas, around a table with my father and brother. My father told us it was time for each of us to exist under our own names, with our own projects and our own spaces online.

I said, “Yes, alright.”

I did not have an instant revelation at the table. I did not leave with a studio name, a logo and a finished business plan — useful though that would have been. The conversation simply stayed with me.

My brother developed his own project, while I began by buying my domain name and building my personal website.

Creating a space that belonged to me

I wanted somewhere that truly belonged to me, beyond social media.

Instagram is valuable for sharing creative work, but we build so much on a platform we do not control. An account can be restricted, removed or lose most of its visibility after an algorithm change.

If all your work lives on one platform and that platform disappears, what is left?

I wanted one place where my projects, photographs and writing could live together, under my own name and at my own address online.

Once I started building the site, I quickly realised how much I loved it. I loved choosing the images, structuring pages, working with type and thinking about the order in which someone would discover my world.

I could spend an hour moving things around, only to put everything back exactly where it started. An eye for detail, apparently.

It really began with Photoshop

Looking back, my interest in web design and graphic design certainly did not appear overnight.

I spent a ridiculous amount of time at the computer when I was younger. I used Photoshop, retouched photographs and made all sorts of strange compositions. I loved photography and always needed something creative to keep me busy.

For my Year 10 work placement, I went to Imprimerie de l’Ouvèze in Sorgues. I discovered the presses, paper, inks and everything involved in turning an image into a physical object.

I worked mainly alongside the graphic designer, who gave me plenty to do in Photoshop.

Clearly, I kept finding my way back to the same place.

At nineteen, I wanted to attend design school in Aix-en-Provence. I studied typography, graphic design, software and drawing, although one teacher managed to put me off it all for a while.

Minuit d’Orsay is certainly not dedicated to her, but she is still part of the story.

I then lived in Canada for a few months and returned to France in 2020. Two lockdowns later, I trained as a tattoo artist, which became the most visible part of my work.

Graphic design had not disappeared. It was perhaps waiting for me to give it space again.

A continuation, not a calculated career change

Tattooing and web design may look completely different, but the way I approach them has a great deal in common.

Both involve drawing, composition, colour, balance and guiding the eye. Something can be beautiful in isolation and still fail when you look at the whole.

That is what I love about designing a website. Every element needs a reason to be there and must contribute to the same direction.

I am still a tattoo artist. Minuit d’Orsay does not erase that part of my story, and it was never a perfectly calculated reinvention. The two practices work naturally together. If you would like to understand the path between my family background, tattooing, design studies and the work I do today, I have written more about my story here.

A few late nights and one name

After finishing my personal website, I missed the process of building something and creating an identity. That made me want to go further and do the same for other projects.

First, I needed a name.

I wanted something memorable and elegant, perhaps even slightly luxurious, but never cold or predictable. After several late nights, Minuit d’Orsay finally appeared.

d'Orsaymeans Paris to me: the riverbank, the museum, the architecture and all the imagery already attached to the name. I wanted Paris to be present in the studio’s identity from the beginning.

Minuitis midnight, the hour when ideas most often arrive.

I can look for a solution all day and find it at precisely the moment I should close my laptop. My brain apparently enjoys becoming efficient at the last possible minute.

Minuit d’Orsay brought a time and a place together: the hour when I create and the city from which I wanted to build what came next.

Building Minuit d’Orsay

Once the name existed, a new set of questions followed: which typeface, which colours, which logo and what sort of voice?

I had become my own client, and I can tell you I was not an easy one.

I loved shaping this identity and watching an idea that was still abstract gradually become real.

Today, Minuit d’Orsay works with brands, independent businesses and creative projects on websites, branding, visual identity, photography and art direction.

One question comes up again and again: what does a website really cost, and why do prices vary so widely? I wrote a separate article about what actually determines the cost of a website, from the designer’s work and the visual identity to the level of detail in the final execution.

Minuit d’Orsay is registered at 9 rue des Colonnes in the 2nd arrondissement of Paris.

Paris is the studio’s starting point, not its limit. I am developing Minuit d’Orsay in London, the United States and wherever the right projects may lead.

I do not know exactly how far this project will go yet. I do know that I want to build it properly and take you along as it develops.

Visit Minuit d’Orsay