Puces Portrait: Aurelien Serre
Operating between the Puces and his Paris gallery, Aurélien Serre creates meticulously curated interiors where rare design icons and anonymous pieces enter into dialogue.
This interview is excerpted from my book The Paris Flea Market (Prestel, 2024), described the New York Times as “a celebration of the culture, history and oddball treasures of the market”.
With a gallery in the Carré Rive Gauche and a presence at leading design fairs such as the PAD, Aurélien Serre belongs to a generation of dealers who move fluidly between the Puces and the wider international design scene. At the Marché Serpette, his stand – in fact three adjoining stands – unfolds like a sequence of interiors, each carefully composed, where rare pieces from the 1960s and 70s converse across material, form and scale. Trained in architecture and shaped by early experiences in the collectible design world, Serre combines both rigor and instinct, bringing together rare design icons and anonymous pieces of equal character and style. His practice is defined as much by sourcing as by restoration: each object passes through the hands of skilled craftsmen, with upholstery playing a central, almost intuitive role in the final result. The choice of fabric, colour and texture becomes a decisive moment – one that can shift the perception of a piece entirely. At the Puces, where standards continue to rise, his work reflects a broader evolution toward more curated, gallery-like presentations. Beyond the individual object, it is the dialogue between pieces – and the atmosphere they create together – that lies at the heart of his approach.
