Inherited tides

In August 2026, in the Bay of Saint-Brieuc in Brittany, I photographed Guillaume Hurtaud and his team of mussel farmers. His son Léandre, a business student, sometimes joins them and may one day take over the family business. But economic difficulties make that handover uncertain. Guillaume is waiting to see whether the business can regain lasting financial stability. Any handover would therefore involve two distinct decisions: a father’s and a son’s. Their story explores both what we wish to pass on and the lives we want to build. How do we choose whether to pass on or take over a family business when its future remains uncertain?

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A yellow hose and blue containers stand in a sunlit yard outside an open mussel-farming workshop.

People and machinery inside a dark workshop are reflected in a pool of water.

Hands sort mussels on a blue conveyor belt, photographed at shell level.

Mussels lie together at the bottom of an open blue bag.

A man in blue overalls directs a jet of water above a conveyor loaded with mussels.

A close view of a heap of mussels with dark, wet, shining shells.

A man works with a long handle above large blue containers between two workshops.

A man gathers mussels with a long-handled tool outside an open workshop.

A person appears inside a workshop, seen through the wheels and dark framework of a vehicle.

A person in a red top holds a vehicle’s steering wheel, seen through the cab window.

A person in a red top stands on a forklift outside the workshop as another person walks behind.

At low tide, mussel-farming vehicles cross the tidal flats while a horse-drawn sulky follows the beach.

Three people stand on a work platform beside the sea, next to large containers.

A man wearing ear defenders and sunglasses sits at the wheel, with two people at the back of the vehicle.

The turquoise cab of a work vehicle stands against the sea, with a silhouette behind the window.

Several people prepare orange cords on the platform beside a large container and a metal tool.

A close view of mussels held inside orange netting.

A man lifts mussel-covered ropes beside the large wheels of a vehicle standing in the water.

A person in red shorts lifts a long net filled with mussels onto the platform beneath an orange crane.

From the edge of a turquoise cab, a person looks along a long line of stakes stretching into the sea.

Two people wearing green gloves work in the water between mussel-covered stakes, viewed from the platform.

Beneath the arm of an orange crane, two people work between the platform and rows of stakes.

Two men work around mussel-covered stakes beside the platform, one bare-chested and the other wearing a T-shirt.

Long rows of dark stakes rise from a calm sea beneath a pale sky.

Two silhouettes face each other through a weathered cab window, around the driving controls.

At low tide, water and sand form broad bands of colour stretching towards the sea horizon.

Next story01 — Alone beneath the northern lights