DS Automobiles and Michelin Éditions, two internationally renowned French brands and long-standing partners, have joined forces in an exclusive collaboration to transform the electric travel experience.
Today they’re announcing their editorial partnership aimed at enhancing the experience of travellers looking for a new way to explore France and take the time to see the unexpected.This avant-garde vision of electric travel is being brought to life by the publication of “The Art of Electric Travel” guide on 25 April 2025, with a foreword by Mathieu Flonneau, a specialist in urban history, mobility and motoring.
In 2024, DS Automobiles is accelerating its energy transition by launching new electric models to complement its already 100% electrified range. This shift is accompanied by a renewed vision of travel: an opportunity to explore, to enjoy new experiences and to embody French avant-garde. Published in March 2025, the guide "L'art du voyage électrique" offers thirty eclectic routes designed for electric mobility, to learn about or rediscover France in silence and serenity.
Jointly developed by Michelin Editions and DS Automobiles, the book is a compilation of cultural and practical information adapted for touring in an electric car, with charging stations, maps, tips, gastronomic stopovers, suggestions for sporting activities and unusual meetings.
"This unique collaboration between DS Automobiles and Michelin Editions combines the knowledge and serenity of travel at the heart of the project and the aspirations of two French companies.
With “The Art of Electric Travel”, we are amplifying our message and DS N°8, our new 100% electric flagship with a range of up to 750 km, invites us to explore special destinations and eating places."
Xavier Peugeot, DS Automobiles CEO. Xavier Peugeot, Directeur Général de DS Automobiles
This editorial partnership is symbolic of French innovation and lifestyle, offering a new possibility where time spent charging becomes a rewarding break, an excuse for other kinds of special and surprising discoveries.
"Michelin Éditions is proud to share this groundbreaking terrain with DS Automobiles covering the most beautiful journeys through France in DS N°8, by changing the perception of travel in electric vehicles and encouraging more sustainable tourism. This partnership with DS Automobiles emphasises our commitment to innovation and sustainability, while allowing us to rethink the pleasure of travel together in the electric age."
Philippe Orain, Michelin Éditions Travel Guides Director
3 questions to Mathieu Flonneau,
historian, educator-researcher, specialist in mobility and the car.
A Michelin Éditions Guide to electric cars in partnership with DS Automobiles. What does that mean to you?
- Mathieu Flonneau: If we go back to the origin of the automobile, it was seen as strange, it was a cause for concern. Then, gradually, it established itself and, eventually, became a genuine part of the family. We can talk about the domestication of the car.
Regarding electric mobility, it's much the same story, after years of mistrust, we are living in a time where the subject of electric cars has reached maturity. Therefore, manufacturer commitment is no longer a gamble but rather a pledge, aiming for more environmental responsibility, quietness and safety.
This is why the relationship between DS Automobiles and the Michelin Guide is interesting, because from its beginnings (in 1900), Michelin has contributed to making motoring acceptable. The aim of the guide was to reassure drivers, by offering them support on the road, for greater safety.
At DS Automobiles, there is a pioneering logic, and the association with the Michelin Guide is all the more interesting as that was one of the first representations of modern motoring.
Electric travel is the way forwards. How has it changed?
- Mathieu Flonneau: We are currently living against a backdrop of hostility to the road and global warming. However, there is a resilience to the road, a form of empathy. The challenge is that the road can be thought of differently, it can be “eco-friendly”. Road use can be limited, transformed and in harmony with nature. We are resourcing motoring, not rejecting it; it is a virtuous rediscovery.
I've been hearing criticism for a long time, with the road being made archaic. The road system can be contested but not the road! The road connects people, it promotes individual freedoms. We can very well speak about road legitimacy and talk about universalism and humanism.
To what extent does electric car travel transform the experience of tourism on the road?
- Mathieu Flonneau: I would say that it's a different journey, but also another kind of journey. A redesigned journey that becomes a succession of proximities.
Time is a luxury, and the need to stop to charge in an electric car poses the challenge of rethinking destinations. We are more about preparing for the trip. It is a chosen trip. We opt for qualitative steps, with the idea that improvisation is possible, but very regulated.
There is a “coffee shop” effect: you stop and rediscover the road.
In this way, we reconnect with the very essence of travel, we get back in touch with motoring.
