Residences for Artists and Researches

Location: Paris, France

Client: ING Real Estate/Icade G3A/ SAEM Val de Seine Amenagement

Date: TBC

Area: 12,500m2

Budget: €17.5 million

Team credits:

FOA Partner in Charge: Farshid Moussavi

Project Architect: Ben Braham

Design Team: Alejandro Zaera-Polo, Elliott Hodges, Fred Holt, Meehae Kwon, Yuji Tunabe, Jessica Yin, Christian Wittmeir, Aldara Zuleta

The project was a residential complex to host artists and researchers on the Ille Seguin in Paris, formerly home to the Renault factory, where each building on the Ille Seguin is to integrate an elevated Gallery to be programmed as an active space weaving through the different buildings.

Our proposal for the residential block is generated from qualities unique to its physical site, bordered on one side by the river Seine and the other by a large park designed by Michel Desvigne. The massing of the complex was carved with two large gardens which introduce simultaneous views of the river and the park to the apartments, bringing nature to the heart of the block.

We followed a tectonic strategy that emphasised this as the character of the building. Rather than fixing a distribution of window locations which pre-determine and homogenise the façade character, we have designed a cladding system constituted of two layers: a floor to ceiling glazing membrane and a translucent envelope of shutters that allows the inhabitants to reconfigure their relationship to the outside to suit their needs. This capacity will form the primary architectural quality of the project, with the façade registering at any given moment the choices of the different.