ArchShowcase 
Sumit Singhal
Sumit Singhal loves modern architecture. He comes from a family of builders who have built more than 20 projects in the last ten years near Delhi in India. He has recently started writing about the architectural projects that catch his imagination. Skylight Tower in La Défense, Paris by Louis Paillard architect & urban plannerOctober 27th, 2017 by Sumit Singhal
Article source: Paillard architect & urban planner “The opportunity to build apartments at La Défense remains a rare one. All the more so an apartment tower (top floor at 50 m). In fact, some thirty years have passed since the building of the last one. The district of La Défense, willed into existence by General de Gaulle to show the world of the 1960s that France was entering into the modern world of finance and business (the famous “Trente Glorieuses” or thirty-year post-war boom), is a curious above-ground urban mixture, an artificial island, veritable realm of “corporate architecture” punctuated by multitude of high-rise office towers, business centers, rather hollow official monuments, shopping centers and a few public housing complexes, the whole placed atop an immense, windswept concrete slab and irrigated from below by a labyrinth of vehicular arteries, railway tunnels among other piped networks.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin
 Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin The two main materials cover these basic geometric forms blue or green tinted glass, and occasionally bronze, and patinated, brushed or thermo-lacquered steel. Nature is rare here, being expressed most often in the form of jardinières and potted plants, and even in flat and shallow basins reflecting the climatic variations of the sky. Inhabitants only occupy these places during office hours because social life is essentially work-related.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin To frequent this world early in the morning or late in the evening is an enriching aesthetic experience, for one has the paradoxical impression of being in full daylight, because the offices remain lit all night long… Another interesting sensation is that this place gives us the impression of being unique, (alone) in the world! Even if it is a bit dated, we recommend seeing Bertrand Blier’s film Buffet Froid, which is a relatively faithful reflection on the very particular world of this business district. For the last few years, the Établissement Public d’Aménagement de La Défense Seine Arche has been attempting to re-humanize this urban area by densifying the few remaining unbuilt areas with the construction of housing. It was under the framework of this effort that we participated in the consultation organized by the Epadesa and Nexity, responsible for project management.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin The competition was a very stimulating one because it required superimposing two housing programs above railways, with the lower section of the tower containing 168 student apartments and the upper section, 112 ownership program apartments – the trapezoidal lot being located just behind the Grande Arche, on the town of Puteaux side, at the foot of an elevated walkway designed by Paul Chemetov. The lot’s main shortcoming was the fact that the great width of the trapezoid was oriented northward and that, on the southern side, we were prohibited from creating bays. And yet, we had to design 11,000 m² of inhabitable surface area. To come up with the ideal form, we applied the Take Zoning method as a design guideline and adapted it to the site by means of multiple scale and 3-D models.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin The idea we were pursuing was to optimize the openings on the south side by proposing a strong unitary form in the shape of an easily identifiable “round hump.” Our work on the building’s profile is what enabled us to resolve the challenge of providing views and maximum sunshine despite the shape of the lot, thanks to this 8-m cantilevered upper section supported by a series of 25-m columns – in homage to 20th-century modernist architectures – in the V, I, O, X or square forms. In addition to these aforementioned challenges, we also had to place this building above three tunnels of train tracks of the high-speed suburban line A. The entire edifice, isolated by its exterior, is clad in perforated cassettes panels made of anodized aluminum to enhance its homogeneity and underscore its presence facing the neighboring towers built in the 1980s, the worst period of 20th-century architecture.”  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin The project is comprised of three main elements: • the site plan of the lot with its trapezoidal form resulting in a volume with constraints with regard to sunshine and views,  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin The approach consists of reinterpreting these three elements in light of the specific features of each site: the resulting architecture becomes unique, thereby reflecting the intrinsic characteristics of the context. Thus, the atypical plan with its trapezoidal form combines while also distinguishing two large, transparent lobbies of the program while maintaining a direct relation with the public space of the promenade of La Défense. Le prismatic and skewed volume expresses the two superimposed programs: the student apartments forming a ten-level base while the ownership program apartments situated above on nine levels are treated as a giant screen turned toward the sky.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin Finally, the singular and unifying materiality (a lightly perforated anodized aluminum envelope) shines and varies like a photosensitive skin. It changes appearance throughout the day, depending on the changing quality of natural light and the hue of the sky, and it reflects and augments and absorbs nearby buildings. At night, the suspended façade turned toward the promenade and the Grande Arche dematerializes. Beyond these architectural criteria, it is first and foremost about proposing a new way of appropriating the vertical space of La Défense with varied and ambitious housing programs blending large scale with new categories of users/occupants.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin Nowadays, from 6 pm on, the site empties, its active forces transforming this part of the city into a lifeless place. These new apartments and their residents, shops, facilities and new, open public spaces are going to considerably reactivate and revitalize the urban spaces as they are currently practiced, i.e., mainly during weekdays. Henceforth, at night and on weekends the heart of La Défense will finally be lived in like a real city thanks to these new citizens, attracted by modernity but also by the calm that reigns there (no vehicular traffic), the broad open spaces, the light, the sky, the wind, the horizon and the comfort of new, low-energy consumption housing while enjoying the benefits of the very high performing transport network. For the office of Louis Paillard the objective is to build inhabited and luminous castles – SKYLIGHT – to challenge the high-rise and mono-functional citadels of office towers.  Image Courtesy © Guillaume Guerin  Image Courtesy © Paillard architect & urban planner Thus, the new generation of students henceforth inhabits the bases of these new buildings. They are housed in functional apartments, broadly lit with natural light and adapted to their lifestyle. The mostly glazed lobby contains common areas such as the cafeteria, the fitness center, a luggage checkroom, a big laundry room, a mailbox area and meeting or waiting areas, under the surveillance of a custodian. The ownership program apartments are either in a large studio format or two-room duplex apartments. They are definitely luxurious, as much in their organization, their dual or even triple orientation, as in their positioning from the 11th ton the 18th floor in duplexes. They turn toward towns adjacent to La Défense: Courbevoie, La Garenne-Colombes, and Nanterre and, through the Grande Arche Paris and Neuilly-sur-Seine. They float above the Promenade de l’Arche and its linear garden like the Amazonian canopy, between sky and plaza. This impression of belonging to the sky is enhanced by the façade due to the hollowed, openwork spaces, like planted loggia-balconies and solariums and veritable extensions the apartment living rooms. The purpose of these interior-exterior spaces positioned around the tower is to enable inhabitants to avoid a legitimate feeling of vertigo and, depending on the season, serve as windbreaks and sunbreaks as well.  Image Courtesy © Paillard architect & urban planner  Image Courtesy © Paillard architect & urban planner It is particularly the case on the north façade, which is slightly detached from the upper volume comprised of ownership program apartments. This protective screen, fragmented and open to the right of the loggia-balconies also plays the role of powerful signal making its mark on the scale of the grandiose cityscape formed by the axis and the Grande Arche de La Défense. Its nine levels are supported by a monumental colonnade, echoing the palaces built in Upper Egypt, or the famous gothic cathedrals extolled by Le Corbusier in his day. This ensemble is rendered technically even more complex owing to the three train tracks of the RER – suburban rapid transit network – passing underneath the building. This colonnade is treated as a veritable “urban drawing room,” crossing point, amorous meeting place… strongly identifying the entrance and the addressing of the double height entrance lobby of the ownership program apartments. The goal of the office is to propose an architectural project in which the, highest inhabited environmental quality is associated with a specific and strong identity.  Image Courtesy © Paillard architect & urban planner  Image Courtesy © Paillard architect & urban planner The office is convinced that in blending these criteria, living in the sky in a decidedly contemporary building with a strong identity is the approach that will foster in future inhabitants and the general public an emotional dimension specifically linked to this new way of living at La Défense. Louis Paillard first graduated from the Ecole Boulle in 1982 with an Architecture and Design degree. He then studied architecture at the École d’architecture de Paris-La Villette and received his professional diploma in architecture (DPLG) in 1988. In 2003, Louis Paillard opened his own office in Paris. His work is founded upon strong convictions about ultra-contextual projects inspired by place. This reflection crosses all scales. The approach is to propose unique and high added value projects, with high levels of environmental quality, pleasant for its future inhabitants, and delivered within planned construction timeframes. It is a human-centered economical, rational and inventive approach to the practice of architecture. Dialog and reflection with all the stakeholders involved are the key words explaining how to successfully achieve a quality building. Since 2003, he has been transmitting this comprehensive vision as a professor of Architecture at the ENSA in Rennes and today at the ENSA in Nantes.  Image Courtesy © Louis Paillard Architecture  Image Courtesy © Paillard architect & urban planner
Contact Louis Paillard Architecture
Tags: La Defense, Paris Categories: Skylight, Skyscrapers, Tower |
|
|
|||||
|
|
|||||
|
|||||
email
Facebook
Twitter
RSS Feed
