A Cabin in a Concrete Cruise liner...for €2 million

Near the Balard Metro station, the French Ministry of Defence is putting the finishing touches to its new HQ, dubbed the French Pentagon. The construction site punctuates the skyline, offering glimpses of shiny new buildings behind high fences, a panorama that we are forbidden to photograph.

Sitting opposite on the other side of the Boulevard Victor, separated by the neat green carpet of the tramway, is another building that is almost military in form. Around 50 metres long - but only 10 metres wide at its broadest point (barely more than 2 metres at its narrowest) - this nautical looking structure though has no connection to its combative neighbour. This is perhaps architect Pierre Patout's finest moment, and a piece of design history that you could today own - if you have €2 million to spare.

Charras: then, now and tomorrow?

I have recently developed something of an obsession with Courbevoie on the Paris city limits, an archetype of the rapidly changing suburban town. There is something completely tangible about this kind of place, offering scenes of urban contrast and conflict that are today rarely visible within Paris.

A recent post on the always interesting Paris-bise-art blog lead me to one particular site in the town, but I was particularly pleased when the trail branched off into on a voyage of urban exploration.

The blog featured the Caserne Charras, a military barracks dating back to the 18th century. Although a listed 'historic monument', it was demolished in the 1960s with only the frontspiece of the building being preserved. Bizarrely this was moved across town and rebuilt at the bottom of the Becon park, a place that has become something of a home for reclaimed buildings - the Scandinavian and Indian pavillions from the 1878 World Fair can also be found here. 

Seen face on the building is still impressive, but move slightly to the side and you'll see that it is barely three metres thick. Somewhat incredibly though it is still in use, offering a shelter and storage space for the park keepers.

The caserne had occupied a large part of what is today the centre of town, so what replaced it? The answer is a huge development also known as Charras, which includes shops, hotels, appartments and leisure facilities - as well as a very unusual (concrete) rooftop park.  

In theory it is the perfect example of faulty urban planning in the 1960s and 70s, and yet it very nearly works. The sky-scraping wealth of the La Defense business sector is clearly visible just alongside, but here we are dealing with something that is very much a second division development. Whereas La Defense is a magnet for workers, shoppers and visitors from across the Paris region, Charras is a very local hub.

Much of La Defense is of a similar vintage, but - for the most part - it has been regularly smartened up and adapted to contemporary tastes. Charras on the other hand has remained firmly in the 1960s. There is a sense of abandonment here. Mirroring the abandoned cars and shopping trollies, the park is a windswept concrete wilderness, used only by the occasional dog walker or as a meeting point for pockets of teenagers.

The shopping centre is a series of short passages with bronze mirrored ceilings. Posters advertise the merits of the development, but even the photos in these show the world as it looked in 1972. It many ways it reminds me of a similar development in my old home town, a now disused shopping centre which has become a 'zombie survival experience'.

Walking along the empty staircases and corridors, it would not be too much of a surprise to come across a zombie here too. Instead of offering a glimpse of the undead though, these paths instead take you to places you do not expect. Along one, the entrance to an indoor market. Down another - sinister - staircase, an ice-rink and swimming pool complex. Plunging further down into the Dantesque depths, a twelve-lane bowling alley.

The biggest surprise though comes on the rooftop level. From what seems to be a small, dated shopping complex, you are suddenly thrown out into a massive expanse of concrete. Few people venture up here, but all are dwarfed by the scale of the high-rise towers that seem to have sprouted from the roof of the shopping centre.


Windblown and slightly disorientating, it is not an immediately pleasant environment, and yet it soon becomes strangely fascinating. It offers panoramic views, and at random intervals, a selection of mysterious geometric forms that have no clear purpose.

Looking around, you also discover that not all is mineral. There are trees and flowers here, as well as small patches of grass. Water is also evident, both in puddles captured on the surface and in the outdoor municipal baths below.

It feels more like a playground than a park. It is a reminder that architecure once encouraged us to explore and appropriate, rather than to be carefully guided. Buildings had mysteries, offering us opportunites to make new discoveries and the freedom to create our own relationships with them. This is a building that has no clear entrance or exit, which can be accessed at many different levels for many different reasons. It offers places to play, to work, to shop or just to relax. And yet it will soon be radically changed.

There is no room for in the new Courbevoie for such an idiosyncratic structure. It is a town that wants to move upmarket, away from an industrial past. The population of the town has increased by around 75% since the Charras development was built with newcomers being generally richer and younger. The municipality is now pushing for a more modern development, offering the same stores and brands as those found in neighbouring La Defense, and concrete will undoubtedly soon be replaced by grass, glass and steel.

An artists impression of what the development may look like. No specific project has as yet been chosen.

Guillaume Gillet - a centenary in concrete

French architect Guillaume Gillet would have been 100 this year, and to celebrate this anniversary an exhibition has been organised in Royan, home of his one true masterpiece, the Notre Dame church. A recent visit to the town gave me the opportunity to learn more about the designer of the Palais de Congrès in Paris (a construction I find both dreadful and fascinating), and discover how a key part of Paris almost looked very different today.

In the introduction to the exhibition, the word 'controversial' is used to describe the creations of Guillaume Gillet. Although he himself declared in 1965 that "nous vivons un âge d'or de l'architecture", public opinion today generally does not share this viewpoint. Nevertheless, his whole career was spent working in a post-war period known as 'les trentes glorieuses' in France, when large areas of the country needed to be quickly rebuilt and funds were abundant. It was an age when anything seemed possible, and architects were given vastly more freedom to imagine constructions than they have today.   

Indeed, freedom seems to be something of a leitmotif throughout Gillet's career. After studying under Auguste Perret (see previous post), Gillet found himself a prisoner of war before his career had even begun. He spent nearly five years as a prisoner in Germany, but he was far from inactive. After befriending several other prisoners with a similar background to his own (and who he would later work with throughout his career), he designed and decorated a small chapel within the prison camp.

Perhaps eternally marked by this experience, Gillet spent most of his career designing both churches and prisons. It was one of his first constructions though that would prove to be his chef d'oeuvre, the Notre Dame de Royan church. Gillet himself became so associated with the building that he requested his ashes to be placed here after his death - a request that was finally accepted in 1996, 9 years after his death.

During the Second World War, the town - an important port on the Atlantic coast - was occupied by the German army, and by the end of the conflict over 85% of the town's buildings had been destroyed. Rather than just disappear from the map, the town authorities decided to give the town a completely new identity, centred around a prominent new structure, the Notre Dame church. 

Built entirely in concrete, it is a spectacular construction, albeit one already in need of renovation. Although a material derided by many, the church truly shows the capacities of concrete to produce the monumental. V-shaped columns shoot skywards around the structure, supporting a roof which is only 8cm thick. Spiral staircases and sweeping balconies complete a building which impresses through it's somewhat austere simplicity.  

The high salt content in the sea sand used to make the concrete is slowly corroding the metal reinforcements. Coupled with the aggressive coastal conditions, the church is suffering, particularly on rainy days. On the day I visited, large dustbins had been placed all around the church to catch the numerous leaks.

As with many architects, the career of Guillaume Gillet was marked not so much by what he built but also by the projects that never made it off the drawing board. Two of the most significant of these were planned for riverside spots in Paris. The first was a proposition for a permanent Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace alongside the Seine at the very edge of the city. Based very much on his Pavillon de la France which was built for the 1958 Universal Exhibition in Brussels, it would have made an impressive addition to the Paris skyline in a position where finally nothing has ever been built.

Sketches for a proposed Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace, © Fonds Guillaume Gillet

Gillet's other principal project was one that came much closer to being built, and one which would have been far more controversial. For over 15 years, Gillet - with associate René Coulon - worked on propositions for buildings to replace the underused Gare d'Orsay on the city's left-bank (later of course to become the world-renowned Musée d'Orsay). Having become little more than an unneccesary additional stop for suburban trains, the station was long scheduled for demolition, and the two architects produced a series of propositions.

An initial rather banal plan for a headquarters building for the Air France company was not developed, but a design for a luxury hotel and conference centre did later win a competition (ahead of an even more radical project from Le Corbusier among others). However both changing tastes and a financial crisis put paid to the project before work could begin. The station was eventually given protected status, and a decision was made to preserve it and transform it into a museum. 

A proposed HQ building for Air France dating from 1957 (top) and the much more daring (and accepted) proposition for an international hotel from 1961. © Fonds Guillaume Gillet  

Gillet's proposed building is not a bad one (and certainly more interesting than the hotel and conference centre he did later build at Porte Maillot), but it would have radically changed the left-bank skyline. However, the Eiffel tower had of course also done something similar a century earlier.

It will remain though an architecture of the invisible, a ghost structure that will now haunt me when I pass by the Musée d'Orsay. To remember Gillet though, it is far better to return to Notre Dame de Royan, as he himself was to do.

Guillaume Gillet, architecte des trentes glorieuses
Until 21st June 2012
Musée de Royan
31 avenue de Paris
Royan

Inside the Palais d'Iéna

A temporary installation by an artist friend at the Palais d'Iéna gave me the opportunity to explore the often difficult to access interior of Auguste Perret's masterpiece.

As part of the current 'Ca et Là' (This and There) exhibition running at a variety of sites across Paris, Italian artist Davide Bertocchi has installed a pièce entitled "Apologie de l’aléatoire (Pendolo)" on the monumental staircase inside the Palais d'Iéna. The sculpture is a play on Foucault's pendulum - by being resolutely anchored to the ground, and moving at the same time as the rest of the world! 

The choice of this spot in the Palais d'Iéna was essential for Davide, as the staircase - which sweeps in two separate directions - provides an interesting dynamic for the piece. It is us who move around the sculpture whilst it remains solidly and regally positioned in the centre. 

Despite being a close neighbour to the Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris and the Palais de Tokyo, the Palais d'Iéna has no links to the art world, and Davide told me that the building managers were initially hesitant about accepting his creation. However, now that it is in place, he informs me that they are delighted with it!

Built at the end of the 1930s, at roughly the same time as it's more well-known neighbours (the Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris and the Palais de Tokyo - which make up two wings of the same building - as well as the Palais de Chaillot (Trocadero)), it was originally designed as a museum.  

Perret - who has often been mentioned before on this blog (here, and here, and here) both designed and built the structure (with his Frères Perret company, the city's foremost concrete specialists), and it is often considered to be his greatest achievement. However, the building has never really had the occupiers it deserves, and has therefore always remained off the city radar.

Quite a well-known structure is also close by.

The concrete here gives an almost organic feel to the interior

The first occupier was the Musée National des Travaux Publics, which had the misfortune to open just as war broke out, and was also possibly the dullest museum in Paris. Displaying little more than scale models of bridges, dams and mines, it attracted fewer than 30,000 visitors a year and was closed in 1955.

Today it is used by the Conseil économique et social, a rather obscure assembly which advises French lawmaking bodies on questions of social and economic policies. Given its role, it has remained closed off to the general public for much of its existence, but recently there has been a move to more openness - which is reflected in their acceptance of a temporary art installation.

The interiors have kept a certain vintage feel

The hémicycle under a magnificent glass rotunda

Traces of a previous existence.

You can see Davide Bertocchi's installation in the Palais d'Iéna until May 21st, weekdays from 9am - 5pm. To enter the building you will need to present an identity card or passport, but once past security, you have free access to much of the building. Photography is accepted if it is not for commercial purposes.

The Palais d'Iéna
Place d'Iéna, 75016
M° Iena

Where the Système Hennebique lives on

I have already taken you to the eccentric home of François Hennebique, France’s first king of concrete, but the Paris offices of his company on the Rue Danton are equally deserving of investigation.

Built by the architect Emile Arnaud in 1901, it was one of the first buildings in Paris to use only concrete in its construction. The forms of the building reflect the Art Nouveau tastes of the period, but here everything is merely decoration. Hennebique wanted physical proof - in the form of a building - that his system could rival traditional methods and produce structures that were equally as handsome (whilst also being far cheaper to build!)

Make no mistake - Hennebique was a formidable businessman. His offices, centrally positioned alongside the Seine at Saint Michel, were attractive to potential clients, but also a permanent advertising structure. All of the ceramics on the facade incorporate the words 'Système Hennebique', reminding passers-by exactly what they were looking at.

The first slogan Hennebique used to sell his system was ‘Plus d’incendies désastreux’ (no more disasterous fires). Initially then, concrete was not seen as being cheap or easy to use, but rather something that was safe. Whatever the reasons, the système Hennebique was an immediate success, with several industrial buildings going up across France before the end of the 19th century. In 1899, he designed his first reinforced concrete bridge, the Pont Camille de Hogues in Châtellerault, a type of structure that would become one of the company’s biggest successes.

Celebrated at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris, Hennebique’s company would just a few years later control 20% of the world market in reinforced concrete. It was a business that deserved prestigious offices in the centre of the city.

Hennebique had clearly second guessed the way the world would develop, but another significant aspect of his success was the way he organised the company. In each of the countries in which he operated, he insisted that local agents create their own offices and find their own staff to complete the projects.

By insisting on this organisation, Hennebique was able to ensure rapid growth for his company with minimal headaches for himself. It was almost like a franchise system, and at the company’s height – in around 1910 – the firm had more than 30 agents operating in over 20 countries.

It was the job of the local agents to identify opportunities, with the head office in Paris making tweaks and giving projects the final go-ahead (making sure that they always used all of the principles of the Hennebique system!). With this system in place, the group was capable of studying over seven thousand dossiers, and working on around 2300 of these during this period.

In 1914, Hennebique could count 25,000 creations across the world that had been built using his system, including 1,500 bridges. However, when war broke out that year, Hennebique’s model was brutally stopped.

Hennebique’s company continued after the war, but using a much changed model, concentrating almost entirely on the French market. The Hennebique company continued – still at the same address - until 1967 when it was finally wound up. François Hennebique himself had died in 1921, but not without leaving a solid mark behind him!

The homes of Auguste Perret: Rue Franklin

I have written previously of the works of architect Auguste Perret (particularly his Mobilier National building), but not as yet of his two creations that also became his offices and homes. As these buildings are separated by 30 years (and around 500 metres!), it is also interesting to note how tastes and techniques changed in this period.

His first self-designed home, on the Rue Franklin in the 16th arrondissement, is also a building that is considered to be one of the seminal constructions of modern architecture. It was built in 1903 when Perret was only 29, and although it owes much to his upbringing and the comparitive success and wealth of his family, it also clearly showed the genius of the family's oldest son.

The Perret family, mother, father and five children, were evidently very close, choosing to live and work together throughout their lives. The father - Claude Marie Perret - was a stonemason and later a builder, and was determined to bring up his three sons to learn the trade.

Whilst working for the family firm, Auguste also continued his studies, eventually choosing to specialise in reinforced concrete (although he would never gain a full diploma in architecture). Together they were able to form a company called 'Entreprise Perret et Fils', which was capable not only of construction, but also of designing buildings and of providing the materials.

For this particular project on the Rue Franklin, the Perret family owned the land. Situated alongside the Trocadero and opposite the Eiffel tower, it was already a very desirable location, and although it was a speculative build (apart from the family apartments and offices on the ground floor), any design would probably have quickly sold in such a spot. Nevertheless, Auguste Perret - now acting as the firm's architect -, chose something radical and previously unseen.

Throughout his life, Auguste Perret would be obsessed with making buildings as organic as possible. He saw the framework of a building as being the equivalent of a human skeleton, and although the structure he produced on the Rue Franklin could have been made with wood or iron, he was determined to test a new process - reinforced concrete.

Interestingly, Auguste Perret was one of the first architects to apply the Hennebique (our friend with the 'Concrete chateau' in Bourg la Reine) system on a residential property. Nevertheless, for this first attempt, he was very unsure about how it would age over time. The building was covered in tiles, not so much for decoration, but more because Perret believed that the concrete would be damaged by the weather and start to decay (some people today may still argue that this is the best way to treat concrete!). As he said, "one must never allow into a building any element destined solely for ornament, but rather turn to ornament all the parts necessary for its support."

The ceramics of Alexandre Bigot on the facade of the building though are one of its most remarkable features today. If you manage to crouch down to almost floor level (as I did for these photos), you can see the signature tiles, but what is particularly noticeable is the graceful restraint of the work. This was the height of Art Nouveau period, but here the ceramics are almost monochrome, and in a pattern that is repeated over almost the entire building.

The family's move to this building was however not initially a happy one. Claude Marie, the father, died in 1905, leaving Auguste at the head of the family. The building though was a success, and Auguste was delighted with the results that the reinforced concrete had given. To reflect these changes, the family company became known as 'Entreprise Perret-Architectes-Constructeurs-Beton Arme', and soon flourished.

Thirty years later, the Perret offices and Auguste's family home moved 500 metres down the road to a new building, but that's another story....

This building is located at 25a Rue Franklin in the 16th arrondissement, M°Trocadero/Passy

Read more about what makes this a great building, including some of the original plans, in this PDF document.

When concrete was a craft

A small workshop in the 11th arrondissement proudly displays the trade of the craftsmen originally based here. Through an elegant, swirling font and a carved mural above the entrance, these masons of reinforced concrete (béton armé) showed that they were a new breed of worker whose skills were comparable to the best carpenters or stone masons. In the modern world at the beginning of the 20th century, they were the ones that represented the future.

Concrete today has such bad press that it is difficult to imagine a time when artisans would boast about their prowess with the material. Swamped in concrete jungle cities where trees of towers are blamed for all of societies ills, few would dare boast today of such a service.

As the architect Mies Van der Rohe noted however, “we must remember that everything depends on how we use a material, not on the material itself”. At the beginning of the 20th century, inspired by precursors such as Anatole de Baudot, the architect of the revolutionary Saint Jean de Montmartre church, everybody wanted to work with concrete. The forms and structures of buildings could now be adapted, opening up a future that would be limited only by the size of our imagination.

In the 1920s, concrete became synonymous with modernity and luxury, and when Mallet-Stevens or Le Corbusier were chosen by the elite to build their houses, this was the material the clients requested. The owners of the establishment photographed here would have been involved in such projects, and would have been naturally keen to highlight their competence to work on such prestigious constructions.

So where did it all go wrong? Concrete is still used massively around the world, with more than one cubic metre produced each year for every person on Earth, but when did it lose its prestige? Paris contains many fantastic examples of concrete constructions, notably the structures designed by Auguste Perret in the 1930s (such as the Palais d’Iena or the Mobilier National), but the real damage to its reputation was done in the second half of the century.

Whereas concrete buildings were once divided into two schools, described by architecture historian Bernard Marrey as the ‘lyrisme de la courbe’ (lyricism of the curve) and ‘la poésie de l'angle droit’ (poetry of the right angle), today they are grouped together with a general sentiment of penny-pinching and poverty of thought. The ubiquity of the material and the lack of reflection on its suitability and sustainability has lead to concrete cancer and crumbling public infrastructure.

Would those who created this enterprise have imagined this future? This was to be a noble material, one that they had mastered and for which they had helped build a solid reputation. It is a shame that I cannot knock on their door and ask them to put us on the right path once more.

Paris Brutal t-il?

Almost all architectural styles are visible in Paris, but I've long wondered if there are any authentic examples of the truly brutal. Coming from the United Kingdom I share my birthplace with a style of architecture that was harsh and cold, and which marked my upbringing. On Saturday afternoons we parked the family car in damp multi-story car parks then trudged around windswept concrete shopping centres watching the rain form large patches of moisture on the blank, grey exteriors.

I've since come to associate these images with the United Kingdom and had found nothing similar in Paris - until one day when I was walking across the 13th arrondissement and discovered this office block at 64-68 Rue du Dessous des Berges. The rarity of such structures could be considered surprising, as although the school of architecture was British-based, the origin of the term brutalism comes from the French béton brut, or "raw concrete". It was the English architects Alison and Peter Smithson who first coined the term in 1954, and two of their influences were also French based; one that could be safely mentioned, Le Corbusier and his love of concrete, and one that was almost unmentionable - the German sea-defences that had been built along the western coast of France.

In France where cooking is king, it is hard to imagine a material being left completely raw. And yet here is a building that is truly coarse and unrefined. This is perhaps not true brutalism as it is just too much of a regular block form, but it does have several design tricks that make it lean towards that school. The two basement levels are cut away from the street level enabling light to seep into a small plant-filled courtyard. The main building above is supported by pilotis or stilts from this level, and the only entrance into the building is through a bizarre, almost children's game-like tunnel which flies over the courtyard below.

Mostly though it is its use of plain, raw concrete that suprises in this city. Like many buildings of a similar 60s/70s vintage, especially in damper, northern climates, the concrete has suffered and is streaked and specked. The letters spelling out the address have slipped off the wall one-by-one, and yet as I walk by new residents are moving in. It is an address that is still obviously in demand and for me, oddly comforting to come across something so reminiscent of my youth.

Are there any other examples of brutalism in Paris? In reality it is a city that had no use for the style. Large parts of Britain were flattened during the war and quickly and cheaply rebuilt afterwards whilst Paris was very largely spared during the conflict. Large-scale construction projects were mostly limited to the suburbs, and it would be in some of these new towns that I would need to go if I really wanted to track down the brutal. However, whilst it can be comforting to return to your hometown, sometimes you find that after discovering new places, the previously familiar in fact becomes banal and ugly in comparison. Finding this building is sufficient for me!

Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

A concrete palace built alongside a hidden underground river from which thousands of the national treasures of the French state have disappeared. Definitely a part of the city worthy of further investigation!

At the entrance to the headquarters of the Mobilier National in the 13th arrondissement of Paris, the architect Auguste Perret placed two concrete guard dogs. Laying motionless on their plinths, they seemingly offer little protection to the state treasures that are stored inside the building. These treasures, perhaps tapestries from the Gobelins workshops or Louis XVI desks, are made available to ministers, bureaucrats and diplomats who are free to choose exactly how they wish to decorate their offices and reception rooms. At the end of their mandates they are supposed to return the goods, but it would seem that this does not always happen. Today, upwards of 16,000 pieces are unaccounted for.

Created over six hundred years ago, the Mobilier National has the role of storing, lending, repairing and sometimes creating a selection of national treasures. Originally based on the Place de la Concorde, by the twentieth century the Mobilier National desperately needed a newer and better adapted structure, and in 1934, modernist Auguste Perret was given the job. The creation he designed and built is one treasure that will hopefully not be allowed to vanish!

Perret was given a rather awkward piece of land to work with, nestled behind the Manaufacture des Gobelins within the grounds of the old family chateau. The terrain has a large slope, and was limited by the contours of the River Bièvre, a small stream which has today been buried underground (and which I will write about in more depth very shortly!). Perret though had a particular idea in his head, and was able to use the slope to his advantage to create a very astucious and interesting structure.

Auguste Perret was at once a rationalist, modernist and a classicist. He received a classic education at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, but became convinced by the qualities of concrete. For Perret though, concrete would architects of the modern era to create structures that would be the equal of those of antique eras. His buildings (the most famous of which are probably the Palais d'Iéna and the Théatre des Champs Elysées) all followed classical rules, and the Mobilier National was no exception.

Perret wanted to create a stately cour d'honneur for the building, but with the 4m slope he needed first to create an artificial ground level. Once this was in place he was able to build the three-sided structure around this courtyard. This raised platform also gave him a natural basement level where vehicles could enter directly from the rear. In many respects, he created a kind of updated version of the Hôtel Particulier with a built-in basement garage!

Although built entirely in reinforced concrete the building is nevertheless an attractive one. Perret believed in a rational use of materials and mostly chose to work only with the simplest block forms, but he often broke his own rules for purposes of decoration. He added traces of coloured marble into the concrete mix to find the perfect tint to the building and produced a series of columns which support a cornice on which the name of the building is written.

And then there are the dogs. A classical touch again, they look out across the sunken stream and make visitors hesitate before entering the building. Unfortunately though, the front of this building, alongside the Square René-Le-Gall, sees few visitors, and the dogs have slipped into an apathetic slumber. Whilst they rest, local dogs come and urinate on them, and members of the powers that be help themselves to the treasures from the unguarded rear of the building.