TGI De Paris
Courthouse Concept + Housing
Courthouse Concept + Housing
The scope for this project is to provide a formal strategy and a conceptual framework for the National Courthouse building in the area of Rive Gauche in Paris. The brief called for the adaptation and integration of the historic Freyssinet Hall - which occupies over 80 per cent of the site, with the addition of 100,000 m2 of housing.
The site is adjacent to a dense urban fabric at its southern border, and the National Library immediately to the north. The residential neighbourhood is comprised of typical Parisian apartment buildings occupied by a vibrant immigrant community. The building mass required to contain the program presented a major challenge to the planners, local politicians, and the neighbouring community.
The question then became about how to create a building form that consolidates two contradictory expectations; the authoritative representation of the institution and the desire to minimize its visual impact. Using minimum formal manipulation, the building form is arrived at by subtraction: sight lines and streets axes are projected onto the building and allowed to shear off mass, dividing the building into segments, opening up vistas and framing views of the context beyond - The resulting form and facade elements maintain a sense of unity and uniformity appropriate for the representation of a courthouse, The strategic fragmentation in this dense context dissolve the building and renders it an elusive object when viewed from the streets of the adjacent neighbourhood. From the north it remains a shimmering edifice, complementing the ‘transparent monumentality’ of the adjacent National Library.
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Location: Paris, France
Type: Institutional
Size: 100,000 sq.m
Client: Private
Status: Concept
Credit: Hout Architecture Inc. Samer Hout, Concept
Type: Institutional
Size: 100,000 sq.m
Client: Private
Status: Concept
Credit: Hout Architecture Inc. Samer Hout, Concept