Due to its size and program, this new facility represents a triple urban, architectural, and landscape challenge.
Creating a new facility always represents a fundamental urban challenge, because in addition to issues of integration, identity, and symbolic representation, there are other key questions, such as the links to be forged with layers of the city’s past that will shape the memory and spirit of the place. Its location in the heart of a hybrid neighborhood on the edge of a national highway and a departmental road that is highly exposed to both noise and pollution means that the future school complex must be protected while affirming its status as a public facility. It must also engage with what is already there by taking into account an existing building while anticipating possible developments.
The project is therefore conceived at the scale of the neighborhood, like a palimpsest. Our proposal aims to achieve coherence with the urban fabric and the city’s history, while weaving together several scales and several histories.
