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Paris-Nord University 's House of Human Sciences
Paris-Nord University 's House of Human Sciences
Saint-Denis, France
Project Featured on May 13, 2015
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Other Projects by Agence Search Architecture
Paris-Nord University 's House of Human Sciences
Saint-Denis, France
Project Featured on May 13, 2015
Type
STATUS
Built
YEAR
2015
This project offered us the challenge of a highly complex program. The program is a delicate balancing act between three heterogeneous typologies: first, Professors' and post-graduate student's offices; then, Public auditoriums; and finally, new-media research spaces.
Also, the client made it clear that they did not want an introverted institution. Instead they wanted their building to engage with the surrounding community. The Plaine Saint Denis is a very diverse area. Once the site for heavy industry and warehouses, now most of the industrial fabric is being demolished to make way for both middle-income housing, but there are still major activities going on. There are many nearby buildings connected to the Paris film industry.
Structurally the project is like a tightrope walker with the auditorium and restaurant cantilevering off the office spaces which are in turn perched on stilts above the entrance spaces and new-media research spaces below grade. Our first approach to the urban context was to distinguish this public institution from the surrounding apartment buildings, buy raising it up on stilts to create a sense of transparency in contrast with the surrounding monolithic street-front. To heighten the effect, we excavated the ground floor, extending the garden space and creating two levels with a transparent glass facade.
We were given a very heterogeneous program, and in response we developed a project that is a campus within a building. Rather than tame the program within a familiar form, we intentionally let each space take its ideal shape and position, and that enabled us to create unusual architecture. The juxtapositions and interconnections between different parts of the program turn the act of walking through the building into a spatially exciting experience.
Also, the client made it clear that they did not want an introverted institution. Instead they wanted their building to engage with the surrounding community. The Plaine Saint Denis is a very diverse area. Once the site for heavy industry and warehouses, now most of the industrial fabric is being demolished to make way for both middle-income housing, but there are still major activities going on. There are many nearby buildings connected to the Paris film industry.
Structurally the project is like a tightrope walker with the auditorium and restaurant cantilevering off the office spaces which are in turn perched on stilts above the entrance spaces and new-media research spaces below grade. Our first approach to the urban context was to distinguish this public institution from the surrounding apartment buildings, buy raising it up on stilts to create a sense of transparency in contrast with the surrounding monolithic street-front. To heighten the effect, we excavated the ground floor, extending the garden space and creating two levels with a transparent glass facade.
We were given a very heterogeneous program, and in response we developed a project that is a campus within a building. Rather than tame the program within a familiar form, we intentionally let each space take its ideal shape and position, and that enabled us to create unusual architecture. The juxtapositions and interconnections between different parts of the program turn the act of walking through the building into a spatially exciting experience.
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