Mobile Architectural Office delivered 35 private and social housing units and a cabinetmaking workshop in Paris (11th arrondissement) this summer.
A project steeped in the industrial past
The construction of a building that includes 35 housing units (privately owned and social housing) and a cabinetmaking workshop located on the ground floor. A former Botelli cabinetmaking workshop, the workshop contributes to the historical continuity of the site and evokes the past through the architectural design. In continuation of the adjoining architecture, through the construction details, the building evokes the history of the site (cabinetmaking workshop), our epoch and contemporary construction methods.

The MAO practice design intent was to reinterpret the archetypes of Parisian light industrial architecture while giving the new building a contemporary interpretation. The building seeks to serve as a reference point rather than an object out of context. The project bears witness to the site history, even though the century-old original workshop was unfortunately demolished for economic reasons and the decline in workshops within city limits. The architects wanted to evoke this past through the clever use of timber in the project.

A building assembled like a piece of furniture.

The building is designed as an assembly of different components, just like a piece of furniture. Its vertical precast concrete structure (prémur), reduced to a strict minimum, supports the floor slabs. Between these structural elements, large timber trusses give the building its identity, through the clever and intricate assembly of concrete and timber elements.

A building assembled like a piece of furniture.

The construction technique of prefabricated concrete and timber is also part of the site history - the building is designed, prefabricated, assembled and adjusted like a piece of furniture.

The project expresses the assembly of the intangible and the tangible:

Assemble history
Assemble stories
Assemble spaces
Assemble functions
Assemble materials
Assemble memories
Assemble lights
Assemble landscapes
Assemble intentions

The project is a subtle blend that ultimately allows each element to find its own balance which contributes a richness that enhances the composition and harmony of the building.