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NMT                                  Der grosse Hof

Type: Open competition - Winning project ex-aqueo

Themes: Urban planning, Office, public space, …

Size: L - 13 ha

Team: With Jens Metz - Plattform Berlin

Client: Stadt Nürnberg

Thon (DE) | 2016

A new center for Thon / Neue mitte thon

More info here : wettbewerbe-aktuell.de

Unser Grundgedanke ist die Erzeugung einer intensiven Verzahnung von Stadtraum und Naturraum in unterschiedlichen Maßstäben. Zwischen dem Siedlungsrand und der offenen Felderlandschaft, auf der Ebenen des Baublocks und innerhalb des einzelnen Hauses bis hinein in die Wohnung entwickeln sich Freiräume, die die umgebenden Strukturen miteinander verbinden.

Das Projekt schlägt eine urbanere Alternative zum Siedlungsbau vor, es setzt auf Mischung statt Monofunktionalität, auf ein ausgewogenes Verhältnis von Dichte und Intimität, es bildet einen Stadtraum mit Landschaftsbezug durch das Ineinandergreifen verschiedener Maßstabsebenen.

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OST                                   Am Feldrain

Type: Open competition - Mentionned

Themes: Urban planning, Housing ,...

Size: L - 7ha

Team: With Jens Metz - Plattform Berlin and Büro Schwarz Landschaft

Client: Stadt Ostfildern

Ostfidern (DE) | 2016

Interlinking between urban and natural spaces

More info here : competionline.de

Unser Grundgedanke ist die Erzeugung einer intensiven Verzahnung von Stadtraum und Naturraum in unterschiedlichen Maßstäben. Zwischen dem Siedlungsrand und der offenen Felderlandschaft, auf der Ebenen des Baublocks und innerhalb des einzelnen Hauses bis hinein in die Wohnung entwickeln sich Freiräume, die die umgebenden Strukturen miteinander verbinden.

Das Projekt schlägt eine urbanere Alternative zum Siedlungsbau vor, es setzt auf Mischung statt Monofunktionalität, auf ein ausgewogenes Verhältnis von Dichte und Intimität, es bildet einen Stadtraum mit Landschaftsbezug durch das Ineinandergreifen verschiedener Maßstabsebenen.

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IVM                                   Micro-Poros

Type: Closed competition-Workshop 1rst Prize

Themes: Public Spaces, Infrastruture, ,...

Size: XS/XL - 500m2

Team: With Stéphane Bonzani, Marc-Antoine Durand and the support of Maëna André

Client: Communauté d’agglomération Tour(s) Plus - Institut de la ville en Mouvement - Vinci Autoroutes - ATU 

Tours/Saint-Pierre-des-Corps (FR) | 2015

Minor interventions for major transformation

More info here : IVM Passages & ATU

Le territoire de Tours et de Saint-Pierre des Corps est emblématique d’une condition métropolitaine contemporaine où ont fini par entrer en conflit les grandes infrastructures de mobilité et les milieux habités. Striés de toute part par de puissantes lignes de rupture – l’autoroute, mais aussi les emprises ferroviaires, les digues – ces milieux résistent malgré tout mais aspirent aujourd’hui à recouvrer plus de cohérence, plus de porosité. Les lignes d’usages, itinéraires fins des déplacements quotidiens, composent tant bien que mal, avec ces lignes de ruptures, passent le long, au bord, par-dessus, par-dessous…

La stratégie du projet, loin de réinventer tout le système urbain, consiste à apporter des microporosités sur des points clés situés à l’intersection de lignes de rupture et de lignes d’usage. Il s’agit d’identifier ces points névralgiques, de les analyser et d’améliorer leur condition de passage voire d’en créer de toute pièce. Ces micro-interventions sont conçues comme des tapis urbains. Formant des seuils, équipant les passages de services associés, fonctionnant en réseau de lieux, ils visent à territorialiser les grandes infrastructures, à les rendre plus urbaines et à mettre en scène ces héritages du 20ème siècle.

Le positionnement de ces tapis sur, sous, au bord de ces infrastructures crée des espaces négociés à l’occasion desquels les concessionnaires peuvent trouver des occasions de faire évoluer leur patrimoine dans le sens d’une meilleure intégration. Ainsi, paradoxalement, ce sont les lignes de rupture qui pourraient devenir des lignes de régénération.

Cette stratégie, inscrite dans un contexte d’incertitude et d’économie de moyens devenus inéluctables, cherche avant tout à déclencher un processus de transformation, à initier des scénarios, mais laisse ouverts les effets d’entraînement. Interventions mineures pour transformations majeures, ces tapis sont volontiers opportunistes : ils composent avec les forces en présence et les pratiques déjà en place, profitent des investissements techniques indispensables (comme l’ouverture partielle de la digue qui fournit l’occasion de faire de l’espace public). Ces opérations ciblées et délimitées de quelques centaines de m2 tout au plus s’inscrivent dans une économie territoriale critique, où l’effort d’investissement en espace public doit être concentré : ces tapis sont précisément dessinés, durablement construits, bien équipés. Leur sol répare des discontinuités, gère les eaux de pluie, fournit des assises, accueille des usages sans les contraindre.

La construction d’un tapis urbain génère une aire d’influence qui suscite des effets d’entraînement plus ou moins forts dans le quartier, sur l’autoroute, sur les emprises ferroviaires. Création d’un arrêt de bus, extension d’un usage sur un parking, mutation d’une parcelle, densification légère, etc.

Chacune de ces interventions situées est une architecture qui raconte le territoire. Les héritages du fer, du maraîchage sur la varenne, des fleuves capricieux et de l’autoroute trouvent dans ces lieux l’occasion de faire récit commun. Le Marché des Cheminots réactive les jardins ouvriers, rouvre un passage sous les voies ferrées, profite de l’abri offert par l’autoroute… Le Tapis des sports travaille la digue du Canal, en révèle l’épaisseur, installe une passerelle en fer.

Enfin, les microporosités, à rebours des master-plans qui décident du futur en ignorant l’à-venir, sont des lieux privilégiés à partir desquels un observatoire des milieux habités peut être mis en place. Des études peuvent être menées en partenariat avec l’Université et des laboratoires de recherche pour suivre ces lieux et, à travers eux, soulever des thèmes de recherche variés : Nouveaux lieux partagés, Contrats de concessions autoroutiers, Capteurs pour la qualité de l’air.

A l’horizon de ces micro-interventions se dessine une métropole où les milieux réels, imaginaires et symboliques sont à nouveau interreliés, où les grandes entités géographiques de la Loire et du Cher sont reconnectées par une promenade jalonnée de lieux-passages, où les Tourangeots et Corpopétrussiens se rencontrent.

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L14                                    Frame

Type: Open competition

Themes: Landart, Port,...

Size: M - 6 Ha 

Team: Partnership Continuum with Lola Marlhoux and Mélissande Aucant

Client: The Land Art Generator Initiative & Refshaleøen Holdings bestyrelse   

Copenhagen (DK) | 2014

Surline the void

The frame is a cloister on the metropolitan scale, a mirror to the horizon, a temple of energy, a place-on-demand, a wind field, a green roof, an elegant background for the little mermaid, a bright monolith, an exhibition room, a place for concerts, a ship in the harbor, and it’s simply a roof and poles structure.

The framework is there to enhanced uses that already exists. We are in a powerful site that needs to be emphasized and protected.

So the architectural object will not change people’s habits. Today, it is a brownfield plot that is sometimes informally used. By his presence, the construction will reveal this place as a necessity and will encourage its use by the residents. The place will become a space-on-demand for Copenhageners.

The object is literally built on the edges of the plot in a offset of 11m deep, leaving the rest of the site completely free for open use.

The style of the framework is intended to be as simple as possible. The object still needs to be sufficiently refined to become a landmark on the waterfront of Copenhagen, but must now learn to fade away for the content it will surround. That why it use three basic of architecture to his simplest expression. It is made of steel and recycled metals from the deconstruction of neighbouring port warehouses.

Also, this is a hybrid object. Subject to harbour weather, the frame will use the surrounding natural resources and effort to provide energy to the future mixed-use district of Refshaleøen.

Six vertical wind turbines are integrated into an optimized profiled mast. The poles put in a network become an electric farm that produce 270 MWh electricity per year.

The green roof transforms the 220 days of annual rain in reusable filtered water. And because of its small footprint, it will minimize its impact on biodiversity.

The purpose of the debate raises the integration of energetic devices in architecture. Without sacrificing the properties of one and the other, the two fields of competences became one.

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AWR                   Phylogenesis

Type: Open competition

Themes: Architecture, Museum of Natural History…

Size: L - 2,5 Ha / 23000 m2 programme

Team: Partnership Continuum with Lola Marlhoux and Christophe Desvignes

Client: AWR Competition   

Berlin (DE) | 2014

In between typologies

Berlin is, by far, a city where it’s comfortable to live. There are spaces between blocks, the public spaces are large and the living conditions are surrounded with green and nature. The most representative typology we can find here is the inner courtyard city block. It’s a historical way to build in Berlin.

The chosen area of Zoologischer garten is very typical for a Berliner challenge. It’s a huge void that stayed inbuilt for decades. This type of leftover land that is difficult to apprehend. By contradiction, the area is very busy. The close Kurfürstendamm is a well-known deluxe shopping street. In the past, it was the fancy place of leisure for the Western Berliners. Still, it’s a crowded area for tourist and local. It’s difficult to believe that our site stayed very quiet all this years, behind all the density and the busyness.

Another major fact to consider is this immediate proximity with Tiergarten. Qualified by the Germans as a park, this forest is one of the green lung of the city. A place composed by big aged trees, nice walk paths and a zoo.

Behind the concept of the architectural promenade there is this idea of discovery by exploration. More you walk, more you discover the resources of the museum. This sensitive exploration is increased by the change of status of the space of different rooms and in between. The three dimensional measures of rooms are different, from simple to triple height, from narrow corridors to large exhibition storeys.

The exploration continues through the walk the museum. It makes the Visitors traveling from space to space, from theme to theme. As he goes all over the museum, he climbs over the building at the same time. The path ends with a dramatic large window. This opens toward a beautiful view over Tiergarten and the skyline of Berlin. The museum scenography finish here to make aware that it’s the human being who is responsible of his own framework where he lives and he has to take care of it.

Some parts of the facade are open, filtered or blind depending of the relationship between inside and outside, the program and the context. The skin and the structure of the building are in wood. The generated pattern is mostly inspired by the vision we can experience in the forest. When we look through a forest, all the tree trunks expand a pattern in the same way in every direction to infinite. The trunks in the foreground are perceived bigger than all the other one in the background. In façade, little and big section of wood alternate reminds this effect. The pavilions surrounded by trees will merge with the landscape till to disappear in it.

(See the competition entries here)

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R12                          Rouages 

Type: Open competition

Themes: Masterplan , Public space, Landscape, TGV,...

Size: XL - 35 Ha 

Team: Partnership Continuum with Lola Marlhoux, Maëna André and Anna Kusniereck

Client: Rouen & Europan 12 France   

Rouen (FR) | 2013

Right bank, left bank and Lacroix Island: the rediscovery of the river environment

As a mechanism with gears of various sizes, the strategy articulates various project scales from geography to detail. As a clock, localized actions in the context will set a mechanism in motion, progressively transforming neighbourhoods. Those city pieces complementarily linked together. The aim is to make a city that leans on each of its pieces to work properly. If one piece doesn’t fit in the gearing the city would work nonetheless –as it always has– but less efficiently. The adaptability of a particular gear will rely on its quality and its function.

  The Axe-Seine great aspiration is to make the territories and the economies of the valley collaborate. Rouen is confirmed in its metropolitan ambition with a new high-speed train station coming with a large program of offices and activities. The city must take advantage of such a move. Which local projects or needs could be set in motion with the arrival of such an urban development?

  For instance, it could be a great opportunity to reconsider mobility at a metropolitan scale. As individual mobility is getting more difficult, public transportation needs to get improved. The project proposes to take lanes from the ring road to create a bus way, thus serving large areas of the city and integrating both central and peripheral. Such a bus line would also link many pre-existing amenities. Very close to the centre, it could offer access to the green lung that the south bank of Lacroix Island represents.

Considering the existing building stock, the project identifies decrepit places and repairs them gently rather than wiping them out. Reshaping them could lead to original dwellings. Intervening on the existing buildings will prepare for the transplant of new programs in those areas. Those programs would thus appear more like a complement to an imperfect situation than a colonizer willing to take its place.

The environment comes with efficient public spaces, large and airy. People that chose a collective and urban living would find there some real gardens, animated by the lively ground floor activities of housing or office buildings.

The station area includes nature, light and density from the beginning. The Seine River provides raw and transformed construction materials to erect a new district. The island bank becomes the scenery for a building-site /event watched from Rouen, preparing the future equal urban intensity of both banks.

Seeing the river as a medium for resources is central in the thinking of the future Rouen in a multi-scale strategy. The project multiplies interfaces in between inhabitants and this geographical element.  Flood plains should be given back to the natural landscape of the river, converting a constraint into a quality for the places bordering it directly and for the whole population of Rouen that will enjoy this new park.

(See the competition entries here)

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W12               Räume nach Wunsch

Type: Open competition

Themes: Masterplan , Housing, Landscape, Rehab,...

Size: L - 6 Ha 

Team: Partnership Continuum with Lola Marlhoux, Maëna André and Anna Kusniereck

Client: Wittenberge & Europan 12 Deutschland   

Wittenberge (DE) | 2013

Empty spaces on demand

Wittenberge developed during the industrialization a varied urban potential in the middle of the field scenery and along the river Elbe. The urban structure remained even after the industrie left  after the German reunification.

The village on the river Elbe laid exactly between two very important cities and became a connection point because of the first railroad bridge over the Elbe. The evolution of the railway as an important mean of transportation linked with the riverine traffic made Wittenberge the ideal location for a port, a railwaystation and industrial development respectively. After the War and the division of Germany, Wittenberges location is again very special: at the East-West boarder. Today it could become once again an important hub, due to the already existing multi-transportation possibilities: the river, the railway and the motorway.

The Elbe Valley is very concisely and especially loved in Germany. In Dresden is it UNESCO world hertage named. There take place many events along the waterfront, concerts, open air cinema, promenades, bike paths and also surfaces to lay down where people enjoy to relax.

Around Wittenberge are fields. The Elbe valley has a very fertile soil  and like the whole region of Brandenburg the fields are important to feed the closely situated big cities.

The city is already educationally and culturally strong established: cinema, cultural center, cultural events, museums,  festivals ...

It also has several large industrial zones that could be converted. As an example we already have the training center, the old oil mill. Singer industrial area is ideal for a more industrial use, which will re-develop together with the port expansion.

We are aware that it has architectural potential which is not only valid for facility buildings...The empty houses in the city must have an important role in the conversion movement due to renovation, new construction, 

(See the competition entries here)

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REZ                        Pirmil - les Îles

Type: Definition study

Themes: Riverside, Masterplan, feasibility study, phasing, ...

Size: XL - 80 ha

Team: Obras - Yvan Okotnikoff, Project leader + 3 emp.

Client: Nantes Métropole, Nantes Aménagements

Nantes, Rezé (FR) | 2012

Turn environmental requirements and rules into a benefit for the landscape. From a village to a neighborhood, a great urban district, the riverside, the Île de Nantes,  Nantes, surrounding communes, Bas-Chantenay, to the metropolis, … one of the site's specificity is to be multi-scalar. It is an opportunity to merge different economies, contrasted lifestyles and a diversity of transportation. The "mixed-use program", that we sometimes need in urban studies, is potentially already here. All we have to do is to reinforce the activity and improve housing areas. We already knew that the existing conditions (already built programs, environmental requirements and planning rules) are deeply anchored. Moreover, some restricted parcels, like those from the slaughterhouse, impose a waiting time. This time can be turned into a benefit, as it was for the area of the Île de Nantes : to avoid a basic urban development disconnected from the river landscape and ignoring this strong geographic structure. To live in the town but also in the nature, to work in a pleasant setting is part of the nowadays strongest urban aspirations. And this idea is utterly matching the site. We can find back the river bank on both sides and the historical green corridors of Rezé: the layout of past geological streams and islands is revealed.

It seems essential to bring back this green continuities. Studying them, we can use all the parameters given by  the site (subsoil, urban structure,..) to extend the river landscape across the border made by the Route de Pornic. Thus, this will settle a strong natural structure. This structure can include some quiet dwellings and community facilities. That seems a good lead.

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EUS                                Eurasanté

Type: Definition study

Themes: Masterplan, Architecture adviser, Hospital, ...

Size: XL - 120 ha

Team: Obras With «Alfred Peter» Office Jordan Aucant, Project leader 

Client: Lille Métropole 

Lille (FR) | 2011-2012

Reshaping a loosened urban fabric by the void and landscape 

  Every built form is different, but all oriented towards the site’s great central un-built area. In other words, every living space should have a close relationship with the landscape: sensible and generous openings (for the North side windows), loggias or balconies (when facing West and South).

  Housing could be new to the site, but we do not consider it as a handicap. Why should we consider housing necessarily located outside the campus? Housing once was close to workplaces. Why this distance today? Why can’t we simply get to work walking?

  Nowadays, the mobility creates a number of behaviors. A matter like "Is it possible to combine the time to get to work and our everyday life needs?" is the question that everyone is asking. This interface is now well integrated in cities knowledge for public transportations: everyone understands that a railway station or a metro station can be an important place, which deserve a particular care, and require specific facilities and services (newsdealer, coffees, bicycle sheds, etc.).

  Building use around Eurasanté is mainly focused in the relationship between offices and health firms. But, visitors, employees have needs as well, not only for transportation and canteens.

  This approach has two benefits: It brings diversity program and use wise. Indeed, some activities are cost-efficient only if they are stretched during daytime, but with a different target at noon and in the evening. This is normally the case of restaurants, sport centers, etc. But, it could also be the case of swimming pools, which could benefit schools and employees during the week, and locals on evenings and weekends. This "abundance" which takes into account all the cycles during a day, and enhances public and private investments, is a condition of sustainability too : more effects for a specific effort.

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E11                 Connecting Borders 

Type: Open competition

Themes: Masterplan , Public space, Landscape, Suburbs,...

Size: L - 17 Ha 

Team: Partnership Continuum with Lola Marlhoux

Client: Rødovre municipality & Europan Denmark   

Rødovre (DK) - 2011

Do you believe in the potential of the suburbs?

City centres tend to display a consistent, identifiable and consequently homogenous style, as architects envision a similarly homogenous population. But such artistic signatures and great gestures seldom acknowledge the pre-existing structures the public is already familiar with. This project therefore aims to identify exactly those structures which promise the most potential to be transformed into public spaces – places of interaction with and in the urban landscape.

We perceive architecture as a generative power to create such communicative channels. While the project approaches each situation individually, as in a clockwork each step influences the next, giving the overall structure shape and consistency as time progresses.

In the 1960s suburbs all over Europe were developed as clusters of individual houses or as larger estates – and Islev as well as Rodøvre are no exception in this respect. Today the uncontrolled spreading of the suburban communities has become a central concern and urban planning has consequently placed a special focus on the establishment of natural preserves and parks to counterbalance the urban sprawl. A similar aim is pursued by renaturation programmes which open up the sealed ground.

We suggest a compromise between individual housing and larger estates by drawing continuations between these two habitations. By acknowledging the interests of the local population we aim to transform the community cautiously and with respect for these interests.

The project preserves the architectural heritage of Undgomsbyen and Islev Skol, which are conceived as integral parts of the local identity. These complexes are expanded to strengthen their use value.

For instance by creating a new sport field and similar recreational facilities, and by transforming one of the roofs into a grand stand.

The project also proposes to centralize the various libraries in Islev within a new building, the Forum, providing state of the art digital information technology for its clients. The building is located above the central traffic circle on Islevbrovej and functions as a visual marker for the community, visible from all the major streets leading in its direction.

The natural landscaping in Islev Torv needs to be given special attention to balance the increasing population density, especially in those areas with high rise buildings.

The current infrastructure places a number of distinct burdens on the landscape we are going to traverse. As the layout indicates, the area is surrounded by commercial parks and motorways which partly absorb the sound pollution. The project aims to cross these boundaries and thereby create a greater exchange between these distinct areas.

While the boulevard stretches the entire municipality, it is grounded in the cultural centre, crossing Slotsherrensvej. Without obstructing the general flow of pedestrians and the traffic, it invites the local population as well as visitors from outside the municipality. Thus, the centre takes on the role of a nexus of interaction between the metropolitan area and the local community.

(See the competition entry here)

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CVS                    Blue Glass Gallery

Type: Commission

Themes: Urban development, Public Space, Architecture, ...

Size: M - 750 m2

Team: Obras - Yvan Okotnikoff, Project leader; William Aucant, Project officer

Client: Ville de Saint-Etienne

Saint-Etienne (FR) | 2010-2012

Compose urban space through an object central to city flows and uses

The gallery plays an important part in the overall reorganization of Place de l’Hôtel de Ville (the city hall square) and Place Dorian. It is the major component of the development planning Coeur de Ville (heart of the city) in Saint-Etienne.

The project is about composing the public space in the classical meaning of the word. It is set up in the major perspective. Aligned with rue Gérentet, it shapes an equivalent to the gorgeous lime trees row along the rue du Président Wilson. The gallery emphasizes the guidelines on which the whole urban project takes shape. It is not a single object, laid on the ground but is strategically placed on the grid plan that organises each element of the public space. First of all, this construction will be the witness for changes in Saint-Etienne city centre. The square that was, so far, rather silent and restricted to its institutional representation status is to become a lively place. The activity cannot be still confined to the sides of the urban square but must colonise the whole public space. The building scale and the activities it will shelter will allow for a better appropriation of the whole area. The gallery is designed as a coloured glass sculpture, kaleidoscopic in daylight and glowing suspension at night. The gallery aims to multiply situations and appropriations.

The materiality of the project is not only chosen for its esthetic qualities but it stands as a demonstration of the local know-how as it has been design directly with the glass craftsmen of the historical Verrerie de Saint Just, just out of Saint Etienne.

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FSC             Le Faisceau-La Défense

Type: Invited Competition

Themes: Masterplan , Buisiness district, Landscape, Infrastructure, Transport, ...

Size: XL - 160 Ha

Team: Obras - Yvan Okotnikoff, Project leader+ 3 emp.

Client: Etablissement Public d’Aménagement de La Défense et Seine Arche

Nanterre, La-Défense (FR) | 2010

Transforming derelict infrastructure into a real potential

The first question can make the head spin: Do we have the possibility to invest here, on a major regional infrastructure, to enhance at the same time the local communities’ living conditions, the links from the Seine river’s loop to an other, the riversides’ qualities and to host a world-city ambition? It is an elementary issue and yet simple. Simple but original, past experiments show us how investments at a global scale denied neighborhood's realities and their inhabitants and they could never count on each other.

  This is the first matter of "le faisceau", a French word to describe here a heavy network of infrastructures, with the ideas of linking, sharing, converging: All in all, It hosts all scales of the project together.

  Within nowadays-metropolitan changes, there is here a "test", which is urban, but mainly led by the politics domain. Which partnerships, which decisions, step by step, can reshape this area, delete its scars and host an ambitious development, respecting the site? Why the economic expansion cannot guarantee a quality of life, also a city more equitable, where everybody can blend in and can find an "Urban delight".

The bet here is an urban invention, which can bring closer economy and city's enjoyment. Make of the acquired wealth a chance, beyond numbers and assessments.

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SAE                  Sustainable quarter

Type: Invited competition - 1rst Prize

Themes: Masterplan , Sustainability, Lanscape, Train Station,...

Size: L - 46 Ha

Team: Obras - Yvan Okotnikoff, Project leader+ 2 emp.

Client: Ville de Saint-Amand-les-Eaux, C.A. Porte du Hainaut

Saint-Amand-les-Eaux (FR) - 2010

Sustainability as a method beyond tricks and tools

  This project is open: it can be adaptable, because sustainability is mainly a matter of methods and interoperating. It needs at the same time: to predict (for example: keeping free land in the long term), to measure out a critical mass and to give a certain "freedom" to the project, for a progressive settlement. We don't think that a "Sustainable quarter" have authority, like the modern planning in the 20's-30's, to impose a new urban figure which, by contrast, make less qualitative the existing resources. This is the principal problem of today’s prototypes (like Vauban (DE)). The project is pragmatically led, taking advantages from the existing conditions, to let the project open.

    This masterplan leans on a very contextual interpretation, related to Saint-Amand-les-Eaux own location. Developing this area (from resources, "savoir-faire", transport, industrial locations, etc.) is part of development process. Building here is a benefit, it's all about methods, and it creates architecture, landscape and public space.

  Besides, the district confirms a breathing and dynamic city, which balances nature and density, animated public realm and relationship with the great landscapes around. The quality of life it brings, is more diverse and interesting: It's the city + the countryside + the landscape. This unbuilt area brings a better continuity between natural environments, enhancing biodiversity. The nature here is also found in pounds and canals, which justify the city's name. Water, a guideline for the conception, is the starting point for landscape.

  In the project, the train station is no longer an intermodal hub, it becomes a real centrality. Now, convenience shops and services have appeared. It is an important central point, but also a place to live, well connected with the surroundings.

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ANG          Local development plan 

Type: Commission

Themes: Territory vision , City vision,PLU, PADD, Urban regulation, ...

Size: XXL - 27 km2

Team: Obras - Yvan Okotnikoff, Project leader; Jordan Aucant, Project officer + 1 emp.

Client: Ville d’Anglet , ACBAA

Anglet (FR) | 2009-2013

Including a territorial project deeply in a plot regulation

  Anglet enjoys a favorable image: The ocean, the pine-trees, the countryside, the garden heritage, etc. But there is also the private gardens and housing quality based on the vegetation omnipresence that generates the image of a "city delight". The city of Anglet is aware of its life's quality.

  The urban vision for this beginning of the 21th century is to find an obvious connection between the green frame, the need for moving city - where there is a large variety of services and animations- and today's transportation (to propose an alternative to the car).

    This quality does not exist by itself; the newest evolutions, about green corridors, efficient buildings and transportation networks, spoil the primary qualities: parks get smaller, fields are turned into suburbs, traffic increases, etc.

  The city planning code (PLU) is developed at the city scale. But the residents, like those who work there, do their shopping or relax have different backgrounds: what happens in the municipality also concern the population of the entire conurbation. This must be a city, which integrates itself in every governance dimension. It helps to anticipate the urban area’s development. This interesting matter interferes with everyday life: it's important to link the city’s project with all the regional scales.

  In the end, the geography’s legibility appears mainly lost. Natural environments are affected by urbanization, including the unorganized urban sprawl in the valley, which leads to the effects on flood risks we know about. The territorial project must get along with the topography, land’s nuances. Finding again a "green frame" is a major issue.

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CLY              ZAC du Bac d'Asnières

Type: Commission

Themes: Masterplan, Urban Advising, Architecture Advising, Towers

Size: L - 160 000 m2 

Team: Obras - Jordan Aucant, Project leader 

Client: SEM 92, Ville de Clichy

Clichy (FR) | 2007-2013

What should be the link between "La Seine" and the parc?

What will be visual perception of the river "Seine" from the park? How to open dwellings and offices on this green breath, situated 7m above the ground? How to get a continuity for footpaths between the riverside and the city center of Clichy?

To answer  this issue, the new district is organized around a few great principles. It takes advantage of some potentials and requirements of the landscape, the proximity of the river, the new park, … It uses the different ground levels, where are situated the gasometers. This topography induces some situations of belvedere towards both the river and to the skyline. The district aims to link the neighborhoods by diversifying the housing supply and intensifying the inner-city network of infrastructures and green mobility, displaying usual urban shapes, all orientated towards the large landscape. Three skyscrapers distance each other : one is situated on the south side of the park, the two others frame the Asnières's bridge on the riverside. Eventually, it completes the supply of facilities for the city: schools, community center, play fields, a park, and convenience shops.

The matter of graphic representation is essential. As the urban planner of the urban development zone (ZAC), we try to look seriously the urban project as far as its architectural details. We brung every actors to confirm all principles for building the project. It was a condition to make a coherent whole.

[continuum]

10.1               Media&KulturForum

Type: Architectural School project for Master Diploma - A Level with highest honours

Themes: Forum, Arts center, Industry fallow, Campus, Learning center,...

Size: L - 5 Ha campus area / 8 000 m2  programme

Team: Individual

Professors: Xavier Bonnaud, Phillippe Thuillier, Yvan Okotnikoff, ...

Berlin (DE) | 2009

Make a public path through a building

The vocational training campus is a huge complex, its buildings can be seen from far. And this «big castle of red bricks» offered views on all the surroundings. To avoid creating a mono-programmatic district, our strategy proposed to install a public equipment on the river bank: Culture combined with Education

The Media & Kulturforum become integrate in this campus of massive objects, even if his style is different. Yesterday, the facade of the fabric was made of some ornamental bricks. Nowadays, the building is covered by a continuous patterned skin which give to him a monolitic aspect.

This building metaphorically shows different entities stacked together, with an fluent organisation of big programs between them. For example, the auditorium works as an entity, such as the restaurant, the exibition room or the media storage: Inside these, you’re focus on the program. The voids in between are opened, they are a reception, a Café and a workplace: These places catch the daylight and they allow views onto the urban landscape outside.

From outside, a cantilever over the promenade invites you to come in. When you go through the building, you don't feel like locked inside. Actually, thanks to the ramps between the levels you've crossed a succession of different sequences. And before you notice it, you've been from the public space to the top of the roof and back to the public space. It's like if the interior of the forum were on your way on a walk along the riverside.

[continuum]

9.1          Knotenpunkt - Junction

Type: Urban School project for Master Diploma

Themes: Masterplan , Industry fallow, Territory, Infrastructure,

Size: L - 23 Ha -

Team: With Lola Marlhoux, Camille Barbier and Nicolas Fraysse

Professor: Frédéric Bonnet, Christophe Boyadjian, Yvan Okotnikoff, ...

Berlin (DE) | 2009

Enhanced a district which have been forgotten

Treptow-Köpenick area is marked by three elements of his history and geography. The territory is situated where the river Spree enter the city, it's a unique landscape. Then, the area was part of East-Germany. When the Berlin Wall fell a lot of industries became wasteland, production decrease and people get unemployed. But more recentely, one of the university of Berlin, the renowned Humboldt Universität, decided to move close to Schöneweide on the Adlershof Campus. His presence will bring a lot a person, compagny and dynamism.

We find a site between the S-Bahn Schöneweide station, a inner-city highway and the river Spree. A very representative 18 Ha void which seems to be forgotten by the urban environment.

Our team elaborate a strategy by combining some sociological datas (unemployment, people transportation, …) with some characteristics of the site (industrial heritage, living close of the riverside,...). It creates 5 different projects on 5 very specific locations, solving the problems one by one. We notice that each project needs the others to work together. This strategy in this area operates like a clockwork.

One of this 5 projects aims to give a second chance to unemployed people by creating a vocational training campus into a beautiful old brewery complex. The challenge became a real chance to change this maroon site on an optimistic place to all people around. An also it was an opportunity to work on a project which will mix contemporary architecture and heritage.