A new bar building is being built above the Porte-de-Clichy metro station, in this area in the northwest of the capital that has been in full development since the Supreme Court of Paris moved there in 2018 to settle. the radiant Renzo Piano building. One hundred and twenty meters long and with a façade clad in caramel-coloured aluminum shutters, the building is an extension of the Stream building (Philippe Chiambaretta, 2022), directly opposite the Lawyers’ House (RPBW, 2020). The Métropolitaine houses eighty social housing units, a student residence, a social reintegration center, as well as commercial premises and a medical dispensary. Apart from some gaps, which allow us to extend the view to the garden of the Honoré-de-Balzac high school, located on the other side, and a slight fork that breaks its volume at the bow, nothing notable distinguishes it from the street, at least, from the who frequent the residential buildings that flourish in the French metropolises.
But sometimes a facade is deceiving. And the quality of the apartments behind it is anything but standard: original in its typology, in rooms of any size, with generous outdoor spaces and a winter garden. We disagree with the logic of cost compression that dominates the sector, which Laurent Girometti and François Leclercq, in a report presented to the Ministry of Housing in 2021, considered responsible for the deterioration of housing quality in France.
The environment, however, is hostile. Noisy, polluted, chaotic. To protect the inhabitants, the architects Ignacio Prego Architectures and Thibaud Babled Architectures imposed the winter gardens. Their project philosophy, more broadly, was designed to reduce disruption and allow everyone to make the most of the positive aspects of the situation. The principle of crossing apartments was thus imposed, so that each accommodation is built around a main room, a large single-piece volume where air circulates without obstacles, even for the studios, which is no small feat.
Quality of materials and finishes.
On the southwest side we have the sun, the winter gardens that heat naturally and the metal shutters that protect when it gets too hot. On the northeast side, we remain in the shade, but in the open air, large loggias, equipped with richly planted flower boxes, maintained by the landlord, which will allow you to benefit from an incomparably more pleasant environment thanks to the trees of the park. , part of which was attached to the patio of the residence.
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