Poitiers 86 | Lanoire & Courrian

Urban project We wished to create a cluster of houses that is both a privacy area and a smoothed porous space, either from the outside or from the inside of the block. A service road irrigates the hearth of the cluster. It is marked out on both sides by vegetated areas. The project is a hybrid space, between a square and a garden. Architecture Project We have imagined this project like a succession of strip parcel. At some places the strips are cut-out, only noticed thanks to a treatment on the floor that defines the outside space. At other places the lashes form the volume of the building; in fact we could say that the building is contained by those lashes. The whole cluster of houses is surrounded by a very porous fence which forms the bases of some accommodations. The frontages are made as the roofing, in a pearly and lacquered metal with wide waves. The delicacy of the metal corresponds to the idea of the initial folding. The structures in front of the frontages virtually stretch the volume of the lashes. Those structures are used as a support for a vertical plant wall and for the louvered shutters, in the roofing prolongation, that will protect the Southern frontages from the summer sunshine. There are buildings, there are gardens. The outdoor spaces are punctuated by objects: trellising, log cabins,… Different varieties of fruit-trees are planted in each lash, coupled with the different shades of claddings; it offers a real diversity and a coloured quaking to the site. Likewise, the slight difference in the buildings implantation makes the whole place vibrate behind the aligned fence. Functioning The block is covered by three ways on the periphery. An intramural mixed way makes a loop that irrigates the heart of the block. The pedestrian alleys: They create practical and botanical visual openings from North to South. Parking: The self-contained housing for purchase are situated on either sides of the square, in the heart of the block. They all have a garage and a ground parking space. North, the access to the garages is situated directly in the Frères Morane Street. South, the access to the garages is made through the internal servicing way. The rental self-contained accommodations are situated Eastern and Western of the block. Some have a ground parking place right in front of the house. Others have access to small parking pools (4 or 5 cars) that are sheltered with the same covering as the accommodations. Housing: One-storey houses. The lounges, living-rooms, kitchens and storerooms are always on the ground floor. The bedrooms and the bathrooms are upstairs. The storerooms/toilets of the ground floor are equipped with shower siphon in order to convert this space into a bathroom. Like this, all the ground-floors form a large living area (living room + kitchen + bathroom) accessible from the ground level. All the living rooms are situated at the South and communicate directly with a small garden. In every garden, there is a small log cabin (made as the fence) to put away garden tools; and a cistern for rainwater that can be used to water the gardens. Outside areas: The diversity of the outside spaces creates different type of intimacy compared to the housing and a hierarchy between public and private life. This structuring is created by the presence of the central square, the pedestrian alleys, the small gardens next to living rooms, and the small courtyards. All those landscaped areas are more or less porous one to another, keeping in mind that we wanted to propose a smooth porous space, blend by various outside areas with different atmospheres.