Cloister Les Cordeliers / St Emilion | Pierre-Antoine compain

The Cordeliers cloister and its church are located within the Bordeaux Region, in the fortified city of Saint-Émilion. Dating back from the 14th century, it is one of the town’s most emblematic and picturesque sites (a listed UNESCO World Heritage Site). In 2017, owners and sparkling wine manufacturers decided to restore the site, especially the ruined church from the French Revolution, and set up a grocery and wine store with premium products. This rehabilitation project has been entrusted to Le Studio (a design studio by Pierre-Antoine Compain). It took 3 years including the site restoration and the interior design to fully renovate the site. Le studio decided to deal with the renovation by incorporating its own touch, a common thread to all its projects, between modernism, spatial design and tradition. Pierre-Antoine Compain played with different parts of the church (altar, ambulatory, choir..) to highlight its unique space. It creates an outstanding site combining limestone and trendsetting furniture. This spatial enhancement is breaking with traditional church codes. The main issue was to combine historical heritage and modern design while retaining the original character and style of the past. The general design of the scenography needed to anticipate different constraints and spatial configurations of places likely to host the grocery & wine store. The church choir provides the spectacular culmination to the principal vista. The spatial scenography is inspired by the sacred liturgy and the theatre scene where wine is the main subject. This architectural program was led by « Le Studio » (Pierre-Antoine Compain) in conjunction with « Architecture Patrimoine » ( Denis Boulanger ) for the site renovation.