Somfy – Light House | Espace Gaïa

SOMFY, headquartered in Cluses in Haute-Savoie (74) since the 1970s, is an international leader in motorization in the building sector.
The architect designed a totem building, the Light House, an innovative platform at the city entrance. The totem building is broken down into three elements: the envelope - interactive skin, the circulations - the in-between and the core - the black box.
Somfy Lighthouse is an Experience Center, focused on showcasing the history and know-how of the company, but also a fullscale demonstrator of active management solutions for the building envelope in the service of interior comfort.
This concept building highlights the know-how of Somfy teams with the ambition that technology is forgotten in order to meet the occupants’ expectations.
This space offers the visitor a new experience at each level of the eco-designed building. The historic rise, the 360 ° Lounge, the panoramic cinema room, an experience center to experience Somfy solutions live, a usability laboratory. More than a showroom, it is a demonstrator of the new architecture / environment relationships induced by current digital and communication technologies. The building is thus designed as an experience to be lived, an immersive and stimulating place.
The facades of the building actively participate in the staging of the whole thanks to a work of double skin allowing variations of atmospheres and link with the landscape according to the interior spaces but also according to climatic variations thanks to a certain number of active solar protection, blackout and free cooling elements.

Its envelope is bioclimatic for optimal management of natural light and thermal inputs.