The project is above all an architectural proposal in order to best respond to the urban issues that are developing in the changing district of Coubertin. The stakes of the competition are above all the structuring of a crossroads, a singular nodal point which concentrates many public transport networks. This quality in terms of equipment must now be relayed by ambitious architectural programs that affirm the identity of a new district carrying the values of our time.
The Technical information can be reduced as follow:
Program: building complex including offices, commercial activities, RATP access and facade dressing of the Asnières-Gennevilliers RATP station
Studio Name: ECDM architectes –
Architect manager: Benjamin Ferrer
Area: 1 950 m² SHON
Year: 2012
Location : avenue Pierre de Coubertin, Asnières-sur-Seine (92), France
Breaking with an urban planning resulting from modernity, it is now a question of asserting a composite architecture sheltering multiple programs and an urban form where the density allows the structuring of the block, where the architecture comes to confront itself with the public space. This location, at the crossroads of two major axes connecting the city to the metropolitan road network, gives the facades of the office building a preponderant role in the reading of the building as a marker of the entrance to the city.
The other major challenge of the project lies in the management of the different flows that will be generated by the hybridization of the tram and metro station, the commercial area of the pedestrian mall of the new avenue as well as the entrance hall of the ‘office building.
The project must therefore generate a unity of place while itself generating visual continuity and articulating situations by proposing a strong identity. As a response to these issues, we wanted to work on a volumetry around the superposition of strata. “High” strata housing the premises of the office building and “low” strata encompassing and unifying the metro station in the operation. A set of shifts and alternations between the fully glazed levels and the levels clad in metal cladding enliven the general volumetry of the building and give a strong and dynamic identity to the entrance to the city.
Our project is characterized by the definition of a common denominator, a major architectural characteristic capable of giving strong coherence to the structuring of the block and the crossroads. In order to best hybridize the metro station within the office operation, we extend the stratification logic of the first two levels of the office building in front of the station. This collective “layer” is made up of two entities: one of glass on the ground floor and the other of a mesh on the first level, defines a relationship to the ground, a relationship between public space / private space, in a modular linearity. More than an architectonic vocabulary, it is a system that can change state, evolve, adapt in relation to the programs that these strips come to dress.
The project is a strong signal of dynamism within the new Coubertin district. Both dense and hybrid with the interweaving of the metro station in the architectural writing of the volume, the project is also intended to be subtle by covering certain “strata” with a metallic mesh. Like micro-perforated blinds, the mesh allows the eye to pass through to guarantee visual comfort for office users from the inside, while it presents, via a game of folding, an evanescent veiling appearance from the outside.
The transport stratum that we are putting in place via the band that surrounds the station and the building on the first two levels will allow active interaction in the mobility of the site. Depending on the types and speeds of travel, different information will be placed on this banner, from advertising signage to information on daily travel. Our intervention is an alternative to simple facadeism. Integrated in a reasoned way in the volumetry and the architectural language of the project, this common base must take advantage of its strategic position at the corner of two major transport routes (pedestrians, cars, tram, bus and metro) to give intelligent added value to the project.