Public Housing in Paris
- Claudia Fuchs
In the heterogeneous developments of the Rue Castagnary close to the Gare Montparnasse, an elegant aluminium facade attracts attention to itself. The new structure, containing ten publicly supported dwellings, harmonizes in its scale and external form with the urban environment. Its bright metal outer skin also corresponds with the facades of the other buildings in the neighbourhood, as does the rhythm of the large casement doors. A homogeneous aluminium cladding is drawn over the street face from the ground floor to the roof. Set outside the vertical panels of extruded sheet aluminium are sliding elements with pivoting louvres that act as sunshading and visual screens and that can be controlled by tenants individually. The interplay of these elements and different settings of the louvres enlivens the appearance of the whole facade. The new structure takes up the typology of the Parisian apartment block, with a shop on the ground floor and with housing storeys above. Of the latter, the two uppermost levels are integrated in the sloping roof and are reached via access related to the site. Since the eastern side is oriented to the noise-intensive railway track, an access gallery was built here that links the two dwellings per storey with the freestanding external staircase. These economical steel stairs leading upwards from the garden court are enclosed - like the access gallery - in a stainless-steel net that serves as a balustrade. Each of the 1- 4-room dwellings has a south-facing balcony. The cantilevered steel structures bestow a sense of lightness on the building and form a contrast to the rendered concrete walls and smooth aluminium panels of the courtyard faces. The internal spaces are distinguished by their radiance, which is an outcome of the light transmitted by the large casement doors, the white soffits and wall surfaces and the exposed concrete of the walls.
