This Flexible Office Offers Plenty of Space for Ideas to Bloom at French Startup, BlaBlaCar

The French tech startup BlaBlaCar connects riders and drivers looking to carpool together. When the firm reached out to Studio Vincent Eschalier to conceive a new headquarters, similar forward-thinking flexibility was at the forefront of their minds. An idea bloomed for a 54,000-square-foot office that beckons some 600 employees to work in it, and supports them as they telecommute.

Two infrastructure levels incorporate fitness, yoga, and radio studios, along with meeting rooms and an auditorium with an exposed-concrete ceiling incorporating square cells to improve acoustics. Five stories of offices and common areas are defined by materials, from solid pine on the first floor to iterations including blue earthenware, brass, walnut, and the top floor’s marble and light oak. “Each color present in these common areas,” says founder Vincent Eschalier, “is found in the toilets on the same floor with the use of terrazzo whose colored fragments echo the break areas.”

The building’s distinctive façade is the real draw, however. “The alcoves are inspired by tulips,” he says. “We tried to reproduce globes in which the occupants could come to nest or isolate themselves. They project the building toward the street and give a glimpse of living within the building.” It’s an enticing offer for those who make the trip into the office.

Italian Illustrator Olimpia Zagnoli Displays 37 Works at Her First Exhibition in France

“We don’t embroider cushions here.” Those were the dismis­sive words Le Corbusier uttered to a young Charlotte Perriand when she came to his Paris studio one October afternoon in 1927 looking to work with him. Fortunately, she was not deterred: She was ultimately hired and became a significant collaborator on many of his projects, one being the Unité d’Habitation de Marseille, for which Perriand did the interiors. It’s that quote along with Perriand’s body of work that inspired Olimpia Zagnoli’s current exhibition—titled “Ici nous ne brodons pas de cousins,” Corbu’s above quote in French—at the iconic housing unit, which is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year. The Italian illustrator’s first exhibition in France features 37 pieces, from a 2019 cover for The New Yorker to ones created specifically for the show, including her debut sculpture, which is in concrete echoing the rough-cast concrete facade of Corbu’s building. But Zagnoli’s lines and color combinations, along with the idea of making art a part of everyday life are winks to Perriand.

This Roadside Pavilion Houses a Car Sculpture by Pascal Rivet in Rural France

In rural France, Studio Bouroullec and tile manufacturer Mutina build a roadside pavilion for Pascal Rivet’s car sculpture.

Lincoln is a full-size replica of a 1960 Lincoln Continental by contemporary French artist Pascal Rivet, whose work examines the industrial versus the handmade, challenging the gesture of reproduction.

Rivet carved the sculpture out of plywood and eventually paints it in the colors the car was produced at that time.

Teenage acquaintances, Rivet asked Ronan Bouroullec to create a shelter for the work, shown here in a rendering, which was planned for a six-week exhibition at Piacé le Radieux, a Le Corbusier–designed arts center in northwestern France.

So that it could be a perma­nent public-art installation, the center’s director Nicolas Hérisson instead proposed that the pavilion be constructed by local craftsman in a roadside field in the small village of Piacé.

Partnering with Mutina, with which Studio Bouroullec has had a decade-long relationship, Lincoln Pavilion is made of steel and corrugated iron painted the same red as the manufacturer’s Rombini terra-cotta tile paneling the structure’s interior walls, while the floor is the Bouroullec’s Pico ceramic tile; the ladder enables visitors to get a closeup view of the final painted version of Rivet’s Lincoln sculpture.

These Eco-Friendly, Micro-Architectures in France Prove Less is More

It’s believed that up to 50 percent of France is undeveloped agricultural land. For its 12th edition, the Biennale Internationale Design Saint-Etienne capitalized on this notion with its theme Parcours des Bifurcations, aka roads, in this case ones that lead to various exhibition sites throughout the country’s east-central region. One is a wheat field along the Rue des Noyers in Firminy, and, in collaboration with the Site Le Corbusier, is where Döppel Studio has conceived “Le Champ des Possibles,” or the field of possibilities. “We come from the French countryside,” says Jonathan Omar, cofounder, with Lionel Dinis Salazar, of Döppel. “This is our first project inspired by that.”

Taking cues from Corbu’s 1965 cabin in Provence—at 1,600 square feet, it’s the smallest UNESCO World Heritage Site—and other projects in his cannon, Döppel created six “micro-architectures” that embrace the natural landscape and promote that less is more. Each installation is under 215 square feet, the figure in France that necessitates a building permit, and clad with eco-friendly tarpaulin stuffed with cereal waste from the wheat harvest. “We show,” Salazar explains, “the potential of France’s empty spaces as refuges for the body and the spirit.” They’re on view through January 15, 2023.

Foster + Partners Translates Architectural Classicism into Modernism at the Narbo Via Museum in France

Some commissions might tempt an architect to dial back time. But for the Narbo Via Museum in Narbonne, France, which displays Roman antiquities, Foster + Partners eschewed pediments, columns, capitals, or other elements of literal historicism. Rather the firm worked in a completely contemporary architectural language, combining state-of-the-art concrete construction, prefabricated building components, and simple notions of mass and spatial gravitas to evoke ancient building traditions.

Present-day Narbonne was once Narbo, the first capital of Roman Gaul, and an important Mediterranean riverine port. In the Middle Ages, the city’s Roman buildings and funerary monuments became quarries for constructing fortified walls. Centuries later, in the 1860’s, when the walls were dismantled for a modern, expanding city, antiquarians retrieved stone blocks carved with figures and texts, and stored them in stacks in a Romanesque church. In 2012, Narbonne held an invited competition to build a regional museum and study center for the reliefs, one that would also serve, more broadly, as an introduction to all of Rome in the south of France. The blocks needed a controlled, protective environment, a more effective method of display, and facilities for conservation and research. The ruins of a Roman villa had also been discovered 20 years before, and they needed special accommodation, too.

With their mastery of concrete and masonry, Romans were inspired engineers and builders. But they were, in their way, proto-modernists, producing construction components in a handcrafted “industrial” process for what we would now call systems design. Just down the road in Nîmes, a 24,000-seat amphitheater offers an early example of a systems building, with stones—modular, fitted, and carved, some in distorted, non-Euclidean geometries—that were all sized and shaped for designated positions in the oval structure.

That Roman savoir faire established a precedent for the Foster team, which approached the project with comparable respect, skill, and efficiency, but in an industrialized systems design. Founder and executive chairman Norman Foster himself Romanized the agenda: “Norman was very insistent that if we were expressing the design as massive, it should be massive, to refer to the language of Roman architecture, instead of covering a frame with finishes, as we normally do,” partner and project architect Hugh Stewart notes.

Like a Roman military formation going into battle, the 104,300-square-foot building is square in plan, with walls of dry-packed, pigmented concrete manually tamped in layers—rosy striations that recall the sedimentary rock canyons of Petra, Jordan, carved with Hellenistic funerary temples. Organized in strict rectilinear geometries, the weighty, 32-inch-thick walls convey a monumentality whose traditions reach beyond Rome back to ancient Egypt’s Karnak.

A tall, cathedral-like hall divides the building into two rec­tangular sections. The soaring space houses more than 800 funerary stones, which are stacked in a clifflike grid of galvanized-steel racks. This is the public-facing side of an industrial storage system with a factory-style gantry that allows museum staff on the other side to retrieve any artifact needed for study or conservation. Otherwise, the stones remain in full view of museumgoers, who can access information about them on interactive touchscreens. Dubbed the lapidary wall, the enormous structure turns what would normally be a back-of-house area into an exhibition hall.

The prefabricated concrete roof extends beyond the load-bearing perimeter walls, providing shade from the meridional sun. Since the museum sits on a plinth, all HVAC ducts and the like run under the floor—another very Roman idea—leaving the underside of the roof as an unadorned ceiling. The interior spaces are modular, “to allow a large degree of flexibility and also an interpenetration of public and professional zones,” Stewart says. “The modular approach to planning gives you all sorts of visual axes penetrating the plan.”

The public entry is like the atrium of a Roman house, a lofty courtyard centered on a shallow reflecting pool with a roof opening above. It leads into the larger of the museum’s two constituent sections, which houses galleries for temporary and permanent exhibitions (including appropriately scaled spaces for frescoes and other artifacts from the ruined villa) along with a restaurant, shop, and small auditorium. Meeting rooms, administrative offices, workshops, and research areas occupy the smaller of the two sections, on the other side of the lapidary wall.

With its dry-packed walls, precast-concrete roof, galvanized-steel storage racks and fittings, and polished concrete flooring, the museum is “a true brutalist building: no finishes on anything,” Stewart acknowledges. “The project harks back to the early days of Foster Associates as a kind of modular, lightweight structural building but with a single big difference: much heavier construction.” For a museum about classical architecture, the firm has a produced a classic of modernism that in its clarity, purity, and spare monumentality achieves, without historical pastiche, the authenticity of a Roman build­ing. The two traditions coincide in a regular, repetitive, engineered structure—the language of both.

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foster + partners: norman foster; spencer de grey; david nelson; grant brooker; andy bow; françois curato; angelika kovacic; piers heath; roger ridsdill-smith; fillipo bari; trevor barrett; ariadna barthe cuatrecasas; peter donegan; carole frising; ed garrod; vagelis giouvanos; ricardo candel gurrea; andres harris; helene huang; raphael keane; amanda lyon; berenice del valle moran; adeline morin; raffaella panella; raj patel; alex (zhen) qian; camilla sand; daniel skidmore; thang vu

jean capia: collaborating architect

studio adrien gardère: museum consultant

george sexton associates: lighting consultant

peutz: acoustic consultant

onsitu: audiovisual consultant

oger international: concept engineer

secim: structural engineer

technisphere: environmental engineer; mep

urbalab: civil engineer; landscape consultant

fondeville: general contractor

bourdoncle: custom galvanized steel

sirewall: external walls

velux: skylights

mecalux: custom shelving system

goppion: display cases

Erco: track lighting

planas: gray concrete

A Look Back at 90 Years of Timeless Design

Modern projects from as early as the 1930’s are still relevant today, proving that form, function, and the pursuit of innovation can endure for nearly a century—just like Interior Design.

City of Tresigallo, Italy, 1939

Masterminded by Tresigallo native Edmondo Rossoni, then minister of agriculture and forestry, the city’s “refounding” began around 1930, when Rossoni ordered a road connecting it to Ferrara be built, to improve trade, and enlisted young professionals—engineer Carlo Frighi, sculptor Enzo Nenci, and landscape architect Pietro Porcinai, among others—to design a rationalist urban plan, with pastel-colored buildings and clean, essential lines, resulting in a tenfold increase in population then and a must-see destination for architects of today.

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La Fondation Maeght, Saint-Paul de Vence, France, 1964, Sert, Jackson and Associate

Led by architect Josep Lluís Sert, a former Harvard GSD dean (1953– 1969) and friend of fellow Spaniard Joan Miró, the institution founded by art-dealer couple Aimé and Marguerite Maeght is France’s first devoted to art, the in situ modern works by the likes of Miró, Alexander Calder, Marc Chagall, and Diego Giacometti, as well as the temporary exhibitions it currently hosts, in harmony with the natural surroundings and the building’s architecture, done in a welcoming Mediterranean village style of white poured-concrete impluviums, earthy brick, and myriad patios.

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Spiegel Gruppe, Hamburg, Germany, 1969, by Verner Panton

The publishing company perhaps most known for its news outlet Der Spiegel enlisted the Danish architect, who cut his teeth at Arne Jacobsen’s studio, for its then new headquarters, his purview encompassing the lobby, lounges, and conference rooms, palette and furniture selection, including the Harry Bertoia chairs in the canteen (which graced the cover of our 75th anniversary issue), and the design of all textiles and lighting; today, the Spiegel sconce has been reissued by Verpan and the canteen is under heritage protection.

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Cartiera Burgo, Turin, Italy, 1981, by Oscar Niemeyer

The headquarters of the paper-manufacturing company now called Burgo Group was designed by the venerable Brazilian architect during his exile years, about a decade after he’d completed the company’s editorial offices in Milan, and one of only two buildings he built in Turin, appointing this one with furniture by Eero Saarinen and him and his daughter Anna Maria; the building stands today unoccupied but there have been recent proposals for its adaptive reuse.

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Casa Orgánica, Mexico City, 1985, by Arquitectura Orgánica

Founder Javier Senosian, now 73, is an early practitioner of organic architecture, this house reflective of the movement, its ferro-cement, or reinforced cast concrete, formwork sprayed with polyurethane and then partially covered with soil for grass to grow directly on the facade, and interior conceived to evoke a mother’s embrace or the sensation of entering the earth, the latter emphasized by an all-over sand-colored palette; first designed with a single bedroom, when the house was expanded, workers dubbed it “the shark” for its appearance and a fin was added.

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This Year’s Winners of Le French Design 100 Reflect the Evolving Landscape of Design

In and beyond the city of lights, France continues to shine a spotlight on design with the second edition of Le French Design 100. The digital festival, which honors the global reach of French designers, kicked off January 20 with an opening ceremony held at the Elysée Palace and runs through February 21.  

Similar to the first edition of the event, held in 2019 at the Musée des Arts Decoratifs Paris, jury members selected 100 product and project winners, that showcase the breadth and diversity of the country’s design traditions and values, such as the art of living, creativity, and sustainable innovation.

“French spirit is based on rigor and critical thinking. We value quality, truth, and creativity, a both intoxicating and positive combination. How can French design be exported to the world?” Philippe Starck, guest of honor at the festival, notes in a statement. “Two parameters should be respected: that designers, authors and creators remember their social, humanist and ecological role and that they forget the ultra-fast cycle of fashion. Today, we must return to the true values of a profession, provide a real service. We are in an extremely good position because of what we are, but also because of what we can become if we make a little effort,” he continues.  

The jury, led by president Hervé Lemoine, director of Mobilier National, includes international experts such as Deyan Sudjic, director emeritus of the Design Museum in London, Jennifer Flay, creative director of FIAC, Paris, Leila Anna Wahba, director and head curator of the Architecture + Design Museum, Los Angeles, Dakota Jackson, designer and founder of House of Dakota Jackson, New York, and Miryon Ko, arts and culture director of Cartier, Japan. This year’s digital edition, supported by president Emmanuel Macron, features exclusive videos and an interactive Le French Design World Map enabling viewers to measure the place and impact of French design on a global scale. For a full list of winners go here.

PCA-Stream and RF Studio Meld Two Historic Buildings in Paris to Create a Modern Office

2021 Best of Year winner for Office Transformation

Situated at the prowlike juncture between Boulevard Haussmann and Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré in the eighth arrondissement stands a hybrid structure originally composed of two buildings, one dating to 1863 and the other to the 1920’s. Governed by French arte de vivre, a non-ostentatious, timeless, and forward-thinking approach, PCA-Stream and RF Studio conjoined the two with complete restructuring inside and out for the lessee, 174-year-old investment bank Lazard.

Two significant moves are immediately obvious. A rooftop dome composed of glass scales caps three added floors, ensuring the enlarged structure stands as a beacon. Smaller in scale is the new, singular entry, which was shifted to the tip of the building. Inside, consolidation entailed erasing the floor borders between the two buildings, creating a new core with elevators, and emphasizing horizontality. Now, each floor boasts nonhierarchical distribution, a high concentration of spaces encouraging collaboration, and its own cafeteria.

Materials include light oak, natural bluestone, leather, and brass. Furnishings in the atrium have a luxe residential quality, like those in fine hotels. Spaces are planned so that visitors do not have to cross paths and have access to screened private lounges—perfect for both a pandemic and Lazard’s dual needs of confidentiality and openness.

PCA-Stream: Philippe Chiambaretta; Francesco Cazzola; Lucille Mazy; Rosa Acampora; Émilie Anquetil; Laura Bouday; Somanad Petitjean; Cédric Martenot; Marco Merletti; Laila Nady; Antoine Calcagno; Tifenn Le Guern; Mely N’da Koyé; Philippine Aprile Mandillon

RF Studio: Ramy Fischler; Simon Naouri; Ermal Reca

Peter Marino Architect Transforms the Cheval Blanc Paris

2021 Best of Year winner for Hotel Transformation

In the late 1920s, architect Henri Sauvage oversaw completion of a large art deco building for Parisian department store Samaritaine. A century later, the building was reimagined for LVMH, including a portion transformed into the luxury hotel Cheval Blanc Paris by Interior Design Hall of Fame member Peter Marino. The 172,000-square-foot property, which encompasses 72 rooms and suites, is respectful of the structure’s history and site but maintains a modern edge in an ever-changing city. “We transformed it without disregarding the existing heritage,” Marino explains. “The work of French artists and artisans was integrated into every aspect.”

Flooring in the main lobby incorporates four different stones in a design inspired by parquet de Versailles, offset by Vik Muniz’s contemporary 12-feet-high renditions of the Eiffel Tower, which are in turn flanked by custom gold-and-bronzed screens. Off the lobby in one of the four restaurants, Marino’s crimson chairs and banquettes play against dramatic wooden walls inlaid with shell. Linking levels, an elegant stone stair wraps around a rusted-steel sculpture by Tony Cragg. Below, a 100-foot swimming pool features custom mosaic tiles and walls of Bianco Sivec marble. Paris architect Édouard François led the building’s exterior architecture, including restoration of the historic facade, and helped create breathtaking vistas in every space. The views became central to the design experience created by Marino, including in another restaurant’s mezzanine, where guests can dine while gazing out at Pont Neuf.

Peter Marino Architect: Peter Marino; Paul Ferrier; Paola Pretto; Ben Hoffman; Enrique Pincay; Alex Malagelada; Costantino Di Sambuy; Damien Yoo; Osamu Mochizuki; Rafael Pimentel; Alexis Brown; Sarah Earl; Saskia De Schrijver; Jonathan Zakarya; Jennifer Fitzgerald; Mandissa Whittington; Richard Arleo; Rosario Vadia; Lauren Mitus