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Awards
Winner of the Lauriers National Architecture Competition for Wood Construction
2017 National Prize for Wood Construction, category: “Public equipment and office building”
Located on a promontory on the heights of Vannes, the new headquarters of the Directorate initiates the transformation of the Troadec site in an administrative centre. Because the site was a former closed and sealed military area, the challenge resided in achieving a certain porosity and openness onto the town, while playing a role in the context of renewal of the adjacent neighbourhood built around the station. In order to catch the inhabitants’ eye, the site’s first building had to be an iconic project, one that would create this momentum of renewal and launch architectural intentions at urban scale. Thought of as a component of a future neighbourhood, the project is the result of the division and distortion of an initial single volume. The project’s slender volumetry acts as an urban landmark perceived from the railway tracks and road. It is a symbol of the mutation of this area within the town. Because of its exceptional location on the heights of the city, the client wanted to set the example in terms of environmental construction and integration within the landscape. The wooden building is able to meet the State’s concern in terms of the building’s impact on its surroundings, as well as to create safe and healthy working conditions for its public servants. Compact and chiselled, the Directorate’s architecture takes its place within a new urban context, showcasing its monochrome shell made of curtains of vertical wooden slats. The hollowed volume reaches for the sky and bears protrusions that reinforces its role as a landmark. The building’s appearance changes with the seasons depending on the way its wooden vertical solar-shading devices are tilted. The opacity/transparency ratio of the façades constantly varies according to the internal activity of the structure. The concrete plinth emerges at the foot of the landscaped park and extends to the east of the site before morphing into a square. The entirely glassed façade of the ground floor lifts the volume above and highlights it role as a landmark of the urban environment. The exterior terraces are distributed on all the levels and act as a true extension of available space.
Client
Morbihan Prefecture
Conduct of operations: Morbihan Departmental Directorate for Territories and Sea
Main Contractors
Architect: AIA Architectes
Engineering and economy: AIA Ingénierie
Environment: AIA Environnement
Consulting firm acoustics: Acoustique Yves Hernot Bruz
Health & safety, technical monitoring: Qualiconsult Vannes
Programme
Offices – Public equipment
Surface(s)
6,779 m²
Cost
€9.7M Tax-Free
Timeline
Competition Winner 2013
Delivery 2017