giving substance to the public space
The future Place Henri Pollès is a first-class metropolitan site destined to become a new district centre. This vast open, commercial and traversing space is to be embodied by the construction of a sequence of buildings that are to border it: in fact, they contribute fully to its identity. We wanted it to reflect a growing and collective awareness of environmental issues. Clearly urban, this architecture calls massively for natural and biosourced materials. Wood and rammed earth are thus part of the tradition of the half-timbered houses in the centre of Rennes.
Layouts, lines and templates are in search of a certain theatricality: the new public space indeed requires limits, it must be symbolic, contained and qualified. In this spirit, we thought it appropriate to stage the anchoring of the buildings on the ground through powerful porticoes. The urban character of this square, with its real commercial assets, must be unequivocal, with an architectural intensity comparable to that of the city centre.
Forming a shared expanse, the square allows multiple uses directly linked to the architecture: café terraces can be built on it, its proportions allow for markets or temporary events.
Particularly close to the town centre, the square is part of the great North-South geographical framework of the area, where the meanders of the remarkable natural landscape of the Saint Martin meadows penetrate into the depths of the Rennes fabric. The square thus concludes a ramification of this extraordinary wet, lively and wooded landscape. Nature is clearly a source of its identity: our architectural proposal, which gives pride of place to natural materials, thus reflects this interface between town and landscape.
program 115 housings and shops client Espacil habitat area 6 524 m² cost 12,58M€HT work full service phase competition label RT2012
