2007 - 2010
Lille, France
The High school Levi Strauss questions the identity and registration of a college in the city, the college is an expression of learning before being the expression of architecture, the project echoes the old urban colleges and deploys a protective and serene force. The project is above all contextual in its urban context and in its materiality: the use of brick, which dominates the landscape, is a contemporary reading of the decorative facades of the district Vauban which has been built in bricks for a long time. Here the brick, single material of the facade, is forming three stratums (one per floor level) which glide smoothly over each other, forming and awning windows or urban. The sweetness of the building is also due to the absence of sharp right angle.
College adapts to context scale and to sunshine to offer different levels of porosity in the public space in a constant game of openness and protection. The movement of children between the court and the floors is staged in the square with a suspended spiral staircase, the courtyard opens generously to the street behind a glass screen, the sports hall dialogue with its place by means of a 40-meters-bay, half board and sports areas open onto the garden and houses for teaching staff, fit discreetly into the urban fabric.
