ÉCOLE NATIONALE SUPÉRIEURE D’ARCHITECTURE PARIS VAL DE SEINE
3 quai Panhard et Levassor, 75013 Paris

Galerie Vivienne“ A Parisian Covered Passage – Pedestrian axis of Seine river left bank ”

International Workshop
Nagoya University Tianjin University École National Supérieure d’Architecture Paris Val de Seine

14th /18th September 2015

Professors
Atelier TABET – Group 5 :Blaise EKODO, Jean CHERON, Jean-Batiste
GUILLAUME, Philippe MAILLOLS, Sabine MOSCATI,Adrien DURRMEIER, Dominique WURST, Sophie
FROIDEFOND, Marco TABETJapanese and Chinese relations coordinator :Boris WELIACHEWNagoya University (Japan) :Hisashi KOMATSU
Tianjin University (China) :Ying ZHENG

The Parisian covered passages :thFrom the end of the XVIII century, especially between 1820 and 1830, Paris attends the birth of a new typology:
the covered passages. At the end of the Terror period and the Napoleonic wars, Paris enters a period of peace andprosperity. Urban life revives, commercial activity intensifies, real estate programs prosper. Boulevards are fillingup again, crowd and strollers go down the city and discover the new shops built in covered passages which goacross blocks. Routes take shape to go from a passage to an other, allowing distances shortening, to escape badweather (rain, wind, snow), to admire fashionable shops’ showcases and to find tearooms to break off momentarily.
Built under new buildings, the covered passages are the ancestors of today’s shopping malls. Bordered by shops
on both sides, topped with glass roofs which supply natural light when there was no electricity, equipped withdecorated paved ground (sometimes even warmed), covered passages offer everything to please and to attractpassersby. The idea to build covered passages appears as typically urban and as the fruit of a certain intelligence:
to combine the idea of a covered market and a shopping street. Market halls existed since the Middle Ages
(Arpajon, Milly-la-Forêt, etc.); it reminds the protected shops of the Ancienne Comédie street and of the Royalestreet, as well as those we find Place Dauphine and Place des Vosges: the workshop is located at the level where
the street is open to the sight of passersby, the law height storekeeper’s housing being located up to the store, asmall staircase connecting both levels.
thBoth typologies are equipped with an invention peculiar to XIX century: a steel structure covering the passage,surmounted by a glass roof. These three combined typologies create a new one: the covered passage.
“Each period dreams about the following one” said Michelet. Walter Benjamin offers us, to decipher the ambiguous
thfigures of a dream peculiar to XIX century, categories as original as fertile that it is up to the visitor to associate
and combine: boredom, idleness, iron construction, World Exhibitions, fashion, collector, inside, mirror, player,passages, etc. They allow to show the emergence of construction forms, communication and transports in thethcities, among which only XX century was able to measure the political impact, at the same time as they offer theability to identifying a trend, at the very beginning of these mass techniques, a fragile utopian aspiration andforgotten promise of freedom. This ambivalence makes of "Passages", even under their fragmentary aspect, anthextraordinary critical homage to the XIX century of Paris, to its architecture and to its writers. (Extracted from a
introduction text of the work).

The site :Crossing of the Urban Development Zone of Seine river left bank. Course going from the boulevard Vincent Auriol,at the level of the metro station “Quai de la Gare” (ligne 6), to the passage under the Petite Ceinture and theperipheral express road (Boulevard Périphérique) of Paris, until Ivry-sur-Seine side.
ndthCompared to districts where are located most of Paris covered passages (2 and 9 districts), the UrbanDevelopment Zone of Seine river left bank distinguishes itself by its youth. The very first studies of this area wereestablished at the beginning of the 80s. And by the end of the 80s were delivered its first buildings located between
the boulevard Vincent Auriol and the BNF (French National Library) (section n°1). At the beginning of the 90s weredelivered buildings on the quai Mauriac and the rue Neuve Tolbiac (section n°2). Housing built around the Rectorywere delivered in the 2000s and beyond. The ENSAPVS building was delivered in 2007, just a liitle time after therdBiopark, which are both part of the 3 phase of the Urban Development Zone. An area where the oldest part is not
35 years old and the most recent one a liitle bit more than 8 years old.
Most of Parisian covered passages are today about 190 years old and some even more than 200 years old(Passage du Caire, 1798). Three centuries are separating the first Parisian covered passages and our today’s
project.

The Urban Development Zone of Seine river left bank :Each sector of Urban Development Zone of Seine river left bank has been designed according to a different
concept: the first sector shows similar typology to Haussmann blocks in its sizes, shapes and colors. In the second
one, around the BNF (French National Library), blocks adapt themselves to the relief, are organized around internal
gardens and are made of varied architectures. The third sector (Portzamparc) is composed of open blocks,
faubourg blocks, where the relation courtyard/building/street varies from a construction to the other (no aligneddimension).
Pedestrian small alleyways were imagined allowing to connect the 1.5 kilometers of the Urban Development Zone.
Nevertheless, all these passages, small places and alleyways are lacking activities to offer a great pedestrian axis
which could connect the three sectors (soon four) of the Urban Development Zone of Seine river left bank.
This Urban Development Zone was built between the Avenue de France and the quais François Mauriac andPanhard et Levassor. These two main roads very busy with a very important flow of vehicules. Docks have nopedestrian activities compare to the boulevards? The Avenue de France, animated during working hours and atnoon, becomes lifeless as soon as the night falls.
The sector of the open blocks of Portzamparc is composed of a mixture between tertiary and residential buildings.
Between these two sectors, the Rectory and the buildings of Paris VII were settled. If more offices are locatedalong the avenue de France, the rest of the sector, apartment and university buildings, is irrigated by streets whichlook like by their sizes the streets of the old Paris. Preferring them narrow and intimist, the architect thought ofrecreating the animation of Saint Germain or the Marais district. Nevertheless, this objective has not been reallyachieved. The commercial areas offer significant surfaces to attract great stores’ brands and chains. All along
docks, pavements are not enough busy to hang on convenience stores and commercial areas surfaces are also
too important there. The closeness, the shops and the activities, which usually attract stroll and pleasure to see
what is taking place, are here solitary exercises.
The fact remains that this sector, the third, concentrates today a large population of academics, students, teachers,researchers and administration staff. But this district real-life experience, in spite of its urbanistic promises, remains
stereotypical. It is an interesting district, but it is not a beautiful district.
Thus a question arises: what can we plan to create a great pedestrian and trading artery to connect and breathe
live into this Urban Development Zone?

The program :Establishing a programmatic framework containing:- Buildings (closed and covered), composition of various functions: students housing, hotels-shops, convenience
stores, galleries, services kioskes, studios, coworking, shops and showrooms, clothing stores, secondhand
clothes, etc., asking for small surfaces- Covered built elements: windows, pergola, sculptural or livable roof
- Landscaped sequences: pathways, equipment, plantations, furnitures…
-It is advisable to maintain the dialogue within teams, so that the proposals get numerous while creating coherent
passages.
As for project choice, the site has been divided into 5 sections, which include roughly limited areas for building
projects and landscaped designs to be handled.
Section n°1: Jean Arp street, Valérie Larbaud street, Jean Giono street. Passage through 2 blocks and a place.
Landscaped Continuation: crossing of Bibliothèque Franþois Mitterrand’s square
Section n°2: Choderlos de Laclos street
Landscaped continuation: square François Mitterrand, rue des Frigos
Section n°3: esplanade Pierre Vidal-Naquet and Crossing of the Halle aux Farines, Paris VII lecture halls Building
Landscaped Continuation: Grands Moulins Abbé Pierre garden and Elsa Morante street
Section n°4: Watt-Biopark blockLandscaped continuation: Elsa Morante street, site of Bruneseau Nord tunnel
Section n°5: end of the ENSAPVS site, tunnel under arches leading to Bruneseau Nord blockLandscaped continuation: Biopark block, continuation towards Ivry-sur-Seine

Layout : Friday 18th September 2015, at 4:00PMA0 panel:
Analysis and reports through ideograms and texts
Choices made and concepts expressed through project sketches
Images of significant atmospheres of the chosen section
Mock-up:
Analysis, concepts and proposal over all the Urban Development Zone: 1/1000
Section mock-up of the project (most representative part): 1/200