Green Park Bègles

designed by Fabre / de Marien + ppa-architectures + Sabine Haristoy /

Location: Bordeaux / France / Type: Residential Parks / Built: 2016 /
Show on Google Maps / Published on November 14, 2018

ppa●architectures: 70 collective dwellings for home ownership in the ZAC des Sècheries, in the city of Bègles.

Relationship to the city / inhabiting the park
The ZAC des Sècheries project is located in a new neighbourhood of the city of Bègles (near Bordeaux). It aims to achieve multiple objectives, which are both a break with the residential fabric and a continuity of the urban part described by the town hall park. The project, which is adjacent to the town hall park, embodies the idea of a park inhabited by »buildings of houses« which is achieved by constructing autonomous buildings as though in a planted continuum. The four buildings have small footprints and are of various heights. Their scales range between those of small collective housing buildings and large individual villas.

Living in a building of houses

The project intends to provide maximum individual character, while also preserving a sense of unity by proposing buildings of a reasonable scale (5 floors / 3 floors). The architects sought to graduate the passage of time from collective dwelling to individual apartment. In order to propose specific solutions to meet the various needs of those different typologies, the breakdown is organised by plot (two 1-bedroom apartment plots, one 2-bedroom apartment plot, and one 3-bedroom apartment plot). This distribution allows the design of appropriate and constructively effective plot morphologies, which offer a variety of access to the apartments (interior patio, compact indoor staircase, outside staircase, outdoor patio), as well as multiple types of private exterior areas.

Building bigger and cheaper

On big apartment types, the project takes into account the need for adaptation of housing with the expansion of a family by the evolution of a housing space. On smaller models, it is necessary to have some storage space, such as cellar, as well as additional space to take on new uses – hence the proposal of a multifunctional collective space. Given the financial difficulties faced when acquiring more floor area, we considered a means to enlarge the perception of a dwelling through its ability to open up to the outside. Therefore, the main room of all apartments features a large opening that offers a generous view out onto the park (4m x 1.5 m). The architecture of the buildings is geometrically simple, white, and ornamented with large windows. This apparent neutrality lends itself to a mutual enrichment between the buildings appropriated by their inhabitants and the surrounding park.

architects and landscape designer: ppa●architectures

Websites :
www.ppa-a.fr/
www.fabredemarien.com/
www.sabineharistoy.com/

Other designers involved in the design of landscape: Fabre/deMarien (associate architect) Sabine Haristoy (landscape designer)
Cost control : Execo
Thermo- & Fluid- Eng : Vivien
Roads & Utilities : Augié
Structure : Astree
SPS Control : Socotec
External joinery: K.line
Sun protections : Griesser

Photo credits : Philippe Ruault
Illustration: Gabrielle Vinson

Project location: 77 avenue de Lattre de Tassigny 33130 Bègles – France
Design year: 2012
Year Built: 2016
Client : Bouygues Immobilier
Developer: Aquitanis (www.secheries-begles.fr)