Project Details
- Project Name
- Institut Mines-Télécom, Paris-Saclay
- Architect
- Grafton Architects
- Client/Owner
- Institut Mines-Télécom, Télécom ParisTech, Télécom Sud Paris
- Project Types
- Education
- Project Scope
- New Construction
- Size
- 432,713 sq. feet
- Year Completed
- 2019
- Shared by
- Madeleine D'Angelo
- Project Status
- Built
Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara, founding partners of Grafton Architects, are the 2020 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureates and the winners of the 2020 RIBA Gold Medal.
Project Description
FROM THE ARCHITECTS:
Context:
The master plan proposes streets, squares and boulevards with the poetic integration of landscape and ecology. It refers to the legacy of the great tradition of educational institutions such as Oxford, Cambridge & Harvard, with their lawns, quadrangles, cloisters and courtyards. We have explored the interpretation of this architectural legacy in the making of a new 21st Century university building for l'Institut Mines Telecom, Telecom Paristech and Telecom Sud-Paris.
Distinct Enclosure: Distinct Place
In order to adequately address the Place de Metro and to give the building a strong presence in this new public space, we have compressed the core educational uses into a compact form to make a strong urban presence addressing the square.
By building lightly on the ground, we release space on the site to make a generous quadrangle, a ‘green room’, within the tradition of Oxford, Cambridge and Harvard Universities.
The form and singularity of the quadrangle and of the total block is held by the research offices, doctorates rooms, and directors offices which hover above a looser more fluid series of inside and outside spaces below.
Six Spaces
The building is organised around six spaces. Five of these are courtyards, one of which is internal, one of which is semi-covered. The sixth space is that of the generous quadrangle, with ‘real ground’ in which we can make a new landscape, a large ‘garden room’.
The community of scholars, professors, and directors circulate around this rich series of interlocking,overlapping halls, courts and spaces.
Project Credits:
Project: Institut Mines-Télécom, Paris-Saclay
Archtiects: Grafton Architects
Local Architect: Vigneu Zilio Architectes
Structural Engineer: OTEIS
Civil/ Thermal/ M&E/ HVAC/ Fire: OTEIS
Quantity Surveyor: Alayrac
Environmental Engineer: Chapman BDSP
Environmental Certification: Green Affair
Quantity Surveyor: Alayrac
Acoustic Engineer: Gamba
Kitechen Consultant: EFC
Signage: Locomotion
Video Animation: Nicolas Gagnon & Grafton Architects