Seine-Amont Site Management Offices / aasb_agence d’architecture suzelbrout

Architects: aasb_agence d’architecture suzelbrout / Suzel Brout
Location: Valenton, France
Client: SIAAP
Project Area: 2740 sqm
Project Year: 2008
Photographs: Hervé Abbadie

The new SIAAP (Wastewater Authority for the Paris Area) head offices are located on a large, liable to flooding plot at the factory’s entrance, north of Valenton. Between a major industrial site, railroad networks, industrial buildings and remains of an agricultural past, the aim is to assert the building’s representation function and to articulate the administrative and technical poles.

Our project integrates the whole programme in a common envelope by organizing shared plateaux, where offices and technical rooms cohabit. The administrative functions are set along the planted promenade, facing the future Zac buildings. The warehouses and service spaces are contained in aluminium-clad volumes and set around a delivery courtyard.

Lifted and compact, the building rises from the site and answers the requirements for natural flood proofing, ventilation and daylight for the parking lot. The wooden skin, clad with vertical rectified pine clapboards, stretches with no ostentation, and creates relations with the landscape. The façade is slit to reveal the entrance. At the centre of the building, the patio is both a landmark and a connecting element between the services.