Paris: The Latest Architecture and News

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Amsterdam-based SeARCH has won a competition in collaboration with Atelier Phileas and LA architectures to design a housing block in the new Paris Rive Gauche district. With each practice focused on one building, the project resulted in the combining of three interconnected high-rises united by a "green ribbon," "cut skyline" and a common expression of function projected onto the facades. Together, they offer 55 family apartments, 180 student flats, 75 middle income apartments, offices, a commercial area and underground public parking.

Netherlands-based Ittyblox has created yet another series of miniature 3D-printed buildings, this time featuring typical and iconic buildings and sites in Paris. Adding to their series of New York, London, and Chicago, among others, the new Parisian series follows suit as a 1:1000 scale model of customizable city blocks.

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Winner of the annual Super Skyscrapers competition, Tommaso Bernabò Silorata’s “Skyframe” is a proposal for a skyscraper in Paris featuring a hotel, business areas and rooftop pool. Despite its status as one of the world’s fastest changing cities, Paris has severe restrictions on its skyline to preserve its existing landscape. Skyscrapers are discouraged in its urban core, an issue addressed in this year’s Super Skyscraper competition. The first place winner, Skyframe, creates a void between the two towers, framing the Parisian skyline, and creating an ethereal swimming experience for occupants on the roof-level pool.

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As part of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP21) in Paris, Tomás Saraceno has revealed a sculptural installation, “Aerocene - Around the world to change the world," at the Grand Palais and Palais de Tokyo. The project features a series of air-filled sculptures that float without burning fossil fuels or using engines, solar panels or batteries.

Opened in January 2015, the Philharmonie de Paris was designed by Jean Nouvel, though he later distanced himself from the project. The concert hall, a 2400 seat venue, seeks to "invent a model all its own," according to the Philharmonie de Paris website. It breaks from the pack of concert halls by mathematically creating a more intimate space -- "the distance between conductor and the farthest spectator is only 32 metres (compared to 48 metres at the Salle Pleyel for a smaller audience)." The architect worked with various acoustic experts to "develop a bold system of cantilevered balconies and floating clouds, combining envelopment, intimacy and spaciousness." Here we see the project as photographed by Danica O. Kus. Read on for the full set.

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Videos

After a meticulous multi-year restoration the Musée Rodin in Paris has reopened to the public. Dedicated exclusively to the work of Auguste Rodin, the state-owned museum has undergone a ground-up facelift designed to breathe new life into the ageing home of the artist's diverse body of work. Housed in an estate originally built in 1732 and open to the public since 1919, the comprehensive renovation has left no stone unturned, including a full structural and cosmetic overhaul. Project architect Richard Duplat was challenged to "recreate the atmosphere it must have had in Rodin’s day" while implementing current accessibility and safety standards, all with the goal to better represent Rodin's influential work.

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Kengo Kuma & Associates has unveiled its latest project for the Galerie Philippe Gravier in Paris. Entitled Yure, a Japanese expression for a nomadic habitat moving in the wind, the project is made from identical wooden pieces, seeking to blur the lines between art and architecture with its organic structural geometry.

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Atelier King Kong has unveiled the design of the new Vitry-Centre metro station in Vitry-sur-Seine, part of the Grand Paris public transport network. The station, located in the southeast portion of the red line of the Grand Paris Express, is a town center station that provides access to the Town Hall and sports and cultural facilities, “links to existing above-ground transport networks (buses) and services to come (tramway), and connects with the RD5, one of the main north-south highways of the southeastern Paris region." Learn more about the design after the break.