The new design of the Multimedia Library and the park by Dominique Coulon & associés supposes a dialogue between the contemporary together with the historical values of the 17th century of the city of Pélissanne, in Provence, located a few kilometers from the French Riviera in France. The project is located in a traditional city very defined by its military character in the Maureau Maison, a historic building dating from 1642.

A permeable piece is added to the historical building that also tries to adapt to the park. Regarding the design, it is about respecting the existing, it seeks to adapt and integrate, a clear example is the tree that can be considered to be part of the same project because the design of the facade of the extension surrounds it giving it the value of a sculptural piece focusing the point of the view of the user.
The renovation and extension projected by Dominique Coulon & associés add a new concept to the original project, respecting the forms, logic, and original composition, the new piece presents a more organic design compared to the traditional classic design. An idea that opens onto the park and seeks to connect the three heterogeneous pieces, the original work, the park, and the proposal.

The use of green color both in the interior in the exterior furniture of the windows together with that of the vegetation and the reflection of the glass of the intervention and the white of the enclosure seeks that interior-exterior communication that is greatly reinforced by the permeability generated by large glazed surfaces.
 

Description of project by Dominique Coulon & associés

The town of Pélissanne is an ancient fortified city located in the heart of Provence in France. The new media library takes place in the historic Maureau Mansion, built in 1642 and set in the heart of an urban garden. The building is thus part of a rich landscape and heritage context. The project dialogues between two eras and two dimensions: the verticality of the rehabilitated volume of the existing building and the horizontality of the extension. This dialogue is embodied in the contrast between the apparent homogeneity of the facades and the different shades of local materials used, such as ocher and Rognes stone.

In the existing part, the classic spatial structure of interconnecting rooms is preserved, establishing a simple internal organization of the media library. The extension displays large, flexible consultation spaces on two floors. The ground level opens widely onto the park and allows the reader to immerse themselves in the landscape, while the upper floor offers a whole different atmosphere. It propels the visitor into the crown of the majestic plane tree, which preservation guided the curved shape of the extension. 

An adjacent building connecting the town hall square and the park is also renovated and transformed into a passage that links different poles within a global and open urban system. The passage is materialized here by a totally empty space bathed in natural light. Existing floors, doors and windows are removed. The tiles of the roof are replaced by glass tiles. The park facade is maintained as it is with its semi-circular porte-cochere. On the town hall side, the facade is open over its entire width, framing of the vegetation of the park.

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Architects
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Design team
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Architects.- Dominique Coulon, Jean Scherer. Assistant architects.- Gautier Duthoit, David Romero-Uzeda, Javier Gigosos, Diego Bastos-Romero, Olivier Poulat, Margot Machin, Thomas Bukenmeyer, Florent Revel, Théo Petit, Yannick Signani.
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Collaborators
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Structural engineering.- Batiserf Ingénierie. Mechanical engineering and electrical engineering.- BET G. Jost. Cost control and monitoring.- E3 Economie. Acoustician.- Euro Sound Project. Roads and utilities.- Lollier Ingénierie. Fluids.- VBET.
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Client
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Town hall of Pélissanne.
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Area
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982 sqm (existing square footage 615sqm + 367sqm extension).
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Budget
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€ 3,336,000.
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Dates
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Competition.- January 2015. Studies.- July 2015 - February 2017. Implementation.- March 2017 - December 2018.
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Manufacturers
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Construction companies.- Demolition and Modeling.- COSEPI France. Water proofing.- SMED. Exterior steel joinery.- BOUISSE SMAB. Exterior wood joinery.- Vollmer. Locksmithing.- SFM du LUBÉRON. Restoration of the facade and Scaffolding.- Atrium Batiment. Interior wood joinery.- Concept Parachini, Menuiserie Bareau. Wood floor.- SINGER. Plastering.- Provence Peinture Revement. Tiles floors and walls.- SPTB. Interior painting and Finish cleaning.- Provence Peinture Revement. Hoist.- CFA division de NSA. Electricity.- YLIOSS. Heating and ventilation.- STME. Sewerage netwok.- STME. Outside work.- EUROVIA. Furniture.- IDM. Signage.- Pol Sud Communication.
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Location
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Rue de la République, Pélissanne, France.
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Photography
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Dominique Coulon & associés. Located in the heart of Strasbourg, Dominique Coulon & Associés is a firm of architects of national and international renown.

For more than 25 years, the agency has earned a reputation for the quality of the public facilities it designs. It has worked on a wide and varied range of programmes, including a media library, music school, auditorium, school complex, swimming pool, sports facilities, a residential home for the dependent elderly, and housing.
 
Dominique Coulon and his three associates Steve Lethos Duclos, Olivier Nicollas and Benjamin Rocchi allow their intuition to lead the way as they seek to develop contextual projects that combine contrast and complexity, where the outer envelope hints at inner richness. Spatial quality and natural light are fundamental elements in every project: space is always controlled by precise geometry.

The agency has received many awards and distinctions: firstly in 1996 with the Prix de la Première Oeuvre for the ‘Pasteur’ lower secondary school in Strasbourg, followed by a number of nominations for the Équerre d’Argent award in 1999, 2002 and 2003. In 2006 it was a prize-winner in the PEB1 Compendium of Exemplary Educational Establishments organised by the OECD, for the ‘Martin Peller’ school complex in Reims. In 2008 it was nominated for the BSI Swiss Architectural Award and for the European Union prize awarded by the Mies van der Rohe Foundation, for the National Drama Centre in Montreuil. It has received a Chicago Athenaeum International Architecture Award on three occasions. In 2014, it won the Pool Vision Contest prize in the ‘public pools’ category, for the swimming pool in Bagneux. In 2017 it received the first prize in the Eiffel Trophies rewarding steel architecture, for the Media Library (Third Place) in Thionville, and was nominated for the European Union prize awarded by the Mies van der Rohe Foundation, for the residential home for the dependent elderly and the residential centre for handicapped people in Orbec.
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