OMA has won the competition to design Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc

OMA has won an international competition to design Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc, a bridge across the river Garonne in Bordeaux, France, that will link the municipalities of Bègles and Floriac.

OMA's stripped-down design with 44m by 545m for the Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc attempts to rethink the civic function and symbolism of a 21st century bridge. It is scheduled for completion in 2018.

Model of the bridge in its urban Bordeaux context. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

OMA he is again on news headlines about architecture on this week as one of the final three firms up for realizing axel springer’s media campus in berlin and now the office led by Rem Koolhaas as winner to design the ‘Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc (previously in METALOCUS)’ in Bordeaux, France.

Clément Blanchet, director of OMA France: “The bridge itself is not the ‘event’ in the city, but a platform that can accommodate events of the city. We wanted to provide the simplest expression – the least technical, least lyrical, but the most concise and effective structural solution.”

Positioned at the heart of the Euratlantique project, Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc provides a link between the municipalities of Bègles and Floriac. But more than simply connecting two points of land separated by water, the bridge itself also offers a generous new public space in the city.

Vincent Feltesse, president of the Urban Community of Bordeaux: “It is an extraordinary architectural gesture. More than a bridge, it is an urban planning intervention in the heart of the Euratlantique project.”

Its considerable 44m by 545m expanse, a continuous surface stretching well beyond the banks of the river, seamlessly connects to the land. The gently sloping surface enables a pedestrian promenade while still allowing the necessary clearance for boats beneath. All traffic modes – including private cars, public transport, bicycles and foot traffic – are accommodated by its width, with the largest allowance devoted to pedestrians.

The project was developed in collaboration with engineers WSP, the landscape architect Michel Desvigne, the consultant EGIS, and the light design agency Lumières Studio.

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Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Urban overview. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Program. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Overview. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Render. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Model. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Detail model. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Diagram. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

Other bridge typologies. Pont Jean-Jacques Bosc. Image © courtesy of OMA.

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OMA. Office for Metropolitan Architecture

Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) is an international practice operating within the traditional boundaries of architecture and urbanism. AMO, a research and design studio, applies architectural thinking to domains beyond. OMA is led by eight partners – Rem Koolhaas, Reinier de Graaf, Ellen van Loon, Shohei Shigematsu, Iyad Alsaka, Chris van Duijn, Jason Long, and Managing Partner-Architect David Gianotten – and maintains offices in Rotterdam, New York, Hong Kong, Doha, and Australia. OMA-designed buildings currently under construction are the renovation of Kaufhaus des Westens (KaDeWe) in Berlin, The Factory in Manchester, Hangzhou Prism, the CMG Times Center in Shenzhen and the Simone Veil Bridge in Bordeaux.

OMA’s completed projects include Taipei Performing Arts Centre (2022), Audrey Irmas Pavilion in Los Angeles (2020), Norra Tornen in Stockholm (2020), Axel Springer Campus in Berlin (2020), MEETT Toulouse Exhibition and Convention Centre (2020), Galleria in Gwanggyo (2020), WA Museum Boola Bardip (2020), nhow RAI Hotel in Amsterdam (2020), a new building for Brighton College (2020), and Potato Head Studios in Bali (2020). Earlier buildings include Fondazione Prada in Milan (2018), Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow (2015), De Rotterdam (2013), CCTV Headquarters in Beijing (2012), Casa da Música in Porto (2005), and the Seattle Central Library (2004).

AMO often works in parallel with OMA's clients to fertilize architecture with intelligence from this array of disciplines. This is the case with Prada: AMO's research into identity, in-store technology, and new possibilities of content-production in fashion helped generate OMA's architectural designs for new Prada epicenter stores in New York and Los Angeles. In 2004, AMO was commissioned by the European Union to study its visual communication, and designed a colored "barcode" flag, combining the flags of all member states, which was used during the Austrian presidency of the EU. AMO has worked with Universal Studios, Amsterdam's Schiphol airport, Heineken, Ikea, Condé Nast, Harvard University and the Hermitage. It has produced Countryside: The Future, a research exhibited at Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York; exhibitions at the Venice Architecture Biennale, including Public Works (2012), Cronocaos (2010), and The Gulf (2006); and for Fondazione Prada, including When Attitudes Become Form (2012) and Serial and Portable Classics (2015). AMO, with Harvard University, was responsible for the research and curation of the 14th Venice Architecture Biennale and its publication Elements. Other notable projects are Roadmap 2050, a plan for a Europe-wide renewable energy grid; Project Japan, a 720-page book on the Metabolism architecture movement (Taschen, 2010); and the educational program of Strelka Institute in Moscow.