Hasta La Ideas

We continue our Social Housing Revival series with a look at the Caserne de Reuilly, the transformation of a 19th-century barracks in Paris into hundreds of affordable homes that is emblematic of the city’s effective approach to retrofit housing.

Located in the 12th arrondissement of Paris, the project was completed in 2020 for the country’s largest social landlord, Paris Habitat, which manages some 124,000 homes in and around the city.

The Caserne de Reuilly now provides nearly 600 homes – half social and student housing and the remainder a mix of assisted and rent‑controlled housing – alongside a nursery, artist’s studios, shops and community spaces, all organised around a public courtyard at its centre.

Led by French studio h2o architectes, six European teams were invited to contribute to the project: LIN Architects, Agencie Anyoji-Beltrando, Charles-Henri Tachon, Office Kersten Geers David Van Severen (Office KGDVS) with NP2F, MIR and Lacroix Chessex.

The recent history of housing in Paris is one familiar to many European cities: soaring rents and land prices have long been forcing residents into the suburbs, while the blocks built during the postwar period suffer from poor maintenance and standards.

In Paris, the concentration of affordable and social housing in its urban peripheries and suburban “grands ensembles” has historically made the divide between the centre and its edges especially pronounced.

In 2022, Paris set a target for 40 per cent of homes in the city to be affordable housing by 2035 – 30 per cent of which is to be socially rented – set to be achieved through the retrofit of disused offices, hotels, garages and schools.

This goal is highly ambitious, but over the past two decades the city has been home to some to the most effective examples of housing refurbishment and retrofit, spearheaded by the likes of Pritzker Prize-winning studio Lacaton & Vassal.

It is this recent legacy that the Caserne de Reuilly continues, tackling a complex site that was not only home to heritage structures but suffered, due to its history as a military site, from an insular, closed-off layout that needed stitching back into the city.

“It was an inward-looking, impassable site – a break in the dense Parisian urban fabric,” explained Office KGDVS associate Justine Rossillion.

Eschewing the design of large, monotonous blocks, h2o architectes tasked the team of architects with creating what it termed “autonomous ensembles,” recognising that there was no single type of apartment to be provided but rather a diverse range of needs and desires.

To allow for the creation of these ensembles, the site was divided into six lots – one for each team, labelled A to F – that either involved the renovation of one of the site’s existing structures, a new build, or in several cases a combination of the two.

In order to establish a common language and set out a series of guidelines, all of the practices involved took part in an extensive series of workshops.

In the words of Lacroix Chessex director Hiéronyme Lacroix, “[The lots] were like a hollow tooth that we had to fill. This supra-order was stronger for us than the envy to shine as an object.”

In addition to the new buildings, a landscape strategy was developed by D&H Paysages, which saw the site’s central courtyard transformed into a large urban park opened up to the surrounding city with a series of new through-routes and paved squares.

At the original entrance to the barracks along the site’s eastern edge, comprising lots D and E, two historic gatehouses were retained and refurbished by MIR to house shops and spaces for local events. 

Setting the tone for much of the work at the Caserne de Reuilly, MIR’s approach was characterised by a blend of careful restoration with simple, volumetric additions.

Two concrete, arcade-like additions overlook the courtyard, each comprised of eight bays that match the existing building’s eight windows and topped by a public roof terrace.

“The extensions are designed as two prisms respecting the symmetrical system of the barracks,” described the studio. “These two prisms have an identical purity but they offer a subtle variation in terms of concrete shades.”

Looking across the central courtyard to plot B, the long, western wing of the barracks was restored and extended by Agencie Anyoji Beltrando.

Much like the entrance pavilions, the studio kept one original facade facing inwards towards the courtyard but created a new elevation of zig-zagging concrete and steel balconies at the rear, overlooking a new paved route along the site’s edge.

“To avoid the effects of facadism – indiscriminately merging contemporary interventions and heritage actions – we proposed a contrasting intervention clearly separating restoration and contemporary interventions,” the studio said.

The western route below these balconies is bookended by two new entrance squares, overlooked by the pink-toned lot B1 by Charles-Henri Tachon to the north and the more angular, stacked form of Lacroix Chessex’s lot F to the south.

Responding to the mixed context of both new and old found on the site, Lacroix Chessex looked to create a building that was “deliberately not standardised”, with each level or facade featuring different sized windows or cut-outs for terraces. 

Inside, apartments were organised on the corners of the plan to maximise natural light and the need for corridors, with large double entrance doors intended to give the homes a similar luxurious feel to bourgeois Parisian apartments.

“For us, the construction of social housing should make you forget that it’s social housing,” Lacroix told Dezeen.

“The solid concrete of the facades was sandblasted to give a stone aspect to the prefab, giving them the appearance of granite construction.”

“To give to this architecture the sensation of a certain nobility and perennity is a social gain,” he added.

At the northern wing of the barracks on lot A, Office KGDVS and NP2F added two simple volumes raised atop concrete bases on either side of the existing building.

The simple facades of these blocks feature oversized openings that align with slightly higher ceiling heights for the apartments in a focus on interior generosity rather than external expression.

“The rough-cast concrete plinth stopped by a long balcony refers to the composition of Haussmann facades, comprising a ground floor with a ‘bel étage’ below the long balcony on the second floor, but it also echoes the base of the existing Caserne building,” Office KGDVS’s Rollinson told Dezeen.

Lastly, on plot A to the south, LIN Architects flanked a wing of the existing barracks with two blocks, one stretching to create a new street front with deep-set window reveals, and the other smaller and wrapped by balconies.

Each of the new buildings is topped by a green space, combining open terraces for residence with spaces for growing vegetables and fruit.

The top photo is by David Boureau.

Social Housing Revival

This article is part of Dezeen’s Social Housing Revival series exploring the new wave of quality social housing being built around the world, and asking whether a return to social house-building at scale can help solve affordability issues and homelessness in our major cities.

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London’s Victoria and Albert Museum has launched its Tropical Modernism exhibition, which highlights the architectural movement’s evolution from colonial import to a “tool of nation building”.

According to the Victoria & Albert Museum (V&A), the exhibition aims to examine the complex context, power dynamics and post-colonial legacy of tropical modernism – an architectural style that developed in South Asia and West Africa in the late 1940s – while also centralising and celebrating its hidden figures.

“Tropical modernism is experiencing something of a modish revival as an exotic and escapist style popular in verdant luxury hotels, bars and concrete jungle houses,” the exhibition’s lead curator Christopher Turner told Dezeen.

“But it has a problematic history and, through an examination of the context of British imperialism and the de-colonial struggle, the exhibition seeks to look at the history of tropical modernism before and after Independence, and show something of the politics behind the concrete,” he continued.

The exhibition follows the V&A’s Tropical Modernism exhibition at the 2023 Venice Biennale, which revealed the team’s precursory research on tropical modernism in a West African setting.

For the in-house iteration of the exhibition, additional architectural models, drawings and archival imagery have been introduced to interrogate tropical modernism in India alongside the African perspective.

Exhibition materials line a series of rooms within the V&A’s Porter Gallery, divided by brightly coloured partitions and louvred walls referencing tropical modernist motifs.

The exhibition begins by tracing tropical modernism back to its early development by British architects Jane Drew and Maxwell Fry. Stationed together in Ghana from 1944, Drew and Fry adapted international modernism to the African climate, proposing functional over ornamental design.

Drew and Fry would also become part of the Department of Tropical Studies at the Architectural Association (AA), which exported British architects to the colonies from 1954 in a bid to neutralise calls for independence.

The exhibition continues by spotlighting local Ghanaian figures who worked with Fry and Drew, noting the power shifts that were taking place behind the scenes to reappropriate the architectural style for an emerging era of colonial freedom.

Influential political leaders Jawaharlal Nehru in India and Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana are the exhibition’s key personas, framing the evolution of tropical modernism from conception to regionalisation.

“The heroes of our exhibition are Nehru and Nkrumah, the first prime ministers of India and Ghana,” Turner explained. “Tropical modernism, a colonial invention, survived the transition to Independence and was appropriated and adapted by Nehru and Nkrumah as a tool of nation building.”

“Nkrumah, who sometimes sketched designs for the buildings he wanted on napkins, created the first architecture school in sub-Saharan Africa to train a new generation of African architects, and this institution has partnered with us on a five-year research project into tropical modernism.”

Through a host of physical models and artefacts, the city of Chandigarh becomes the exhibition’s narrative focal point for tropical modernism in India.

Under prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Chandigarh was the first large-scale modernist project, recruiting Drew and Fry along with French architect Le Corbusier to plan the ideal utopian urban centre.

As with Nkrumah – who saw how the Africanisation of architecture could become a symbol of progress and change – the exhibition also aims to highlight Nehru’s ambitions for a localised modernism drawing from the Indian vernacular, rather than the Western Bauhaus style.

The display culminates in a video featuring 16 key tropical modernist structures, interspersed with interviews and footage explaining the social and political context behind each building’s realisation.

“We made a three-screen 28-minute film, shot in Ghana and featuring panoramic portraits of over a dozen buildings, cut with archive footage from the time and interviews with architects like John Owusu Addo and Henry Wellington, and Nkrumah’s daughter, the politician Samia Nkrumah,” said Turner.

According to Turner, the exhibition begins to address gaps in the V&A’s collections and archives pertaining to architecture and design in the global south.

“Archives are themselves instruments of power, and West African and Indian architects are not as prominent in established archives, which many institutions have now realised and are working to address,” Turner explained.

“Tropical modernism was very much a co-creation with local architects who we have sought to name – all of whom should be much better known, but are excluded from established canons.”

Bringing tropical modernism back into contemporary discourse was also important to the V&A as a timely investigation of low-tech and passive design strategies.

“Tropical modernism was a climate responsive architecture – it sought to work with rather than against climate,” Turner said.

“As we face an era of climate change, it is important that tropical modernism’s scientifically informed principles of passive cooling are reexamined and reinvented for our age,” he added.

“I hope that people will be interested to learn more about these moments of post-colonial excitement and opportunity, and the struggle by which these hard-earned freedoms were won.”

The V&A museum in South Kensington houses permanent national collections alongside a series of temporary activations and exhibitions.

As part of London Design Festival 2023, the museum hosted a furniture display crafted from an Alfa Romeo car by Andu Masebo and earlier in the year, architect Shahed Saleem created a pavilion in the shape of a mosque at the V&A as part of 2023’s Ramadan Festival.

The photography is courtesy of the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Tropical Modernism: Architecture and Independence will run from 2 March to 22 September 2024 at the V&A Museum in London. For more events, exhibitions and talks in architecture and design visit the Dezeen Events Guide.

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Mecanoo founding partner Francine Houben has joined Dezeen Awards 2024 as a judge. Here, she selects five projects that best reflect her work.

Houben is the founding partner and creative director of Dutch architecture studio Mecanoo, which has completed numerous cultural, civic and residential projects around the world.

“Together with the partners, we lead the firm in creating architecture that responds to the context, culture, client requirements, and environment, enriching the human experience through thoughtful and sustainable design,” Houben told Dezeen.

“Architecture rooted in context”

The architect aims to design buildings that are fundamentally connected to their surroundings, while pursuing sustainable innovation.

“Our core ethos revolves around creating architecture that is deeply rooted in its context, embraces cultural diversity, the client’s requirements and enhances the well-being of its users,” said Houben.

“We believe in the power of design to positively impact communities and the environment, striving for innovation, sustainability, and social relevance in all our projects.”

She is currently overseeing a diverse range of projects spanning cultural, educational, residential, and urban developments.

“From designing innovative mixed-use developments to revitalizing historic landmarks, our team is committed to creating architecture that enriches lives and enhances communities.”

Studio Mecanoo has received numerous accolades over the years. Houben explained each award is a “testament to the hard work, creativity, and dedication of our team”.

“Winning awards not only boosts morale within the firm, but also strengthen our reputation and credibility within the global design community.”

Houben among Dezeen Awards 2024 judges

Dezeen Awards 2024 launched last month in partnership with Bentley. This week we announced our fourth set of Dezeen Awards judges, including architect Sumaya Dabbagh, designers Alfredo Häberli and Bethan Laura Wood, and fashion designer Karen Millen.

Submit your entry by next Wednesday 27 March to save 20 per cent on entry fees. Click here to find out more.

Read on to find Houben’s views on the five projects that best represent the work of her studio:

Delft University of Technology Library, Netherlands, 1998

“The Delft University of Technology Library is fascinating for its holistic approach to sustainability and its ability to create a vibrant and inclusive learning environment that fosters creativity and collaboration among students and faculty.

“This project showcases our commitment to sustainable design and creating inspiring learning environments.

“By seamlessly integrating innovative technologies with thoughtful architectural design, the library provides a dynamic and inviting space for students and faculty to engage in research and collaboration.”

Library of Birmingham, UK, 2013

“The Library of Birmingham is intriguing due to its innovative design, which redefines the traditional concept of a library by emphasizing community engagement and interactive learning spaces.

“Designed as a modern civic space, the Library of Birmingham reflects our belief in architecture as a catalyst for social interaction and knowledge exchange.

“Its striking facade and dynamic interior spaces redefine the concept of a contemporary library, fostering a sense of community and learning.”

Read more about Library of Birmingham ›

Delft Railway Station and City Hall, Netherlands, 2015 to 2017

“This integrated transportation hub and municipal building exemplifies our approach to sustainable design and human-centric architecture.

“By seamlessly blending modern technology with traditional materials, the station and city hall provide a welcoming and functional environment for commuters and government officials alike.

“Delft Railway Station and City Hall is compelling because of its transformative impact on the urban fabric of Delft, demonstrating how architecture can enhance connectivity and civic engagement while preserving cultural heritage.”

National Kaohsiung Centre for the Arts, Taiwan, 2018

“The National Kaohsiung Centre for the Arts stands out for its bold architectural expression and its seamless integration with the surrounding landscape, creating a dynamic and inviting cultural hub for the city of Kaohsiung.

“This cultural landmark embodies our commitment to creating architecture that celebrates cultural identity while pushing the boundaries of innovation.

“With its undulating roofscape and integration with the landscape, the centre has become an iconic symbol of Kaohsiung’s vibrant arts scene.”

Read more about National Kaohsiung Centre for the Arts ›

Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi, UAE, 2025

“The Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi is noteworthy for its sustainable design features and its role as a cultural institution that promotes environmental awareness and preservation of biodiversity in the region.

“This landmark museum reflects our dedication to creating architecture that honours cultural heritage and promotes environmental stewardship.

“With its innovative design inspired by the region’s natural landscapes, the museum offers immersive exhibits and educational experiences that inspire curiosity and conservation efforts.”

All photos are courtesy of Mecanoo unless stated otherwise.

Dezeen Awards 2024 in partnership with Bentley

Dezeen Awards is the ultimate accolade for architects and designers across the globe. The seventh edition of the annual awards programme is in partnership with Bentley as part of a wider collaboration to inspire, support and champion design excellence and showcase innovation that creates a better and more sustainable world. This ambition complements Bentley’s architecture and design business initiatives, including the Bentley Home range of furnishings and real estate projects around the world.

The post Five key projects by architect and Dezeen Awards judge Francine Houben appeared first on Dezeen.

Interiors practice Sundholm Studio has refreshed the 30-year-old Nanas restaurant in Durham, North Carolina, with strong colours, bespoke timber joinery and metalwork.

Previously named Nana’s, the restaurant was renamed Nanas, in tribute to “not one nana, but rather the entire genre,” Sundholm Studio creative director Shaun Sundholm told Dezeen.

The space – intended to capture the hospitable “spirit of grandmothers” – comprises a bar, salon, dining room and an outdoor patio.

Sundholm’s aim was to update the space with “modern details that bring the outside in”.

The existing curved walls in the entryway were retained and reworked with wooden slats, which light passes through to evoke “a walk through the woods”.

Wooden window blinds and sheer drapes in the dining room help with acoustic absorption and adjusting the natural light levels.

The dimly lit entrance was contrasted with the bar, dining area and salon, where jewel-toned colours like emerald green, sapphire blue, and rich amber orange have been used.

“I aimed to pay homage to aspects of the previous design where possible, accentuating some of the interesting bits of the existing physical space, such as the curved wall at the entrance and the hints of orange throughout – recalling the bright, blaze orange walls of the past,” Sundholm explained.

In line with the jewel-toned colour palette, Sundholm selected a variety of textures to use across the restaurant, including glossy green handmade Italian tiles and brass finishes.

Blue velvet upholstery covers the banquettes in the bar, while “vintage luggage” orange leather covers the banquettes in the salon and dining area.

Brass archways designed by local metal art studio Andrew Preiss Designs feature across the restaurant, including as a portal between the salon and dining area. This arch motif is echoed in the bathroom mirrors.

Earth-toned grasscloth wallpaper and a plaid-patterned carpet contrast the solid colours and textures.

“For this restaurant, our initial mood boards culled from a diverse range – from The Golden Girls and vintage Ralph Lauren textiles to 1970s Cadillacs and abstract impressionist art inspired by the Smoky Mountains,” Sundholm said.

The studio’s goal was to “distill these inspirations into their core elements” and use them to inform the interiors in a “non-gimmicky” way.

A collection of mixed-media artworks by local artist Jason Craighead featured across the restaurant add to this aesthetic.

Other recently renovated restaurants featured on Dezeen include Aino and Alvar Aalto’s Savoy restaurant in Helsinki restored after 80 years and The Bird in Montauk designed by Home Studios.

The photography is by Lissa Gotwals and D L Anderson.

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There are 24 hours in a day, but almost half of those remains shrouded in mystery and, in some cases, fear. The darkness of the night makes us feel a little less secure because we can barely see anything, especially in areas away from bright city night lights. It’s an almost literally different world that’s just begging to be explored and enjoyed, provided we can see safely and adequately. Night vision cameras and equipment do shed some light on the subject, but they paint the world in dull shades of gray that make it impossible to actually enjoy the experience. That’s where the AKASO Seemor Night Vision Goggles come in, revealing the beauty and wonders of the night as if it were daytime, with some help from AI.

Designer: AKASO

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You need light to see things, and that’s true for both our eyes as well as the cameras that turn light information into the beautiful images and videos we enjoy. Of course, there isn’t much light at night, so cameras need to either add more lights or use a different kind of light. This is why most night vision cameras, including security cameras, only see the world in shades of black and white, because the light that they get is only enough to see the forms but doesn’t have sufficient color information.

Ultra-low Light Full-color Night Vision

Fortunately, we have come to a point where what can’t be fully accomplished in hardware can be enhanced by software, particularly with artificial intelligence. The AKASO Seemor Night Vision Goggles is, in fact, the first of its kind to harness the power of AI for this very purpose. Labeled as “AI-ISP,” the technology integrates advanced AI algorithms with the binoculars’ Image Signal Processing (ISP) to enhance image and video quality. The result is a breathtaking view of the night in true full color, with rich hues and 99% color reproduction that blows any night vision camera out of the water. It accomplishes this without requiring more lights that would have disturbed the serenity of the night world and chased nocturnal creatures away.

Of course, AI can only use what it’s given, and the AKASO Seemor, fortunately, has solid foundations, starting with a large 1/1.79″ CMOS sensor that can “see” even with weak light. The more light it can gather, the more data the AI-ISP has to work with in order to create that magical experience of seeing the night in color. The visual range of the Seemor goggles is also mind-blowing, allowing you to spot human or animal movement 1,640 ft (500m) away or identify the outline of buildings that are 3,280 ft (1km) in the distance. All these stunning scenes can be recorded in high-resolution 4K, both for photos and videos, ensuring that those enchanting nighttime memories will be preserved in as high a quality as you saw them with your eyes.

The AKASO Seemor Night Vision Goggles isn’t just powerful, it is also simple and convenient to use. Built-in 2.4GHz Wi-Fi lets you connect to your smartphone both for remote monitoring of what the goggles see as well as fast transfer of photos and videos. Two 3,200 mAh batteries give you up to 8 hours of uninterrupted enjoyment, and two 1/4 nut ports at the top and bottom of the Seemor let you easily mount the device on tripods or even helmets. Whether you’re trying to observe the mysterious creatures of the night, chasing down urban legends, or simply trying to discover beauty in the darkness, the AI-powered AKASO Seemor True Full-Color Night Vision Goggles opens your eyes to a whole new world you could never see before.

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The post True full-color night vision goggles turns night into day with AI first appeared on Yanko Design.