At the intersection of Route de Meyrin and Rue Hoffmann, the project involves a 1950s corner building whose arched geometry already establishes a strong relationship with the site. The challenge is to extend this logic while carrying out a profound transformation of the site.
The construction of a residential penthouse creates nine dwellings and affirms a continuous horizontality that frames the panorama and complements the building's shape. Its concave ends establish a dialogue with the convex curvature of the existing structure, ensuring formal continuity.
The typological distribution of the penthouse is based on a simple principle: the living spaces open onto the urban space, while the bedrooms open onto the trees. Its steel and wood structure aligns with the load-bearing elements and extends the shafts, ensuring structural lightness. The project approach is based on a careful reading of the existing structure – grid, materiality, plan – considered not as a fixed model but as an active resource.
Of heritage interest, the existing residential building requires targeted interventions that preserve the built substance: the reinforcement of the four distribution stairwells improves stability in the face of wind and earthquakes; replacing the joinery and interior insulation provides better thermal comfort and creates a new perception of the interior spaces; restoring the historic colours of the façade connects the building to a wider urban context than its own: that of the city.
Behind this long building, the demolition of the car park frees up the space needed for a six-storey building with ten corner flats, all with dual aspect. Inspired by the existing structure while asserting its autonomy, its shape is derived from the morphology of the site and its relationship with Avenue de la Forêt, which is set to become a tree-lined path for soft mobility.
A single-storey base, whose use is still to be decided, connects the two residential buildings. Its black ceramic and largely glazed façade, reinforced by an uninterrupted canopy, reinforces the codes of the block.
The various interventions now form a new coherent and continuous urban ensemble, giving the strange feeling that these interventions have always existed.
