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Trousseau hospital
The Trousseau hospital, located in the 12th arrondissement of Paris, started a year and a half ago an overhaul of safety standards for its smoke extraction outlets. But that was not all…
The building also needed emergency staircases. Jean Bocabeille, the architect from BP Architecture, the practice in charge of the project, explains that as far as the patients were concerned "the building needed to be given a cure".
In total, three identical stairways were created on three facades in a way that supports this building where sick children receive specialist treatment. The three transplants represent contemporary assault towers where the world of the Middle Ages meets a universe of science fiction : " it was important to release a world that is reminiscent of children's stories, marvellous, strange and even troubling at the same time", explains Jean Bocabeille. One of the objectives of these unusual creations is to surprise and find some coherence in a "muddled" context.
Simple elements in a transparent envelope
If the aesthetics of this project appear sophisticated, the elements, are in themselves simple: the staircases are metal, the steps and the landings are metal grating, the upright and horizontal railings are in galvanized steel sheet. As for the walls of the stairwells, they are clad right up to the top in expanded metal panels of non anodized unwrought aluminium. "The triangular panels fit together in three points, depending on the depth which varies from 3 to 30 cm and with extremely controlled random coding", the agency emphasizes. Finally, this construction allows the elements to change depending on the weather and to change from a silvery shade to a golden one, from being opaque to transparent. Just like in a dream…
(Source: Bâtiactu - 11/12/2009)
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