2023-11-24 11:41:30
The Equerre d’Argent 2023* trophy in the “Places of activity” category rewards the project “Therapeutic workshops for an establishment specializing in addiction in Meulan-en-Yvelines (Yvelines)” from the L’élan Retrouvé Foundation signed by Tolila + Gilliland Atelier d’Architecture.
On the banks of the Seine in Meulan, these therapeutic workshops were commissioned by the Élan Retrouvé Foundation. They complement the Gilbert Raby Center, a private health establishment of collective interest (ESPIC), participating in the public hospital service and specializing in addiction. The center is located in the grounds of an old property. The sloping plot is bordered by an old stone wall to the north and the Seine to the south. All of the center’s facilities are located at the top of the plot, once morest the street which borders it.
Implementation and organization of workshops
The new building is located at the end of the plot on the east side, in place of a parking lot surrounded by trees. It is inserted into the slope of the land and operates around two entirely independent levels in order to eliminate the need for an elevator. In the center of the building, an unheated volume serves as a bioclimatic interior street and ensures the distribution of the rooms. The workshops are modular spaces which can accommodate a maximum of different activities (writing, theater, manual work, etc.).
Distribution you program
On the ground floor (top) the therapeutic workshops and the laundry are intended for patients housed on the site and accessible from the north. From the south, on the garden level (lower), the day hospital welcomes patients in the care suite on a daily basis. Use of the pharmacy, also on the garden level, is reserved for hospital staff. The technical spaces are positioned to the north or in contact with the ground: they act as buffer spaces in winter to limit losses.
Bioclimatic design
The interior street is widely lit via an overhead glass strip. It is temperate in winter and protected by removable blinds to ensure summer comfort. Openings in the upper and lower part allow passive ventilation of the central space and evacuation of hot air stored by the glass surfaces in summer (nighttime freecooling). The workshops, largely glazed to the outside, have openings in the upper part on the side of the internal street in order to take advantage of the ventilation flow. The entirely glazed south entrance is equipped with metal clerestory grilles oriented at 45°. These sunshades provide protection in summer while allowing the winter sun, which has a greater angle of incidence, to pass through.
The jury’s assessment: “A fair, sensitive and simple response to a complicated program. The opposite of a machine building, it is a therapeutic architecture that inspires comfort and exudes sincerity. Doctors and patients want to come there and stay together. Equipment that spreads generosity. »
Construction economics
The compact volume and rational distribution of the program make it possible to limit the number of architectural elements and thereby the consumption of materials while remaining within the budget. On the garden level, the semi-buried part of the building led to the choice of a reinforced concrete structure less sensitive to water than wood. After the slab was completed, the work continued on a dry site.
Organic and geosourced materials
The wooden frame structure and joinery were prefabricated in the workshop. The facade is clad in triangular larch shingles. The partitions are made of mud bricks on the interior street side and earthen plastered inside the rooms. The raw earth bricks, from the Cycle Terre factory, were chosen in particular for their thermal inertia which provides warmth in winter and coolness in summer.
Thermal performance
The building is compact in shape in order to group spaces, limit the length of the facade and thus energy losses. Prefabricated wooden panels insulated with wood wool ensure thermal performance: insulation in winter and thermal phase shift in summer.
Well-being and natural materials
In addition to the environmental aspect of eco-materials, it seemed logical to the architects to use them for this program with a medico-social vocation. It is proven that the well-being of building occupants is increased when they are in contact with natural materials.
*The Équerre d’argent is a prize awarded each year since 1983 by a jury made up of architects, architectural critics and developers, set up by the magazine Le Moniteur des Travaux Publics et du Batiment as well as the AMC title The Architecture Monitor. It is a prize which rewards a team made up of the client and the project manager (architect and engineer) who contributed to the construction of a building on French soil (building completed within the year).
Source: L’élan Recovered
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