Jeanne-Hachette housing project. Architect: Jean Renaudie.

Designed 1970, completed 1975.

Ivry-sur-Seine, Paris.

The drawing shows one of the upper floors of the Jeanne-Hachette building, 50 meter above ground level. Each dwelling is different, each is on two levels. Each has at least one, and usually several planted terraces. The black triangles indicate the location of voids overlooking the floor below. In addition to housing, the building includes offices, shops, municipal services, an art gallery, a cafe, restaurants, a metro station and much else. It is a miniature city in itself that can be infiltrated and climbed over. It is in effect a kind of Mont Saint-Michel for the people built in the wake of May 1968. Thirty years later, though the area has declined economically and socially, the apartments continue to be highly valued by their inhabitants.

Geometry at Flikr