Renée Gailhoustet - Framing Views and Orientation Vol.2
Few times is the name of a worshipped architect a female one. Isn't it well known, already, that the face of an architect in people's minds is stereotyped as a tall, slim, smartly-dressed man with distinctive, 'signature- glasses', with a set-square in his hands, while tending to slip a pencil from behind his ear?
Now, allow me to tear the above image apart with the face of Renée Gailhoustet.
"Each habitant can use the town as he wishes"
Receiving her education at École des Beaux-Arts, she studied under Marcel Lods of the Modern Movement, an architect who endured both World Wars, therefore a particularity of his would, understandably, be the use of prefabrication methods in the construction of buildings. Under the wing of Roland Dubrulle she participated in the renovation of the Ivy-sur-Seine and later many of her works include residential towers such as Raspail and Lenine, the Jeanne-Hachette complex, the Casanova Towers with her partner Jean Renaudie and, last but not least, the neighborhood of Maladrerie in Aubervilliers.
Gailhoustet's approach at collective housing with a balance of brutality and unconventional design, carrying with her the brief, while nurishing the users' lifestyle within her design decisions. The important thing is that she is not just using a formula of a movement, but she is applying the site characteristics on point to the houses.
Having just completed my second year of studies, I have experienced the first realisations of what urban planning involves. Popping questions like 'Do I want to treat this as a batch of identical pieces, or provide special considerations on each different housing unit', or 'Are all apartments going to appeal the same or will some lack in quality of living from the rest', make you think the direction of the design throughout the design process.
What Renée Gailhoustet has achieved through her contribution in collective housing is engaging with the terms 'home'. She respects the variety and disagrees with the relationship of residential towers and direct replication, a thing which in a society with relatively high growing population digits is considered a luxury...
Personally this lies in the same net of concerns as regionalism. While defying the classic mould of architectural forms (without that meaning I encourage any kind of odd design that breaks the convention), this architect is adding to the local identity and diversity of the locations she is building in.
Not following the vertical lines of her designs' floors allowed her to add gardening spaces in all floors which directly related and reinforced her material decisions by going brutal in her tours d'habitation. Layering and altering details of walls is something to admire from Gailhoustet's designs as she proves that it doesn't take a lot of effort to give a building more individuality.
While designing an urban complex the most important holistic consideration would probably be the street view and pedestrian engagement from street level. How Gailhoustet is providing shelter via overshadowing the entrance with entrances and exits is key to encasing the housing block within the urban skin. A similar feeling yet very different design concept is found in Vienna in Hundertwasser's 'Hundertwaserhaus' where he connects his intricacies to the conventions of the buildings next to his self-paid-for construction.
