BOULEVARD MORLAND

First, because of its imposing size, more than 40,000 m2 on the banks of the Seine, because of its volume, which marks the entrance to the capital's hypercenter, and because of its architecture, designed by Albert Laprade in the early 1960s, which responds formally and symbolically with a certain austerity to the administrative function of the premises. On the former Ile Louviers, it is a building that stands out in the urban landscape, a landmark on the horizon of a relatively low-lying district between the Bastille and Jussieu, between Bercy and Notre-Dame.

To go beyond an elementary approach that would only be interested in a form of customization, of artificial adaptability of architecture as an answer today to tomorrow's needs, we propose to engage a real innovative project, to find and reinvent an urbanity through a demonstrative and open approach, to open up the field of possibilities by looking at the building and its inclusion in the territory for what it is, with its qualities and shortcomings, without pathos or nostalgia, as a megastructure to be invested in, abundant and plural, a capable and intelligent infrastructure, the promise of a renewed rendezvous between the metropolis and its river.

Through the attractiveness of the programs and in particular the development of a commercial offer, our objective is to widen the Marais-Bastille route with a very attractive polarity. The routes are essential, it is a question of creating crossings, of offering paths that divide the block between the quays of the Seine and the Boulevard Morland, between the Rue Schömberg and the Rue Agrippa d'Aubigné, and of looking further afield for soft connections to the Pont de Sully and the Boulevard Henri IV, or the Bassin de l'Arsenal and the Boulevard Bourdon on the other side; an interesting track is also to find a better pedestrian link with the banks and a reopening of the building towards the river. On another scale, that of the bicycle, it is also a new stage between the Docks, city of fashion and design, the Arab World Institute, the European House of Photography.

By relying on the strength of the building, the genius of the site, and with a great deal of freedom to write, we wish to take an innovative approach, to build, with all the actors involved, a project that is both prolific and coherent, economically rational but above all an "extraordinary" place, a place of invention outside the paths of uniformity or banality, an attractive place for encounters, open to the inhabitants and firmly rooted in the district, whose influence extends beyond the metropolitan scale.