Refurbishment of the Musée des Arts et Traditions Populaires in Paris to preserve cultural heritage
This project refurbishes the remaining structural skeleton of the Parisian Musée des Arts et Traditions Populaires (1972), to transform it into a multifunctional cultural center. The new architecture connects with the historical heritage of the surrounding park and of the previous museum, while synergically interacting with contemporary transformations of the place. The building becomes a symbolic "lighthouse", to shape a new landscape and strengthen the sense of belonging for the neighborhood.
National
France
Paris
Mainly urban
It refers to a physical transformation of the built environment (hard investment)
All that remains of the Parisian Musée des Arts et Traditions Populaires – ATP (1972, closed in 2005), one of the most popular masterpieces of J. Dubuisson, is its structural skeleton. Located at the edges of the park “Jardin d’Acclimation” (1860), this relic stands almost unnoticed next to the Louis Vuitton Foundation (2014), a glass architecture by F. Gehry, inspired by the sails of ships.
My refurbishment project reconverts the structure into a polyvalent cultural centre with a high-performance envelope, that responds dynamically to the surrounding environment.
Architectural, technological, esthetical and structural choices are connected in a systemic way with the historical and natural values of the place, to enhance the memory of the building and its interaction with the neighbourhood. The project respect Paris Energy Plan for 2050 and promotes methodologies to adapt the built heritage to climate change, reducing urban heat island and enhancing human thermal comfort.
Starting from archive research, the proposition is supported by engineering and regulatory insights, such as the study of building elements and the comparison between the historical and future loads, to draw up a structural, technological and functional adaptation. Particular attention was accorded to the fruition for all people and to the improvement of bioclimatic behaviour, to face sustainability challenges.
The creative use of innovative technologies characterizes the building from an architectural, energetic and communicative point of view. The refurbishment concludes unfinished narratives becoming a metaphorical lighthouse, recalling the one of Fort St. Jean (Marseille), alongside which the original collection of Musée des ATP has been transferred. Therefore, the intervention regenerates the spirit of the place, fostering local identity and sense of belonging for the whole area and responding to urban heat island reduction and human thermal comfort improvement.
Refurbishment of historical heritage
Human thermal comfort
Climate change adaptation
Technological innovation
Bioclimatic architecture
This refurbishment embraces the original vision of the nearby Jardin d'Acclimatation, aimed to adapt plants and animals to the Parisian climate, through the conception of a bioclimatic dynamic building, blended with its natural surrounding and able to respond to environmental changes. Sustainable architectural strategies, considering energetic and human comfort issues, includes the use of natural resources, the mitigation of extreme meteorological occurrences and the improvement of energy efficiency. Energy-saving is achieved by minimizing lighting, heating, and cooling loads, thanks to façades solutions adapted to their orientation. In the tower's longitudinal façades, turned to east and west, internal shading allows the entry of thermal energy in winter. During summer, electrochromatic glazing darkens the glasses to avoid glare, mitigate interior light and minimise cooling consumptions. To ensure sun shielding, windows open by adopting parallel hinges. The south façade, exposed to high solar radiation, has a double skin with internal motorised slats. In summer, natural upward ventilation is allowed, while in winter the slats close to store heat. On the north façade, exposed to cold winds, triple glazing reduces heat loss. To illuminate the exhibition spaces with natural light, skylights from Dubuisson's original project, changed in their morphology, have been introduced in the roof. For those far from the tower, unaffected by shading, the opaque slope is turned to south and covered with photovoltaic panels.
The conservation of the existing structure enhances circularity and re-using. Furthermore, to accomplish bioclimatic regulation, the project employs geothermal energy through radiant floors, rainwater collection and a solar thermal system to heat sanitary water, while high-albedo materials, vegetation and water mirrors reduce urban heat island and safeguard population from heatwaves. These solutions make the project exemplary in sustainability.
The project enhances the aesthetic value of sustainable technologies through the composition of an architectural narrative that reconciles the geometric rationality of the remaining structure of the Musée des ATP with the morphological complexity of the Fondation Louis Vuitton, which represents a glass vessel landed in the park of the Jardin d'Acclimatation. Drawing inspiration from iconographical research on naval scenes, exemplified by Hogenberg's 1572 etching of the port of Genoa, the metaphor was completed by reinterpreting the Musée des ATP as the harbour pier with the lighthouse tower towards which the Gehry's “glass vessel” is heading. In this sense, the archetypal function of the lighthouse, namely light signalling, is reinterpreted in a contemporary key, thanks to electrochromatic glasses. This technology, which minimises cooling consumption, transmutes the facades in an artistic orientation point in the evening, using the building's lighting to compose dynamic luminous graphics, signalling the museum's position and its creative vocation. Other technological elements that responds to functionality and sustainability assume aesthetic relevance and enhance the quality of experience for people: the walls of the exhibition platform recall, in a translucent way, the vertical texture of the original opaque envelope through channel glass, allowing diffuse natural lighting for interior spaces; the garden roof, on the exhibition platform, improves the landscape view from the top of the tower, reconciling its image with the surrounding garden; the water basin, which is part of the solutions to reduce summer overheating, becomes an element of conceptual connection with the Fondation Louis Vuitton and its aquatic area, contributing to the metaphoric lecture of the vessel and the lighthouse; finally, the diagonal bracings of the original steel structure, entirely preserved, remain visible from the glass facades of the tower, like a design artefact in a display case.
The project is inclusive at different levels.
It’s inclusive towards the population since it’s a multifunctional building with a cultural vocation. In fact, it offers a diversified pool of activities at all hours of the day, with a museum, a theatre, a library, a reading space, artisans' housing and studios that can be visited, exhibition spaces for the artistic productions, a restaurant and a belvedere on the park and the city.
An articulated system of ramps, that connects the street level to the raised entrance and to underground exits, solves the problems of accessibility, allowing the building to be inclusive of all categories of users. In addition, the museum is directly connected through its main transversal path to the Jardin d'Acclimatation, allowing visitors to enjoy the beauty of the garden and to take open-air walks, alongside those in the building. Encouraging people to walk in a natural landscape, easily accessible by the city through public transportation, in alternative to drive elsewhere by car, accounts for improving healthy physical activity and for pollution reduction.
The concept of inclusion has also been applied to the relationship between the architecture and its context. The architectural interpretation of the building as a lighthouse picks up on the metaphorical vision of the Fondation Louis Vuitton, creating a single scenario that integrates and highlights both architectures. Finally, the project is historically inclusive, as it uses innovative technologies in a respectful manner of Jean Dubuisson's original design: for instance, the construction of skylights on the roof of the exhibition platform recalls those in the architect’s drawings, the electrochromatic glasses respect and enhance the modularity of the original façades, the preserved structural bracings are shown behind the glass façades of the tower, and the vertical texture of the platform's opaque envelope is reinterpreted in a translucent way through the use of channel glass.
This project for the refurbishment of the former “Musée National des Arts et Traditions Populaires” (ATP) in Paris was stimulated by the multidisciplinary debate involving, since its closure in 2005, intellectuals, architects and the population of Paris on the necessity to regain a prominent place in the programmatic and cultural context of France for this prestigious building by Jean Dubuisson. In particular, its relevance was the object of the conference of 10 March 2016, at the “Institut national d'histoire de l'art” in Paris, attended by specialists in 20th-century architectural heritage, French and foreign architects, and representatives of the city and of the State. The present project is therefore part of this debate to preserve the cultural heritage of that architecture. It has been implemented by a collection of historical and contemporary photos, documenting its state of use and abandonment, and original drawings, dating from 1953 to 1972, which have been digitally cleaned to make them more readable. In 2017, the Paris City Council approved the decision to entrust the abandoned ATP Museum, owned by the City of Paris, to the LVMH group, who decided to renovate it under the guidance of the architect Frank Gehry. It was scheduled to open in 2020, but so far only the deconstruction of non-structural parts has been achieved. Starting from the remaining structural skeleton, the proposed project aims to enhance the original structure and spaces, by restoring the cultural vocation of the ancient museum and providing a new architectural concept for the community, which aims to resolve this historical debate.
The project concept involved the collaboration of several institutions in Italy and France. First, the universities Politecnico di Milano and École des Ponts ParisTech, within which the methodology and design were developed. The technical survey of the existing structure and the structural engineering verification were possible thanks to T/E/S/S Atelier d'Ingénierie in Paris. The research of Jean Dubuisson's original plans was made through the collaboration of the Centre d'archives d'architecture contemporaine, created by the Institut français d'architecture in Paris. The assessment of the urban layout of the project, aimed at linking original elements of the Jardin d'Acclimatation with the architecture of the nearby Foundation Louis Vuitton, and its impact at the level of urban thermal comfort are models that are being explored during my PhD, with the contribution of the agency of sustainable design and engineering Franck Boutté Consultants in Paris, awarded by the Grand Prix de l'Urbanisme 2022. The design process carried out demonstrates how innovation and cooperation in all fields is needed to bring together different skills and approaches to achieve solutions that can face the complexity of contemporary local and global challenges.
The project involve the following disciplines: architecture, structural and building engineering, ergonomics and accessibility, art, lighting engineering, energetic consumptions, materials technology, thermal comfort, biodiversity and botany. To develop the project, I collected and synthetise the necessary information in these fields, by involving the advice of experts. The final concept allows to all this different knowledge to interact and influence each other. Starting with the engineering constraint of preserving the original iron structure, the architecture defined the configuration of spaces to host cultural and exhibition activities, without overloading the existing elements. The study of the modalities of artistic production has made it possible to present art ateliers visible to the public to see the artists at work. Physics and lighting engineering allowed to implement energy efficiency in the facades, allowing the best conditions of comfort, in relation to the different use of the spaces. In the parts not affected by the tower's shading, photovoltaic panels increase the sustainability of the building through renewable energy. In this direction, the electrochromic glass technology makes it possible to modulate the incoming light inside according to changing conditions of natural light outside. During the night, the façade’s modular lightening becomes an artistic element of attraction for the neighbourhood. A complex system of ramps guarantees the building's accessibility, making it affordable to all categories of users. A pedestrian passage through the building directly connects with the park, encouraging outdoor walks and contact with nature. Botany and biodiversity are involved in green roofs and in the park. The original concept was therefore continuously checked and modified to acquire and integrate the solutions provided by the various disciplines.
The innovative character of the project is the result of a comprehensive approach, where the functional and technological adaptation of an existing structure responds, at the same time, to the needs of sustainability, aesthetics, inclusion and historical recall. One of the most innovative elements are the electrochromatic glasses, not only because they constitute a cutting-edge technology, but also for the creative use proposed in the project. In fact, despite these special glasses are designed exclusively for energy efficiency and light regulation during summer days, the project proposes to adapt their performances for artistic and communication purposes, allowing the composition of luminous graphics that enhance the modularity of the historical façade. More generally, the different technological and architectural solutions implemented in the different parts of the building (structural conservation, double skin, channel glass, skylights, green roof, water basin, ramps and paths, differentiation of façade technologies according to sun exposure, geothermal energy, natural ventilation, solar thermal and photovoltaic panels) brings together functionality, environmental sustainability, historical references, aesthetics and inclusion.
Some of the above-mentioned technological adaptations also participate to enhance the security of the visitors and of the artistic patrimony of the museum as well. For instance, the skylights of the exposition platform have sensors to automatically close when rain impacts on the glasses and open when smoke is detected in the spaces below, while the slats in the double skin of the tower are in fire-resistant materials and closes automatically to prevent fire propagation in the air cavity. The building's metabolism is synchronized with that of the park, reacting to the changing of seasons and to the times of the day, generating a dynamic architecture which evolves continuously thanks to its smart technological apparatus.
This project adapts an architectural heritage to today's climatic, territorial, cultural and functional context by a multidisciplinary approach. Conceiving a building capable to benefit from the local environment and to respond to extreme climatic occurrences is also a key issue for new constructions. The urban environment acts on the buildings with wind, solar radiation, noise and pollutants. On the other hand, architectures intervene on the outdoor spaces by producing shade, altering natural ventilation, accumulating and releasing energy, varying the vegetation areas and intercepting/rejecting noise and pollutants. As the objective of the project was to refurbish an existing structure, the available actions were constrained in morphology and positioning. To decipher the possibilities of urban design to alter microclimatic parameters (such as windspeed, air temperature, surface temperature, relative humidity and mean radiant temperature) and to find the right approaches to conceive more sustainable neighbourhoods (counteracting urban heat island and enhancing human thermal comfort), I am undertaking a PhD in Paris. The aim of my studies is to develop a systemic methodology for optimisation of built and vegetal forms through generative design, to reduce energy consumptions and outdoor thermal discomfort, improving the resilience of public spaces against summer overheating. The concept of architectural metabolism, where the building reacts to adapt to climatic variations, will be transposed from this project to new constructions, to establish, in the early stages of the design process, the morphological conditions to improve sustainability and thermal satisfaction.
The objective is to create a unique methodology, that can be adapted and replicated to all places, for the creation of “unique” architectural solutions, that rises from the microclimatic and environmental specificities of the area of intervention and that cannot be transplanted elsewhere.
The project responds to the global issues of climate change adaptation while preserving and enhancing the local historical and natural heritage. In France, the summer of 2022 has been among the hottest ever and extreme heat phenomena will increase in future. It is therefore necessary to build sustainable urban landscapes, applying solutions aimed at energy sobriety, urban heat islands’ reduction, thermal comfort improvement and people's health protection. The façade technologies and the building's systems adapt dynamically to the different seasons and daily phases, to take advantage of the climatic context of the place, reducing energy demand and providing comfortable spaces for the population. Electrochromic façades, photovoltaic panels, thermal solar, heat pumps, green roofs and natural ventilation are used in this regard. Grey, green, blue and soft solutions are used to decrease urban heat islands. Light materials and cladding lower the accumulation of solar radiation compared to corresponding dark ones. These elements, together with the water pool and vegetation, reduces air temperatures. In addition, trees affect air quality and biodiversity and are important shading elements that increase the thermal comfort of people. Finally, the museum's management model, which combines the indoor tour with the natural outdoor one in the park, encourages physical activity, allowing people to enjoy a large part of the day and discouraging the use of the car to seek other activities elsewhere. In addition, charging stations for electric cars and dedicated spaces for bicycles are provided for sustainable mobility. The project aims to present itself as an exemplary approach of reconverting an existing building heritage, respecting its historical and cultural value, while adapting to and taking advantage of the climatic characteristics of its location through a careful use of innovative technologies, in order to respond to current issues of environmental sustainability.
