Les Olympiades
Architect: Michel Holley (1968-1975)
Location: Paris, France (13th Arrdt)
Browsing Arch Daily today, i noticed an article on Les Olympiades, which is a housing complex in the heart of the 13th Arrondissement in Paris. So I decided to repost a photo that I took there a couple of years ago.
There was apparently an exhibit on this district at the Pavilion de l'Arsenal in February and March of this year. I was in Paris at the time, but didn't know about it or I definitely would have gone.
At one time, Les Olympiades were seen as the realisation of a modern utopia. "Better living through architecture" and all that. Architects as social engineers, I guess. It didn't quite work out that way.
My wife lived in one of these apartment towers as a kid, and I went to college in another, the first year after arriving in Paris back in the mid-90s. It's now in the heart of what has become one of the city's two main "Chinatowns" (the other being Belleville). So the pagoda rooflines are particularly apt and prescient, I suppose.
Anyway, despite its failure as a social experiment and a vision of modern utopia, I still think it's a pretty interesting place, and has a certain beauty.
Les Olympiades
Architect: Michel Holley (1968-1975)
Location: Paris, France (13th Arrdt)
Browsing Arch Daily today, i noticed an article on Les Olympiades, which is a housing complex in the heart of the 13th Arrondissement in Paris. So I decided to repost a photo that I took there a couple of years ago.
There was apparently an exhibit on this district at the Pavilion de l'Arsenal in February and March of this year. I was in Paris at the time, but didn't know about it or I definitely would have gone.
At one time, Les Olympiades were seen as the realisation of a modern utopia. "Better living through architecture" and all that. Architects as social engineers, I guess. It didn't quite work out that way.
My wife lived in one of these apartment towers as a kid, and I went to college in another, the first year after arriving in Paris back in the mid-90s. It's now in the heart of what has become one of the city's two main "Chinatowns" (the other being Belleville). So the pagoda rooflines are particularly apt and prescient, I suppose.
Anyway, despite its failure as a social experiment and a vision of modern utopia, I still think it's a pretty interesting place, and has a certain beauty.