The practice’s mixed-use design for the Jean Moulin site includes new public realm connecting the La Défense’s financial district to nearby Puteaux along the Patrick-Devedjian Ring Road, as well two new buildings.
A 15-storey tower will provide residences for students and young professionals, while a six to eight-storey building will house flexible office space with a stepped roof terrace. Both buildings will be modular timber-framed structures.
Facilities for leisure, sports and entertainment feature in the proposal along with a climbing centre, yoga hub and a 1,400m2 food court and indoor market on two levels.
A green promenade runs through the linear site with pedestrian links, cycle lanes and access to public transport.
RSPH says it has considered both embodied and operational carbon in its proposals, with both new buildings designed to be adapted for reuse.
The practice, founded by the late British architect Richard Rogers, teamed up with local practice AREP and Swiss landscape architects VOGT, among others, for its entry to the contest for the Empreintes project.
It will eventually see five locations surrounding La Défense overhauled with new public realm and ‘low-carbon’ structures.
RSHP partner Stephen Barrett said: ‘The project represents a significant challenge, occupying as it does an interstitial site currently dominated by large-scale infrastructure and marked by radical changes of level that are presently almost impossible to navigate.
Source:RSHP
RSHP’s proposals for the Jean Moulin area
‘The fact that it is possible to transform such difficult environments into places where future generations can live and work well, delivering an inclusive, exemplary mixed-use low carbon development in the process, is precisely why we consider this project so important.’
Georges Siffredi, president of the Département des Hauts-de-Seine and of Paris La Défense, said: ‘The winning team for the Empreintes project shares our vision of a new urbanism imagined for the future of La Défense.
‘Sustainability, mixed-use and reversibility have been placed at the core of the proposal. The Jean Moulin redevelopment will allow the renewal of this neighbourhood and the creation of new urban links between the business district and Puteaux city centre.’
RSHP was founded in the 1970s as the Richard Rogers Partnership. After becoming Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners in 2007 it changed to its current moniker, RSHP, last year.
Rogers died in December 2021, aged 88. His breakthrough into international stardom, and one of the buildings he is most remembered for, was the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris. RSHP has had a base in Paris since early 2021,
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