Architectural excursion of Creative Factory
Creative Factory © EPFL / LAST
Professor Emmanuel Rey's studio of the Laboratory of Architecture and Sustainable Technologies (LAST) went on an architectural excursion to visit the Creative Factory building in Renens. This extra-mural teaching activity gave the students the opportunity to explore the adaptive reuse of a former logistics center into a multifunctional building, with particular attention paid to housing typologies. The visit closely resonates with the issues addressed within the framework of the Reliefs urbains design studio.
The architectural project plays a central role in the search for qualitative alternatives to regenerate urban territories. Through an approach at different scales, the LAST studio aims to analyze, explore, and experiment with these issues from the perspective of urban transitions.
The excursion to Creative Factory, designed by the firm Bauart, was conceived in this spirit. Located in the rapidly evolving Ouest lausannois, the architectural approach of this project embraces a combined approach: urban revitalization, reduced embodied energy consumption, and the minimization of environmental impacts. Reorganized around a newly created internal street, the building accommodates lofts for both living and working, as well as workshops dedicated to education, creative practices, and light manufacturing.
The tour enabled students to explore various design challenges related to adaptive reuse, while also placing into perspective the questions of contextual integration, conceptual coherence, spatiality, landscape and typology in relation with broader challenges associated with urban territories in transition