City ground, city grounds
Bâle © Christian Gilot / LAST
Christian Gilot, architect in Brussels and professor at UCLouvain, was the guest of Prof. Emmanuel Rey’s studio at the Laboratory of Architecture and Sustainable Technologies (LAST) to present his research focus on the links between architecture and the city. Entitled “Le sol de la ville, les sols de la ville : Poétique d’une multiplication”, his lecture allowed the students to understand the richness and complexity of the evolving relationship that cities have with their grounds.
A graduate of the universities of Louvain and Harvard, Christian Gilot teaches at the UCLouvain and has been invited professor at EPFL for numerous years. He is also involved in the practice within the office Blondiau Gilot Architects in Brussels.
Showing both analytical and creative reflections on the issue of urban soil, the conference first focused on the history of ground construction within cities, illustrated by the evolution of the urban space of Paris, Geneva, Lausanne, or Basel. The explanation of the concepts of embankment, retaining wall, backfilling, and cavity allowed the students to understand certain topographic issues related to urbanization, soil artificialization, and the interlocking of different construction scales.
Returning to these themes, he then focused on emblematic approaches in terms of the interpretation of the territory and the relationship with the ground in the project process, using three examples: Luigi Snozzi's Casa Kalman in Monte Carasso, Herzog & de Meuron's Hebelstrasse residential building in Basel, and Esch Sintzel Architekten's Maiengasse apartment building, also in Basel. The skillful soil management illustrated in these examples showed the students the interest of a careful reading of our built environment, or in Christian Gilot's words: the imperative need “to learn to see”.
Resonating with the issues addressed in the studio RELIEFS URBAINS, the conference allowed to put into perspective the didactic approach, from the urban project to the construction detail as a relevant process for the transformation of urban territories in transition.