Wellbeing Centre

  • Vichy, France
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This project for a new bath-therapy centre at Vichy, a turn-of-the-century spa town with a fusty image, aims at creating an architectural and urban event capable of giving the town an air of modernity. The site is cut by a wide boulevard, providing the opportunity to create a tangible and visible connection between the gardens linked to the water springs on the city side and the Parc de l’Allier.

 

The proposed building oversteps the boulevard and creates a frame/reverse-angle shot of the city looking towards the park and vice versa. On the boulevard-side façades, a large vault creates a strong city-gate symbol. The centre is made up of two parallel blocks – one for therapy, the other for accommodation – linked by a roof-bridge on which are two swimming pools.

 

The building’s handwriting tends to assimilate the refined and monumental character of spa-town architecture by the use of glass in different forms: in blocks on public floor areas, and set against copperleaf backgrounds in the huge hall, in clear bays with fine lacquered steel and aluminum fittings.

 

 

 

Olivier Boissière in Jean NouvelJean NouvelEmmanuel Cattani and Associates, Éditions Artemis Verlag, Zurich, 1992