Médiathèque Robert Calméjane

The site for the new library in Villemomble is that of a defunct minor château of which, today, only the estate gardens remain in the form of a public park. The two main elements of the programme, four multi-purpose rooms for private hire and one multifunctional library, are separated from one another in order to reduce noise nuisance. This programmatic schism creates an architecture that appears volumetrically fragmented from the garden but is more unified from the street side. Schizofrenic, its urban face is an opaque linear screen composed of alternating panels of polished concrete and glass, evocative of stacked industrial containers. In contrast, its park face is completely transparent thanks to the open volumes of the reading rooms. The overall silhouette of the building is reminiscent of French mansions with their vast slate roofs. The presence of the new building in the park fills a historical emptiness and awakens the submerged memory of the bygone château.