In collaboration with Atelier WOA.

The Commune Tower is an ambitious project that entails building a 50-meter wooden high-rise in Paris. Our project implements the subtle articulation of urban issues specific to the neighborhood, architectural issues specific to the program and technical issues linked to building with wood. The Commune Tower is thus a manifesto of a new era where wood construction and metropolitan issues finally meet up.

The potential of wood in the articulation of architecture and structure is expressed in multiple ways, from the building entrance to the rooftop garden: on the façade, wood lies beneath an aluminum shell, visible beneath the thickness of the walls, where it is best protected. As one nears the building and looks up, the wood is visible from below. Wood is also present inside the building: the student housing units boast the development of a “mirador alcove” in maritime pine that looks out over the city.

Halfway up, just above the historic Parisian height limit of 25m, the tower is recessed to generate various collective spaces with different degrees of intimacy: the collective dimension of the program is thus also expressed in the façade. Communal spaces extend outside via balconies and suspended terraces, designed as tiered green spaces of biodiversity. The rooftop terrace is a large belvedere with vegetable patches and trees.

Finally, the project creates the conditions of reversibility or maximal mutability of the building. The post and beam structure used on the façade creates the most ample free space between the structure and concrete core.