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Architects: Barre Bouchetard Architecture | B2A
- Area: 180 m²
- Year: 2023
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Photographs:Maxime Verret
Text description provided by the architects. The project focuses on the extension of a mid-century house, on the edge of the Mouzaïa neighborhood in Paris. This construction is typical of the row houses on Beauregard Hill and leans against the slope, the first floor being raised above the garage and the entrance hall. Living areas overlook the street and turn away from the garden below.
The operation meets this primary desire of finding a direct link to the outside space and a second wish for a small and more intimate living room, an extra room inherited from family memories. The neighborhood, preserved by its singularity and the presence of an old quarry underground, implies a certain modesty in the intervention.
These multiple conditions fabricated the project, making the most of some given opportunities. The extension thereby lines up to the other constructions and opens the kitchen towards the backyard through large stairs giving access to the terrace below.
An overhang onto the garden, allowed by an article in the urban regulation, offers a suspended window on the outside, a large frame on the green scenery. All of that is contained under one roof covering the stairs and protecting the inside from sunrays, making out of this simple gesture a plural answer to the different wishes and the particularities of the site.
The construction system expresses the assembly of basic elements following a logic of stacking. The timber frame of the extension settles onto piles made of masonry, forming a foundation for the terrace and the planted borders. The large wooden gantry establishing the new façade combined with the metal reinforcement opens the house widely on the outside.
The two main elements hold up wooden rafters regularly set on the primary framework. Crowning this layering, the roof benefits from the different thicknesses of the cover to withdraw the gutter. Rainwater thus goes down to the borders giving a plant-covered environment to the terrasse which unfolds from the living rooms to the garden.