La Grande-Motte : a mysterious City of Gold

by Jacinthe Gigou

Eden, Poseidon, the Temple of the Sun, Capri, Bali… So many divine names and idyllic destinations christen the buildings of the city. The scene is set : this is not a traditional town. La Grande-Motte tells the story of a dream fulfilled, the dream of building a city from scratch, a place where everyone could come to rejuvenate. But how do you give a new city a history ? That was the architect’s challenge, answered with monumental architecture paired with a striking green framework that has become iconic. A vegetal city with solar-oriented urban planning, oscillating between the memory of an ancestral past and the utopia of an imagined future.

At the time of its construction in the 1960s–70s, La Grande-Motte had a poor reputation. It symbolized the concrete overdevelopment of the coastline and the clichés of mass tourism. It was built during the Trente Glorieuses, under the Racine mission established in 1963, which aimed to develop tourism along the Languedoc-Roussillon coast. Initiated by the Pompidou government under the influence of General de Gaulle, this mission played a key role in the rise of mass tourism for working-class families. Alongside La Grande-Motte, resorts such as Port Camargue, Cap d’Agde, Gruissan, Port Leucate, Port Barcarès, and Saint-Cyprien were developed. These gigantic projects required the construction of new ports, roads and highways, and airports. Infested with mosquitoes, the Languedoc coastline was sanitized through drainage, mosquito control, and desalination operations.

However, La Grande-Motte stood out from its neighbors by being created entirely from scratch, ex nihilo, like two other cities of the era: Brasília, the capital of Brazil, designed by Oscar Niemeyer in 1960, and Chandigarh in India, built by Le Corbusier in 1966.

After studying philosophy and literature in Khâgne in Paris, where he was taught by Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean Balladur (1924–2002) turned to architecture. His literary background became a vector of humanism in his work, with architecture conceived around the place of humans in society. He continued to write throughout his life, primarily on architecture and urbanism. “If I were God, I would beware of architects! They are the subversive instruments of humanity’s secret project: to rebuild the Lost Paradise,” he wrote about La Grande-Motte.

From 1963 to 1992, he served as the city’s chief architect and urban planner, its composer. He faced criticism from both peers and the public, who nicknamed the city “La Grande Moche” (The Big Ugly) or “Sarcelles-sur-Mer,” due to the extensive use of concrete and the pyramid-style architecture, considered overly decorative and contrary to the principles of modernity. But Balladur believed in his model, even if it earned him the ire of his contemporaries. “I was trying to create a happy setting, free from both present and past. I embraced heresy,” he confided in an interview.

“La Grande-Motte is, in a way, a sacred place. Men and women come here to worship the sun,” said Jean Balladur. The region indeed offers two major assets: an almost constant sun and the sea. In his plan, Balladur paid homage to these elements while drawing inspiration from various places he had visited : Brasília in 1962, Egypt, and Mexico, especially the truncated pyramids of Teotihuacan. He also drew on Henri Sauvage’s stepped apartment buildings in Paris and incorporated the architectural daring of Le Corbusier as well as the aesthetics of Mies van der Rohe.

Evocative of an ancestral past, the pyramids give history to a city built entirely from scratch. While this bold, unprecedented form attracted criticism, for Balladur the pyramid evokes the dune, softly complementing the horizontal coastline, unlike tower blocks, which he saw as too radical. The design provides views of the surrounding maritime and mountainous landscape, with Pic Saint-Loup and the Cévennes as a backdrop. He oriented the buildings so that every apartment could enjoy a sunlit terrace and a sea view, the height of luxury.

To complement the buildings, Balladur partnered with the landscape architect Pierre Pillet, who undertook a colossal task : 36,000 trees were planted, placing ecology at the heart of the project—a green city ahead of its time. Beyond creating a verdant environment, this network of greenery protects the city from the harsh effects of salt and wind. However, it took decades for this vegetative aspect to fully flourish, allowing umbrella pines, tamarisks, laurels, and other species to reach their peak. To this day, no other resort on the European coastline offers such a rich presence of vegetation.

The formal diversity of the buildings testifies to Balladur’s boundless inventiveness. The variety of graphic details on balconies and loggias, the moldings, creates a vibrant effect on the façades, a rare example of kinetic architecture reminiscent of Vasarely’s paintings. The plurality of plastic effects harmonizes into a great architectural uniformity, giving the city its identity. The multiple plays of solids and voids, the wide pedestrian avenues, the careful attention to street furniture, the numerous green islands, and the relegation of cars to the background, all of this makes La Grande-Motte a haven of peace and a work of total art. The city of the sun offers a cinematic setting full of symbols, travel, and esotericism. Today, thanks to the revival of the 1960s–70s, architecture and vintage enthusiasts mingle with families and the general public, making La Grande-Motte a city for everyone, just as its original vision intended.

JACINTHE GIGOU

An art and architectural historian, Jacinthe Gigou has spent twenty years promoting and disseminating modern architecture. She worked as a curator at CIVA and as director of the heritage agency Arkadia in Brussels until 2020. She co-founded the Brussels Art nouveau & Art Deco Festival and the Brussels Biennale of Modern Architecture. In 2021, she launched Modernista, a platform dedicated to Belgian Modernism. In parallel, she works as an architecture journalist and critic for various media outlets and co-authored the book 150 houses you need to visit before you die.

Instagram : @modernista.be