Description
A pioneering bioclimatic housing project in an exceptional natural setting
This house is part of the Roquebrune housing estate, an innovative alternative to conventional housing, built between 1972 and 1975 by architect Jacques Hondelatte and his partners Jean-Claude Duprat and Michel Fagart. It has retained its original spatial layout.
Set in 750 sqm of private landscaped grounds, the house offers 123 sqm of living space over 4 levels.
The living space is arranged over two half-levels, with a kitchen and dining room opening onto a panoramic south-facing terrace, offering an uninterrupted view of the landscape. A few steps further up, a double-height lounge is flooded with light thanks to huge geometric bay windows overlooking the Palanges forest. This space is complemented by a study (or bedroom) on the mezzanine and a shower room.
The upper level, served by a spiral staircase in wood and metal with a design typical of the 1970s, comprises the sleeping area, with three bedrooms with fitted wardrobes and a shower room.
A garage and a fourth bedroom with shower room on the ground floor complete the property.
The house benefits from the communal facilities of the development, such as a large garden, children’s play areas and clotheslines.
The house is set in unspoilt natural surroundings in the commune of Gages-Montrozier, a 20-minute drive from Rodez and 40 minutes from the Aubrac Regional Nature Park. The development is served by a private road and has all the local amenities of the village (crèche, school, sports field, groceries, etc.).
Architecture in symbiosis with nature
The architects focused on the uses of the residents and prioritised the design of the interior spaces over that of the architectural envelope. Designed to be bioclimatic, a decade before the term was coined, the house offers a living space that is well sheltered from the prevailing winds on the north side, and widely open to the unobstructed view on the south side. Its compact volume limits energy loss and optimises light.
The different areas, arranged on half-levels, communicate with each other through a number of visual openings that add a lightness of touch to the whole and create fluid, airy circulation. The many windows overlooking the panorama and the horizon immerse the living spaces in the surrounding nature. The sloping roof creates more intimate spaces upstairs.
Ecological philosophy and sustainable urban planning
Created by a group of friends, most of whom work for Crédit Agricole, who wanted to live outside Rodez, the development comprises 19 houses that meet the needs, economic constraints and communal living principles desired by the families. The collective nature of their approach meant that the sponsors were able to call on the services of town-planning architects to create a harmonious, high-quality habitat that would reduce design and construction costs.
Jacques Hondelatte and his associates have come up with a project that combines ecology and sustainable urban planning, favouring collective spaces over private ones, as an alternative to the conventional housing estate model. The development is adapted to the natural site, which has been preserved as much as possible and whose landscape potential has been ingeniously exploited by placing the buildings between the rocks. The relief of the land creates privacy between each plot, with no fences or hedges, accentuating the feeling of space within the site. The homes have been designed in 7 models, with different facades and openings, to create a harmonious whole.
Jacques Hondelatte, architect and poet
Jacques Hondelatte (1942-2002) is a little-known public figure but an influential designer for many architects, particularly those who have had the opportunity to study and work with him, such as Boubacar Seck, Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal. A visionary designer, his avant-garde work straddles the border between architecture and contemporary art.
After graduating from the Bordeaux School of Architecture in 1969, he worked as a consultant urban planner at the Gironde Departmental Public Works Department and then at the Bordeaux Public Works Study Centre until 1973. He worked with architects Jean-Claude Duprat and Laurent Fagart for ten years, and taught at the Bordeaux School of Architecture until his death in 2002.
Jacques Hondelatte built relatively few buildings. His best-known works include the Fargues (1971) and Artiguebieille (1972) houses, the Cotlenko flat designed in collaboration with Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal (1990), the Niort town centre and its dragons (1992), and the Goubet school in Paris, as well as his unfinished projects for the Bordeaux District Court (1988), the insularity of Mont Saint-Michel (1990) and the Millau viaduct (1994).
Awarded the Grand Prix National de l’Architecture in 1998, his work has been featured in a number of exhibitions, notably at the Arc-en-Rêve architecture centre in Bordeaux in 1999 (“Des Grattes-Ciel dans la tête”). In 2007, works by Jacques Hondelatte were featured in an exhibition entitled “Avant, après, l’Architecture au fil du temps” (Before and after, architecture over time), which ran from March to September 2007 at the Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine in Paris under the direction of Patrice Goulet, and in which the Roquebrune housing estate figured prominently (the house for sale was featured); in 2018 (“Chacals comme festivals ou chacaux comme chevaux?” (Jackals as festivals or jackals as horses?); in 2012 at Six Elzévir in Paris (“Le projet oublié” (The forgotten project)); and in London in 2017.
“Rare are the architectures that arouse emotions in us that cannot be explained rationally. First of all, we are caught in a zone of doubt. Then, unexpectedly, we are swept away as if by a magic trick. Then you remember that architecture is also the art of enchantment. Extract from Espazium, on the occasion of the exhibition devoted to J. Hondelatte by Arc-en-Rêve in 2018.
