ProtoCAMPO

Designed as a 290 sqm reception area for up to 350 people, ProtoCAMPO consists of a vast wooden agora rising to a height of 3 metres, covered by a 6-metre-high inflatable dome.

The pressure inside the dome is maintained by two discrete motors located on the structure. The pavilion is defined by a frame of seats and a floor in maritime pine, which frame an open space under the dome.The inner field is accessible via a wooden ramp. It is a place conducive to exchanges and can accommodate a large audience under its high acoustic performance dome. Bright and open to the outside, the installation explores the idea of a mobile and flexible architecture, open to the public and to events, with a minimal environmental footprint.

The ProtoCAMPO was conceived as part of the 2022 edition of Villa Medici’s Festival of Huts. Among the four pavilions presented by French architectural firms and a group of students from Sciences Po and the Ecole des Arts Décoratifs, ProtoCAMPO is a proposal that explores both the field of mobility and that of celebratory architecture.

With its wooden structure that can be erected in five days and its dome that can be unfolded in less than an hour, ProtoCAMPO offers a vast, flexible reception area that’s easy to set up.

Presented and designed in the historic gardens of Villa Medici, ProtoCAMPO is inspired by two archetypes of the Roman city: the agora and the cupola.

The agora has been interpreted as a lightweight, prefabricated wooden structure. The dome, an architectural feat of antiquity revisited by the Enlightenment, is reinterpreted here using contemporary materials and an inflatable dome. The canvas, set on a wooden ring, houses a space conceived as a base camp open to the values of living together. In revisiting these symbolic forms of the “ideal city”, the architects combine technology and simplicity, high-tech and low-tech.

ProtoCAMPO is one of a series of three proto-architectures – along with Proto-Habitat and SOLARproto – developed by Wald architects Frédérique Barchelard and Flavien Menu.

These three proposals are manifestos for new forms of housing, in line with changing lifestyles. Entirely demountable and built from French wood, the “proto” is a rethink of production methods and the optimisation of resources. A nomadic, ecological and modular construction, it meets the needs of both urban and rural dwellers, and is both temporary and scalable over time.

A simple innovation with a low-carbon footprint, ProtoCAMPO offers a high-quality, ecological and affordable space. It’s an architecture that takes shape through complete monitoring of production and a partnership approach, federated by a synergy of responsible local players.

Together, they founded Wald during their year of residence at Villa Médicis in 2019-2020. The company develops projects that combine low-carbon construction and sustainable living. Wald produces architecture, spaces and objects with strong ecological values: an environmental ecology, as close as possible to the concerns of low-carbon construction, both through timber construction and the use of biosourced or geosourced materials; a social ecology, dedicated to the development of buildings for new uses; a mental ecology, philosophically inscribed in the need to develop architecture in line with the values of sustainability, hybridity and equality.

Wald’s work has given rise to a solo exhibition at the arc-en-rêve architecture centre and the Musée Bargoin in Clermont Ferrand, a group exhibition at the Collection Lambert in Avignon and will be included in the HOME MADE exhibition at Le Grand Hornu in 2023.

Wald has been the subject of press articles (Le Monde, Vogue, AD, etc.), TV and radio programmes including France 2, France Culture, France Inter and will appear in the documentary Design for Better devoted in part to WALD’s work on CANAL+.