Description
De Stijl inspiration in Meudon
Designed by Claude Parent between 1960 and 1964, Maison Mauriange-Auboyer’s sleek, graphic silhouette overlooks an exceptional panorama of the capital.
Built on a 903 sqm plot overlooking the surrounding countryside, the house offers 266 sqm of living space over 3 levels.
The ground floor features a vast living room with large bay windows opening onto a panoramic terrace offering spectacular, unobstructed views of the monuments of Paris: the Eiffel Tower, the Sacré Coeur, the Dôme des Invalides, the towers of La Défense, etc. A sculptural, angled fireplace separates the living and dining areas. A separate kitchen and a study with shower room complete this level.
The first floor is accessed by a superb metal and solid wood staircase of exquisite design. It houses the sleeping area, comprising a master suite with dressing room and terrace, three bedrooms, a bathroom and a shower room.
The garden level comprises an independent flat with living room, bedroom, kitchen and shower room, a storage area, a cellar, a laundry room and a boiler room.
Bright and open to the panorama, the house has retained its period materials, fittings and built-in storage. Its open-plan layout offers a great deal of freedom in terms of interior layout. The angled floor plan brings the different rooms to life with recesses and slants, creating alcoves and corners that invite multiple uses.
Maison Mauriange-Auboyer is ideally located in a quiet, residential area of Meudon, just 5 minutes’ walk from the station.
Neoplasticist inspirations
For this house, initially intended for two families, Claude Parent took advantage of the sloping ground and opened up the building to the view, by articulating two volumes around a 120-degree angle on its south-facing façade to capture maximum sunlight. The programme proposes the creation of two very distinct living units, which share a common hall and staircase, in order to offer privacy to each family.
The whole of the original house is characterised by a geometric approach and sober polychromy. On the façade, the composition develops around a set of grey concrete beams, extending beyond the plan in an exercise in style. The tangle of horizontal and vertical lines creates a graphic structure, with each façade treated differently, alternating between smooth cement, bay windows, coloured surfaces and balconies.
With its pronounced orthogonal lines, the Mauriange-Auboyer house is inspired by the neoplasticist movement, and recalls the famous Schroeder House by Dutch architect Gerrit Rietveld, built in 1924.
Maison André Bloc, 1961, Antibes © Laurent Kronental
Maison Schröder, Gerrit Rietveld, 1924, Utrecht
Towards the oblique function
At the start of his career, Claude Parent’s desire to renew and question inhabited space was part of the Neoplasticism movement and inspired by optical and kinetic art. He designed unstructured homes with dynamic volumes based on an expressive orthogonal grid, such as the Bloc house in Antibes and the Mauriange-Auboyer house. After his meeting with the French architect Paul Virilio in 1963, which led to the creation of the “oblique function” in 1966, his work turned towards the design of inclined planes in a quest for the continuous movement of human beings in space, who thus play an active part in architecture.
Claude Parent © Chloé Parent
Claude Parent: avant-gardism and posterity
An architect and theorist, Claude Parent asserts a great deal of formal freedom through his buildings and his writings. Many of his works are true architectural performances, combining new aesthetics and technical innovations.
Many architects, including Jean Nouvel, were trained in his studio, and leading figures in international contemporary architecture such as Rem Koolhaas, Daniel Libeskind and Bernard Tschumi were inspired by his work.
Renowned for his avant-garde work, the French section of the Venice Biennale paid tribute to him in 1996, the FRAC d’Orléans devoted a first retrospective to him in 1999, and a major exhibition of his built and graphic works (with scenography by Jean Nouvel) was organised by the Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine in 2009.
Infos techniques
Asking price: €1,760,000
Fees payable by the seller
Property tax 2022: NC
Full ownership
Heating : Gas
ENERGY CLASS: E / CLIMATE CLASS: E
Estimated annual costs: between €3,630 and €4,960 per year, average energy prices indexed to 1 January 2021
