Kiosque Contours / Atelier Craft

Kiosque Contours / Atelier Craft

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Text description provided by the architects. Design and construction of a kiosk and its adjoining terrace for the culture agency Bon Esprit, in the Parc Des Impressionnistes in Clichy, France. Aiming to instigate a new dynamic for the public park located in a part of Clichy currently under construction, the city in partnership with Bon Esprit worked on implementing a new space composed of a bar, a restaurant, a small stage, and a terrace. Over time, the kiosk will also become an anchor point for the agency’s yearly music festival, Contours.

 The actual park overlays an old industrial building site for the construction of Gustave Eiffel’s gasometer structures. Atelier Craft’s design echoes that forgotten heritage by using a dodecagonal geometry for the structural frame of both bar and stage pavilions. Made of local untreated Douglas wood, the structure is braced thanks to bright orange lashing straps that also act as a visual reference from the park’s various entry points. Its central location led to designing an easily accessible space in the continuity of the park, allowing the 200 m² cloud-shaped terraces to be used even when the kiosk is closed.

Open since 2010, the Parc des Impressionnistes is today recognized as an example of urban biodiversity thanks to its numerous ecosystems fostering a diversity of flora and fauna. Various strategies were put in place in order to preserve this natural habitat.

First, the project’s anchoring to the ground is achieved using micro-piles for foundations, preventing land take and the use of big machinery. Secondly, like the metal connectors clipping the wooden structural elements together, most of the materials are assembled mechanically in a way where they can easily be reused and repurposed. Finally, the curved shapes of the terrace directly follow the location of the trees so they can keep growing organically. In short, once the Kiosk Contours are disassembled, they will leave no trace of its presence on site.