David Chipperfield Wins Business School Competition in Paris

David Chipperfield Architects has won first prize in the design competition held by the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry for a new gateway building at HEC School of Management, one of the most prestigious business schools in Europe (HEC is ranked no 1 in Europe by the Financial Times). The 9,000 square metre project will accommodate the MBA programme, with a large capacity auditorium and state of the art facilities.

HEC was founded in 1881 and is a business school affiliated to the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The existing campus opened in 1964 on a 300 acre wooded site in the community of Jouy-en-Josas, a suburb of Paris near Versailles, close to the other top French scientific academic establishments on the “Saclay Plateau”.

The new MBA building will be situated at the intersection between the campus and its planned southern expansion. It will provide a shimmering new façade for HEC facing the existing main campus entrance and the future expansion. The project breaks down the building volume on a long narrow site into a series of multi-faceted blocks whose size more naturally integrates with the scale of the surrounding buildings. These blocks shift in plan relative to one another, creating a series of protected semi-courtyards. Shared functions and the school’s more autonomous teaching spaces are gathered around a large common hall which crosses a campus artery, serving as a ‘social collector’ for HEC and integrating the MBA faculties into the life of the rest of the institution. The architectural approach provides generous informal study areas.

David Chipperfield Architects is working on the project with local architect Duplantier Architecte, Bordeaux.

The project is David Chipperfield Architects’ first competition win in France. The project is scheduled for completion by September 2010.