JDS to Design New Youth Center in Lille, France

JDS / Julien De Smedt Architects have just signed the contract to execute their first French project for the city of Lille. The project that houses a youth hostel, a kindergarten and offices is the result of an invited competition that JDS won in collaboration with EGIS, Agence Franck Boutté Consultants, and SL2EC.

Project Description from the Architects:

Over the past twenty years Lille has become a European hub; a destination for business and congress, a great place to study and live and also a tourist destination. It is a city with a turbulent history of conquest and reconquest, a heritage as an important medieval city and later on enjoyed and sometimes suffered the title of Northern France industrial capital.

Our project emerges from the idea of creating an urban catalyst, accommodating three distinct programmes on a triangular site. By placing a program in each point of the triangle we offer maximum privacy while allowing them a closeness and continuity of space, organized around a garden, like a cloister of calm in the center of the city. The lifting of the mass of the programme at the corners illuminates and activates the adjacent public spaces and creates a continuity from outside to inside of the building.

Project Details:

Project: Youth hostel, kindergarten, office    
Budget: 12,150,000 EUR    
Type: Invited Competition
Size: 6,980 m2
Client: SAEM Euralille    
Status: 1st Prize 2011
Location: Lille, France    
Team: JDS, EGIS, Agence Franck Boutté Consultants, SL2EC        

JDS Partner in Charge: Julien De Smedt    
Project Leader: Renaud Pereira
Project Team: Henning Stuben, Sandra Fleischmann, Heechan Park, Francisco Villeda, Edna Lueddecke, Wouter Dons, Felix Luong, Leonora Daly, David Dominguez Iriondo, Priscilla Girelli, Marion Julien