Solar Architecture & Energy Efficient Glazing Solutions
Setting sail in the Champs Elysées HUGH DUTTON Hugh Dutton Associates
Surfacade The Publicis headquarters are situated in one of the most visible addresses in the world, at the top of the Champs Elysées, and neighbours the Arc de Triomphe. The company’s recent expansions have made it one of the largest advertising agencies in France and the chairman felt it appropriate to transform the headquarters from the ageing and dated 70’s office building into something more in fitting with the company’s image and unique location. The company chose Los Angeles based architect Michele Saée’s response to their brief to upgrade the ‘Drugstore’ a café occupying the ground floor of the building. His proposal involved not only a restructuring of the café, but also a manifestation of the Drugstore transformation on the facades of the whole building. His design involved 74
adding a series of wavy glass screens in front of the existing mirror glass curtainwall with a tall sculptural corner piece on the main entrance corner that faces the Arc de Triomphe. Freedom of Form HDA’s technical design began with a computer graphic model image supplied by the architect Michele Saee. Contemporary computer graphics give a remarkable liberty of form and representation. Materials can be just alluded to, light can be manipulated, forms can be completely free, surfaces can be stretched, and distorted at will. The modern film industry’s reliance on the computer for the image is powerful evidence of this. The freedom that the computer gives is however deceptive. The same liberty cannot easily be found in traditional construction materials.
The challenge for the facades was to realise this fluidity and freedom of form in glass and steel, which by nature, are naturally fragile and rigid. The design team had difficulty in finding a name for the glass screens. In the end the word ‘Voiles’, the French word for sails, was chosen. The term is evocative of flat curves, wind, and movement. Such images were considered appropriate. Planning constraints All facade components must remain within strict legal limits as determined in the building regulations: 1 meter in front of the building property limit on the Champs Elysées and 600mm on the Pressbourg and Vernet Facades. Anchorage to the existing building The existing building, built after a fire destroyed its Hausmannian predecessor in 1974, was intelligent glass solutions