The construction of the Résidence Julie-Victoire Daubié is included in the Cité internationale’s development project called “Cité 2025”. The residence welcomed its first international students and researchers in September 2018. It was inaugurated on the 22nd of March 2019.
The Résidence Julie-Victoire Daubié is managed by the Fondation nationale Cité internationale universitaire de Paris.
Recognised by critics, the Résidence Julie-Victoire Daubié has won two architecture prizes. It was the winner in the “habitat” category for the Prix de l’Équerre d’Argent, the AMC & Moniteur architecture prize in 2018. It also won the “D’A” architecture prize.
The east and west façades are completely panned and equipped with awnings, offering direct views of the park whereas the north and south sides are opaque, covered in a veined metal cladding made out of stainless steel.
Paned on the north façade, the open spaces on the garden level form the base of the accommodation.
Designed in the shape of the letter H, the house reserves the central space for passageways and upstairs lounges that are completely covered in glass and which serve as a vertical meeting gallery between the two living areas. There are numerous communal spaces: a lounge-library, a playground, a gym and a solarium. The residence has 106 rooms (studios, one beds, two beds), some of which have para-hotel services.
In July 2014, the Bruther agency won the competition for the construction of this new building. It was financed by the Régie immobilière de la Ville de Paris (RIVP) who are the owners and contracting authority.
Density, as well as thermal and energy performances, guide the Bruther agency’s project. The residence has a “compact plot” in the shape of a “split cube that is as tall as it is wide”, according to the constructors. The exposed concrete and glass is divided into three strips. Elevated on pilotis, it frees up the space on the ground in continuity with the park, multiplying the landscape perspectives. The construction of this building on the site was also well-made vertically as the communal spaces are partially buried thanks to restructuring the ground.
The building meets environmental standards set out in the Paris Climate Plan.
The building was constructed about ten metres from the ring road, allowing for the installation of living acoustic and visual protection that reinforces the green framework of the park. In order to protect it from the noise of the ring road the residence opted for a split strategy: the ground was dug out and the building was raised. Sitting below ground level and accessible by a series of ramps and steps, the ground floor is completely protected by the height of the anti-noise wall.
Not only does the design of a hollow cube characterise the geometry of the building, but so is the transparency and the framework of the glass façades one of the project’s most identifiable elements.
Inside the house there are kitchenettes, closets and offices in a vertical strip to save space and to be functionally efficient. In the one-bed apartments, the partition is removable: the residents can open their apartment up into one big room to make it more open if they wish. The plan benefits the global research community because it makes it possible to create an intermediate space for the right of traffic: a discussion room between the lift and the walkway. There again the strictness of the spatial organisation allows for an additional space that is conductive to making social connections.