Espace Le
Corbusier
Rue de Saint-Just-Malmont
42700 Firminy
France
Le Corbusier 1954-67 (Church 2006)
Eugène Claudius-Petit - the newly elected mayor of Firminy in
1953, who had been Minister for Reconstruction and Town Planning before -
wished to offer decent residences to the population. He carried out this
project by creating Firminy-Vert ('Green-Firminy'), a new ‘urban unit’
conceived like an urban expansion. This realisation was led following the
principles of the Charter of Athens.
As a result - after Chandigarh City in India - this is the
largest concentration of Le Corbusier buildings in one place. Here you can
visit L’Unité d’Habitation (including a model apartment, the nursery school
and the roof terrace), L’Espace Le Corbusier in its entirety, the open-air
theatre and - upon request - the St-Pierre Church building site.
Indeed the church was left unfinished because of the high
costs for building the concrete roof at the time, and is being completed now
following the original plans, although with a new function: a detached
location of the Saint Etienne Museum of Modern Art.
The Unité d’Habitation is one in a series of similar
buildings by Le Corbusier, including those in
Marseille and
Berlin.
Firminy is about 14 km (9 miiles) from Saint Etienne, in
the south of France.
By train, take the national rail Lyon - Saint Etienne -
Firminy line.
By air, the nearest airport is Saint Etienne, with daily
low-cost flights to and from London Stansted.
Guided tours Monday to Friday start at 2:30 pm from the
Maison de la Culture / Espace Le Corbusier. Visiting on Saturday and Sunday
is only by advance booking. The tour lasts about 3 hours.
Le Corbusier's
original architectural 'manifesto', describing what he sought to achieve, as it first
appeared in English in 1931. Accessible (if an unconventional style for today) and
stimulating.