"Neighborhoods of Tomorrow": The ten winning architectural firms revealed

This project was launched in June 2023 in Marseille by President Emmanuel Macron, who called for "inventing a new radiant city".

"The idea of ​​this major international consultation was to identify ten districts on which we would work on quality, in the field of architecture, environment, work on beauty (...) to make them true laboratories for improving the living environment of the inhabitants," the Elysée recalled during a press briefing.

"Since the 1980s with +Banlieues 89+ led by Roland Castro, this is the first time that an international architecture competition (...) for working-class neighborhoods has been launched in France," the same source explained.

Thirty teams of architects worked on neighborhoods located in urban and semi-rural areas.

"These projects show that urban policy is not just about large housing estates, but also about neighborhoods in small towns or medium-sized towns," explained Jean-Baptiste Marie, director general of GIP Europe for architectural and urban projects (Epau), who led the consultation.

A budget of €450.000 has been allocated to develop three architectural projects for each site. Funding for each project is shared between the state and local authorities, with construction scheduled to begin in the first half of 2027.

Some 216 citizen juries also participated in the development of the projects.

In a video, Emmanuel Macron called for "valuing what is already there" and "putting an end to the tabula rasa policy (...) which can be very traumatic for the inhabitants".

In Corbeil-Essonnes (Essonne), a media library is planned for a former boiler room measuring 37 meters high and 50 meters in diameter. In Pessac (Gironde), the project involves excavating the interior of a vast apartment tower to create communal spaces, student housing, and economic activities, including workshops for artisans and artists, on the ground floor, in order to revitalize the Saige district.

The winners are the firms La Soda (Caen), Base (Colmar), H2O (Corbeil-Essonnes), Cathrin Trebeljahr (Coulommiers), Raum404 and Estran (Le Mans), Atelier du Rouget Simon Teyssou et associés (Lodève), Topotek 1 (Manosque), Atelier Marion Talagrand (Marseille), Dominique Perrault Architecture (Pessac) and Lab705 (Sedan).