WS6 : GEOMETRICAL PROMENADE IN PARIS

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Instructors: Jorge Hidalgo, Lorenzo Ponzo, Nicolas Leduc, Bernard Vaudeville, Benoit Stehelin, Alexis de la Taille, Simon Aubry

Since approximately fifteen years, “Architectural Geometry” gathers a
worldwide community, sharing and growing a knowledge based on
theoretical and computational research. Despite the very recent nature of this development, the origins of this discipline are considerably more ancient and are linked to local schools of thought.

Specifically, France has given a distinguished historical contribution to this field, both from the point of view of construction techniques (Gaspard Monge, Jules-Hardouin Mansart, Philibert De L’Orme…) and from the point of view of descriptive geometry (Gaston Darboux…). Public Institutions in Paris preserve preciously the testimonies to the works of these pioneers. With this workshop, we aim to uncover the collections of the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, which are normally not accessible to the public. Thanks to the physical models (by Philibert De L’Orme and Robert Le Ricolais), some of which date back to the 18th Century, we will try to understand how these visionaries succeeded in merging geometry and construction.

Contemporary Paris contains several realisations, representing the current heritage of the geometrical approach in constructing buildings. By exploiting previously published conference presentations, we will visit them guided by some of the people having contributed to their design or execution. We will investigate together the link with the history of sciences and techniques.