• The Atelier d'Architecture King Kong presents in its new premises in Bordeaux, an exhibition on the missed appointments of architecture.

  • After contacting around thirty architects, from the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region but not only, the workshop selected 28 winning projects, which however did not materialize.

  • The reasons that have caused these projects to fail are multiple, even if they are often budgetary or political.

Something could have happened, but the meeting did not take place and the story that had begun suddenly came to an end... The Bordeaux architecture studio King Kong presents, in its gallery installed in its Wilson's new premises, an exhibition entitled "Architecture's missed appointments", on these projects which ultimately did not materialize.

“The idea came from a joke, while discussing with other Bordeaux architects, says Paul Marion, one of the partners of the agency.

We were talking about these missed appointments, because we all have in our drawers projects selected as potentially feasible, and which for a thousand reasons did not happen.

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Amusement park, museum and wellness yurt…

From the joke was born the desire to bring out these ideas stored in cupboards.

And after having contacted about thirty architects, from the region but not only, King Kong selected 28 projects, of all sizes, mainly public but sometimes private.

We thus find a project for an amusement park dedicated to music, with buildings in the shape of instruments, which was to come to life on a private estate, in Corrèze.

Another on the rehabilitation of the Gabut wasteland in La Rochelle with a center dedicated to circus arts, or even a project for an archaeological museum-park in Isère.

The Bordeaux agency Moonwalk presents a yurt project in which well-being activities were planned for students, on the Bordeaux university campus.

A cultural center project, designed by the architects Dominique Coulon and Christian Bardin, was to see the light of day behind the Gaumont cinema in Talence, and ultimately did not happen...

The very first Arena project in Bordeaux

Many projects within the framework of calls for expression of interest (AMI) for Greater Paris, or for the Réinventer Paris competition, also found their place in this exhibition, such as this "vertical camping" which was to see the light of day near of the Canal de l'Ourcq in the 19th.

Another category: those projects that were finally realized, but on the occasion of another competition.

An agency had thus won the first competition for the rehabilitation of the Lesieur silos at Bassins à Flot in Bordeaux, with a project for exhibition spaces, before the site finally accommodated a hotel.

"We also see the very first project selected for the Arena de Bordeaux Métropole, which included a shopping center backed by the performance hall, before another competition was relaunched, and the building was finally done by Rudy Ricciotti" explains Pauline Marchandou, communications manager at Atelier King Kong.

“Questioning what remains as a mess”

“The prerequisite for this exhibition is that it only brings together winning projects, not discarded projects, insists Paul Marion.

The idea is to show that we were on the verge of enjoying something, equipment, a structure, and that it suddenly stopped.

We are not trying to argue, we are not vengeful, but we want to question what remains as a mess, whether for the architect but also for the community, which commits money for these competitions.

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These projects were stopped at different stages, for multiple reasons, often budgetary or political, for example during changes in the majority at the head of communities.

“With us, we had several scenarios, recalls Paul Marion.

We had a performance hall project in La Rochelle, where we went so far as to choose the companies, and in the end there was a building permit problem on the land.

It didn't stop there as the community found another piece of land, we won the competition again, and the project came to a halt a second time, this time for funding issues.

The project finally came to fruition years later, with another architect, and on another site.

“Rarely useless work”

But the most "traumatic" experience at King Kong remains that of a cultural project in Avranches (Manche) which fell apart for political reasons.

“It concerned the renovation of an existing building, and an extension, the idea being to use the roof of the media library to offer a belvedere over the bay of Mont Saint-Michel, with a building that barely emerges from the ground. says Paul Marion.

The exhibition also offers a reflection, philosophical and sometimes poetic.

“Is architecture that has not been built still architecture?

asks Paul Marion as he wanders among all these aborted projects.

“I say yes, especially since this work is rarely useless, and it is often reinjected into another project in another different form.

Matter is rarely totally lost.

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Exhibition open to the public at the Galerie de l'Atelier King Kong, 353 Bd Wilson in Bordeaux.

kingkong.fr

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  • Bordeaux

  • Aquitaine

  • Architecture

  • Exposure