Hacine Cherifi Gymnasium, Lyon Education Building, French Architecture Images

Hacine Cherifi Gymnasium

Education Facility in Rillieux-La-Pape, Lyon, southern France design by Tectoniques Architectes

17 Nov 2015

Hacine Cherifi Gymnasium, Lyon

Design: Tectoniques Architectes

Location: Rillieux-La-Pape, Lyon, southern France

The Hacine Cherifi gymnasium in Rillieux-La-Pape

Winner of the WAN Wood in Architecture 2015 AWARD

Tuesday 17 November – The Tectoniques agency is proud to announce that the Hacine Cherifi gymnasium, a project recently built in Rillieux-La-Pape, has been awarded the prestigious WAN Wood in Architecture 2015 AWARD.

The panel of judges, which met at Timber Expo in Birmingham during UK Construction Week, was composed of international architects from the agencies Arup Associates, Hopkins Architects, SOM and the Finnish firm Puuinfo.

This is the seventh year of the WAN Awards which cover the whole range of areas of architectural expertise and which have been remarked for the members of their judging panels as well as the calibre and number of participants.

This award acknowledges both the expertise of the architects who have a long-standing history of working with wood, and the project to build a community facility that is overwhelming in its simplicity as much as in its sheer size. The building is mainly built
from wood with straw-bale panels as insulation.

The whole team at Tectoniques would like to thank its client, the Rillieux-La-Pape town council, the wood engineers at Arborescence and all its partners.

1 Sep 2015

Hacine Cherifi Gymnasium in Lyon

Design: Tectoniques Architectes

Location: Rillieux-La-Pape, Lyon, France

The Hacine Cherifi gymnasium forms part of the same development as the Paul Chevallier schools complex, another Tectoniques project for the town of Rillieux-La-Pape. Next to the schools with their pleated, green roofs, its size makes it an imposing, yet silent, neighbour.

The building houses two sports halls and support services over a total surface area of 2,500 sqm with internal ceiling heights of 9 and 12 metres.

Faithful to the agency’s values, the architecture uses a mixed wood/concrete structure without pretence or artifice, the wooden components being largely prefabricated.

Hacine Cherifi is a boxer from the town who made history in 1998 at the Astroballe when he became the first French world Middleweight champion since Marcel Cerdan.

An active contribution to the public space
The facility includes a gymnastics hall (880 sqm, a multi-purpose sports hall (1,100 sqm) and the spaces required to host the general public and sportspeople.

The volumes are organised very simply. The two halls are set at right angles around a block which accommodates all the support services. The terraces offer seating for up to 400 spectators, which overlooks the multi-purpose sports hall and opens out at the back onto the entrance area and the cafeteria which are clearly visible from the public spaces outside. The fully-glazed facade on the road, offers glimpses of the activity inside the facility without disturbing the sports events or training in progress which takes place below the cross-cutting perspective.

Scale adapted to the context
In order to limit the structure’s impact on the surrounding urban environment, the architects made use of the height difference between the street and the interior of the plot to integrate part of the building into the slope. This also allowed them to create at access at the top of the building (rather than the bottom which would lead directly into the sports halls). This made it possible to reduce the height of the building on the road by 6 metres. These dimensions match the scale of the neighbouring school and the residential fabric of the neighbourhood.

Urban mediator
The building has a very simple shape and the facades are unadorned. Whilst the style of the schools is fluid and landscaped, the simpler, more sober gymnasium, in contrast speaks of stability and solidity. It occupies the northern corner of the development at the crossroads between two of Rilleux’s major roads.

The main facade to the east on rue Salignat clearly states the facility’s public status with a large, glazed facade, mounted with a cantilevered volume. At the rear to the west, the building is deliberately silent, as a residential programme is under construction and not yet finished. Towards the south it overlooks the schools, situated on the opposite side of a pedestrian alleyway which provides access to the schools and cuts across the development.

Wood and straw
As in all the Tectoniques agency’s projects, the construction system is both intelligible and visible. The raw concrete walls which run the height of the underground section of the building are left visible from the interior. Above these walls, the structures are all made of timber. The main structure is formed from a series of portal frames. These are composed of glue laminated spaced columns and beams with a span of 34 metres, placed on a 5.8 metre framework.

For the purposes of transportation, the beams were built in two parts, pinned and bolted together on site using metallic eyelets. Lifting and putting the beams into place made for a very dramatic stage in the construction process.

The 2000 sqm of components which make up the exterior siding are prefabricated into boxes, assembled using an external wall insulation system around the structure. From the inside out, the system is composed of three-ply spruce panels laid over the battens, the OSB panels which make up the base of the boxes, the 36-cm deep box framework filled with straw, a 40-mm insulating woodfibre panel, the rain barrier and the cladding made up of three-ply douglas fir boards onto which timber tiles, also made of locally-sourced douglas fir, are fixed.

The beams are put to good use by alternately constructing the roof above and below the height of the columns. This system creates large, glazed, horizontal strips which face north and run the height of the beams. This provides abundant overhead lighting but avoids glare.

Flashes of red break through the monochromatic tone
Light shades have been used to create a calm, peaceful atmosphere and ensure the facilities remain discreet. The floor is beige, the wall panels are made of light-coloured timber and the position of the lights and radiators fit into a carefully designed layout. The only colour is the red gymnastics equipment which creates a stark contrast with the overall monochromatic tone.

Hacine Cherifi Gymnasium – Building Information

Client: Rillieux-La-Pape Town Council
Project Management: Tectoniques Architectes
Design and Engineering:
Wood Structure: Arborescence
Thermal and Environmental analysis: Inddigo
Concrete structure and technical lots: Somival
Economists: Tectoniques Ingénieurs
Scheduling, supervision and coordination: Arc
Building control: Veritas
Health and Safety: Socotec
Landscaping: Itinéraire Bis
Total Gross Floor Area: 2,740 m2
Budget: €3.7 million ex. VAT
Cost of timber: €1.15 million ex. VAT
Year delivered: 2015

Main products and systems
Structure:
Raw concrete base (locally sourced) /
Glue laminated timber framework (source: Germany) /
Spruce columns and beams (source: France)
External siding:
Unfinished solid wood Douglas Fir timber tiles (locally sourced: Vallée d’Azergue)

Woodwork
External woodwork: aluminium (source: France)
Internal woodwork: 3-ply spruce panels (source: Austria)

Performance:
Quantity of wood consumed: 583 m3
Wood certification: PEFC
Wood heating system: Boiler – Wood chip
Energy consumption: 80.6 kWh/m≤/year
Of which heating: 40 kWh/m≤/year
Labels: BBC (low energy label – not labelled)
Result of the air-tightness testing:
0.50 m≥ / (h.m≤) ‡ 4 Pa m3/m≤/h
Wall insulation between wooden supports: Straw – 360 mm

Main contractors:
External works: Charrin
Carcass work: Valentin
Framing / Cladding: Lifteam
Roofing / Sealing: Projisol
Exterior woodwork: Chosset & Luchessa
Interior woodwork: Toutbois
Partitions / Linings / Paintwork: Nebihu
Soft flooring: Sols réalisation
Tiling / Ceramics: Fontaine
Lifts: Schindler
Heating / Ventilation / Plumbing: Siffert
Electricity: Elec4

Photographs: 11h45

Hacine Cherifi Gymnasium in Lyon image / information from Tectoniques Architectes

Location: Rillieux-La-Pape, Lyon, France