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Galeries Lafayette

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Galeries Lafayette

Depth and clarity

The presence of a department-store on a major throughway should be an event and be attractive.  The passer-by should feel called out-to on the pavement.  The shop, itself a public interior space, should extend the public exterior space of Friedrichstrasse.The reading is through depth and layering.  From the street, the space at ground level is free, devoid of any wall.  The dematerialisation of the corner allows motorists or pedestrians to see cones of light, of which the larger one quivers, vibrates, flashing rays of colors.  The reading of the structure of the spaces on different levels is simple.  It allows each person to know at any given moment where they are and where they are going.  The two big mirrored cones in the central space are objects of fascination, where according to different themes, massages and images race across surfaces, and using an inverted process of anamorphosis, a precise image deforms and invades the ensemble of mirrored surfaces.

These moving, deformed image-massages are completed by other perfectly controlled and precise images on two big screens, on Friedrichstrasse and Franzosischestrasse.
The screen-printed façade in progressive mirrored grids allows signs to appear through triangular halos (resonating with the cones) or rectangular halos (formatted to the screen).
The offices are perforated by cones of white light, actually interior lighting.  The floors are sprinkled with transparent glass blocks around the cones, becoming progressively more opaque.
Geometry and light create this architecture with infinite variations, linked to time, the hour of day, and to the nature of programmed images.  It is halfway between abstraction and figurative, artificial and natural light.  We wanted to create a game, a subtle, scenographical tool as a motor for seduction, questioning the shown and hidden, the dark and light, the intelligible and sensitive.
It alights one of the first lamps of Friedrichstrasse's renaissance.

Description by Jean Nouvel

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  • Georgi Sokolov
    Georgi Sokolov updated 86 media, uploaded 11 media, updated and added a digital reference
    oehi galeries lafayette aw050909 9 eqwv galeries lafayette aw050909 10 qutk galeries lafayette aw050909 11 cjxs galeries lafayette aw050909 12 iolx galeries lafayette aw050909 13 jxdi galeries lafayette aw050909 14 vuch 278290240 a62feb78ca o quhf 2347927892 22ac8c8ca4 b kwmk quartier207 galerieslafayette 00e1306506486594 Jean Nouvel: Galeries Lafayette, Berlin {B*} - Galeries Lafayette (by night) - Friedrichstraße - Französische Straße - Berlin Mitte
    about a year ago via OpenBuildings.com