Laugh - Silo
- department: Alpes-de-Haute-Provence
- common: Riez
- naming: Silo
- address: quartier Sainte-Anne
- authors: Henri Bernard
- date: 1937-1938
- labelling: 28 November 2000
In 1937, architect Henri Bernard was asked by the Riez wheat cooperative, created the previous year, to build a silo with a capacity of 15,000 quintals in the city.
The silos are then a recent typology in France, the first having appeared from 1929. The projects are therefore still very experimental, and generally receive financial support from the State through agricultural cooperatives. Architects and engineers of Rural Engineering teamed up with farmers to develop these buildings, several hundred of which will be built in a few years, and which will even be represented at the International Exhibition in Paris in 1937, dedicated to “modern life arts and techniques”.
For the silo of Riez, the architect Henri Bernard, author of several cooperatives in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, will benefit from a virgin land located in the south-east of the city. The construction of the building requires extensive earthworks, but the absence of nearby buildings gives the architect great freedom. Work began in spring 1938 and was completed in May 1938.
The silo, 11 meters wide and 22 long, is built to the northwest of the plot, in parallel with the departmental road 911. It consists of two adjacent volumes: to the south, the nine blind hexagonal cells in reinforced concrete, whose edges are visible on the side façade. To the north, the more complex and open volume of technical and office spaces, built in coated masonry. The assembly is dominated by the vertical volume of the elevator cage. The north facade is divided into three parts: the ground floor, with its cantilevered canopy, is clearly distinguished from the upper storeys, with vertical openings and corner balconies, and a rooftop terrace.
The upper part of the façade, set back from the other floors, has vertical openings that illuminate the traffic areas and also has a small concrete cantilevered canopy. The inscription «SILOS» in letter of clear cement fixed on the building, completes the composition.
Following subsequent expansions and improvements (1969 and 1974), the complex is now divided into two distinct parts: the former silo in the north-west and the warehouses housing metal silos in the south-east.
By its aesthetics exceeding the simple expression of technical constraints and its 36 meters of height, the silo of Riez constitutes a prominent urban signal in the surrounding landscape. The building is currently decommissioned.
Author: DRAC PACA, Eve Roy, 2018
Sources:
- VESIAN Hélène, Study Grain elevators in France in the 1930s, 2013.
- KUB Agency, ARLES Bruno, Heritage expertise of the silo of Riez carried out for the DRAC PACA, 2017.
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