Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat - Saint-Hospice Residence
- department: Alpes-Maritimes
- municipality: Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat
- naming: Résidence Saint-Hospice
- address: 2 chemin de Saint-Hospice
- author: Oscar NIEMEYER (architect)
- date: 1972-1978
- protection: unprotected building
- label patrimoine XXe: Commission régionale du patrimoine et des sites (CRPS) du 15 March 2007
Trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Rio de Janeiro, Niemeyer began collaborating with Lùcio Costa and Le Corbusier in the 1930s. In contact with the two masters, he developed a sense of volumes and artistic form that became his signature. In the 1950s, he obtained many commissions in his native country, notably from the President of Brazil, Juscelino Kubitschek, with whom he befriended. After carrying out the ambitious project of Brasilia, which allowed him to refine his style and acquire a world fame, Oscar Niemeyer decided in 1965 to leave his country, because of his opposition to the military regime established after the coup d'état of Humberto Castelo Branco.
Exiled in Europe, he received in 1967, the year of his installation in France, the commission of a villa in Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat. The sponsor, the Italian publisher Giorgio Mondadori, wants to occupy the plot he has just acquired on the Pointe du Colombier, in Cap Ferrat. To make the operation profitable, it is divided in two. On one of the halves, the publisher’s villa will stand in the middle of a huge vegetal estate of 9000 square meters; on the other will be built a set of duplex, also designed by Niemeyer and intended for sale.
The architect installed this eight-duplex bar parallel to the slope of the land. Accessible by car from the side of the building, a wide corridor in the basement serves garages, on the left, and gives access to the basement of the apartments, on the right, from where one can go up to the garden level. Pedestrian access is also via an outside street, at the rear. The entrance and the kitchen are in this area, to the east, while to the west a large living room opens widely on the garden and the pool. The wall staircase leads to a very open landing, with characteristic curves. Upstairs, the bedrooms overlook the park. The original terrace overlooking the kitchen has been closed everywhere, and some apartments have undergone minor improvements.
The free plan allows to have spacious, bright interiors. To the west, the flexible design of the loggias repeats that of the inner landing. The overhang of the terrace slab and the vertical separations between the apartments preserve the privacy of the loggias and private gardens. In their extension, everyone can directly access the common outdoor areas and the pool.
- Editor: Eve Roy, drac paca crmh, 2006
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