Immeubles sans affectation immédiate (ISAI) du groupe Faidherbe

English translation

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History

Following the bombing of Amiens in 1940 and then 1944, the municipality launched a competition for the Reconstruction of the city, which was won by architect Pierre Dufau. The question of housing was then paramount: 60% of Amiens dwellings had been destroyed during the war. The Ministry of Reconstruction and Urban Development then launched a national programme for building housing in the most severely damaged cities: Buildings Without Individual Assignment. In Amiens, three groups were planned, including the group along Boulevard Faidherbe, fitting into the municipal plan developed for the reconstruction of the city by Dufau. The project was entrusted from 1946 to Paul Sirvin, chief architect, who engaged Joseph Andrieu and Pierre Dufau for the construction of this ensemble of buildings which provided for 200 dwellings. This large-scale residential architectural project marks an important milestone in the State's public housing policy in the aftermath of the Second World War. They become a showcase for the MRU, which desired the rapid creation of an exemplary ensemble, testament to its effectiveness and efficiency in the reconstruction of the country. The Amiens ISAI project thus stands out through the pragmatism of its design and the strategic choices that led to rapid realisation for an ensemble of this scale. The ISAI inaugurate reflections on social and collective housing which resulted from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s in the creation of Large Ensembles and Habitations Bon Marché, driven by various ministerial plans and programmes. The ISAI Faidherbe are also an example of the close collaboration established between the State - the MRU - on the one hand, and a territorial authority - the city of Amiens - on the other to meet the urgent housing needs of those affected by war damage and to manage the complex question of war damages. The intervention of Pierre Dufau is significant in this respect: mandated by the MRU to be one of the architects of the ISAI (he designed building 12, secondary entrance at the corner of Jean Catelas and Martin Bleu Dieu streets), he is also the town planner and chief architect of the Reconstruction of Amiens. The ISAI Faidherbe moreover hold a particular place in the reconstruction of housing destroyed in Amiens. They propose, on a vast plot entirely consolidated in the city centre, high-standing collective housing. They are an unprecedented alternative to traditional adjoining individual brick dwellings of the Amiens type. It should be noted that the reception by the people of Amiens was cool, although the quality of life, comfort and hygiene were particularly carefully attended to there. The situation in the city centre at the intersection of two important traffic axes, the monumentality of the plan and elevations, the facing stone enhanced by decorative elements (sculpture by Emile Morlaix, mosaics, fountain, wrought-iron balconies), the diversity of services offered (cellars, underground car parks, service lifts, refuse chutes, toilets and service entrances, service apartments etc.), the large size of the apartments, the vast tree-filled park at the heart of the block are all elements that make the ISAI one of the major achievements of Amiens Reconstruction. The architectural approach of the ISAI Faidherbe is moreover characteristic of that of the Second Reconstruction in Amiens, whose architects are concerned not to make a clean break with the past but to integrate new realizations into historical and urban continuity. Paul Sirvin, Joseph Andrieu as well as Pierre Dufau implemented architectures with classical sobriety, founded on the symmetry of the plan and the elevations of the façades, on stone facing, on the rigour of lines and the discretion of ornamental elements. It should however be noted the absence of regional character which often marks Amiens reconstructions. Here are affirmed the modernity of materials such as concrete and standardisation techniques as well as the imprint of the "liner style" of Art Deco in the curved lines of balconies and stairwells, ribbon windows and decorative elements.