☉ Telephone Exchange Transformation is a proposal by DATA and Obvie developed in 2021. It is located in Paris France in an urban setting. Its scale is large with a surface of 17.520 sqm. Key materials are glass and concrete. Ailleurs studio collaborated as visualizer.
The project is the transformation of a telephone exchange in Paris, by Jean Dumont in 1972, into a contemporary office complex. Rather than demolishing, this project transforms an industrial infrastructure by preserving its structure but renewing its Parisian image.
The prefabricated concrete facades are removed, the original structure is revealed, and large windows dialogue with the urban space. The grid plan of the telephone exchange offers maximum surface area and total reversibility. The implacable constructive radicality of this device is revealed in the manner of a beautiful ruin.
The prefabricated concrete, blond and sandblasted, is in keeping with Haussmann tones. The aluminium joinery is heterogeneous, like the traditional ironwork : anodised, smooth, corrugated or micro-perforated. The terraces and the roof garden guarantee summer comfort and offer views of the monuments of Paris