A first date at Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye outside of Paris
A divine/magnifique/charmant spot for a first date, I'd say!
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Three years ago this week, I stumbled off of an airplane into the European territory for the first time. I was masked, terrified, and a little over a year into my French Duolingo daily streak. A very handsome French man, who I had met thanks to the Eames House, rescued me from Charles de Gaulle aéroport and then took me on what became my last-first-date with someone. If you’re new here, wildly, he’s now my husband. We ate lunch in a jazz café in Montmartre (my first experience eating the absolutely awesome razor clams), saw the Futuro House in the flea market, and then trekked to Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye. I was so obviously enchanted. A handful of bucket list items checked off within a few hours, plus I was spinning with the serendipity of our encounter!!
This week, exactly on our first date anniversary, we began settling into our new, tiny, historic apartment on the French side of the Basque Country. I’m thinking about how rapidly life moves and in such a way that has absolutely spoiled me. Although! It feels impossible to celebrate anything this week amidst so much global defeat. How do we continue from here? So, I thought I’d walk you through the mechanistic magic that is Villa Savoye as a tiny ounce of a reminder of how spellbinding life can be when we stay connected to each other. And even more so when we’re connected to artistic movements. Le Corbusier even said, “the purpose of construction is to make things hold together; of architecture, to move us.”
*The* Villa
If you take a car approximately 44 minutes northwest from the Louvre, you’ll end up at a residential gem designed by Le Corbusier. Approaching Villa Savoye through its dense periphery of trees is the definition of stumbling upon pure modern architectural bliss. For me, it was akin to finding water in the middle of the desert. Or maybe some buttered razor clams in a Parisian jazz café.
The residence was constructed from 1928-1931 and is currently operated by the Centre des Monuments National as a visitable house museum. What I love about the operating organization’s storytelling is their approach to the design from a humanistic perspective. It isn’t so much about the physical structure as it is about the experience of it. They say that “visiting the villa Savoye is enjoying a real architectural walk.” It’s completely in tune to how Le Corbusier intended, and I think that’s something many people get wrong about him and his designs. He wrote: “We climb imperceptibly by a ramp, which is a feeling totally different from that given by a staircase formed of steps. A staircase separates one floor from another; a ramp connects.” He called the stairs and ramps “two elements of vertical communication.” There is a clear pathway to which you naturally snake through doors, ramps, and spirals to experience the house. Surprisingly, unusual colors denote a functional transition between living spaces.
This wasn’t a pavilion of glass, white walls, and cement, but a methodical system for someone’s enjoyable day-to-day living. These are qualities that I adore about the modern era of architecture. Even though I know that modernism actually DOES equate to warmth, I was still beautifully surprised by the internal glow of this home.
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If you hear even one thing about the architect, it’s usually related to his quote about how the house is a machine for living. This particular house is a machine in the most obvious way, when you notice the various knobs, switches, and pulls in chrome. At the flick or pull of these devices, the house becomes animated. Entrancing.
Related Notes:
There’s a song that’s often in my head—a total ear worm. “Il fait chaud, il fait froiiiiid!” Whenever I hear it, I imagine Villa Savoie’s bath handles. They’ve impacted me.
Connecting you back to more Le Corbusier on Absolument when I wrote about his Keyboard of Colors. In 1931, Le Corbusier published the manuscript Architectural polychromy—study for architects by an architect [involved, by the way, in the adventure of contemporary painting](translated from French). He explained, “color modifies space, classifies objects, stimulates physiological reactions, and has a strong effect on our sensibilities.” That year, he created the “Claviers de couleurs,” the Keyboard of Colors. On this piano, you’ll find 14 hues fanned out to lighter variants, completing a set of 43 distinct colors.
The colors of the house deeply reminded me of the bathroom wall colors of the Eames House studio. Each wall and the ceiling are painted a different color— green, red, pink, blue, cream—in a palette that is oddly similar to this idea put forth in Villa Savoye. Coincidence? I’m not sure. It’s pure perfection!
- interviewed a ton of cool people about their “transcendent experience” in architecture. Dispatch #31 is “for people who have feelings about buildings.” AKA I was the target audience. Moments of existing in total awe within architecture are like the chapter markings of my building-centric life. I can pinpoint all of the strong memories associated with visiting particular homes and buildings for the first (or second or third or whatever) time. This time at Villa Savoye was the start of a very personal, monumental chapter!
**
Thinking of you,
Kelsey Rose
This!! Thank you ever so much for these words--and I loved reading about your last first date!
"a reminder of how spellbinding life can be when we stay connected to each other. And even more so when we’re connected to artistic movements. Le Corbusier even said, “the purpose of construction is to make things hold together; of architecture, to move us.”
I went there as a history of art and design undergraduate… I couldn’t believe I was in one of his buildings … so special so exciting- it was both egalitarian and elitist in some strange way … elements that would be replicated across the globe in prefabricated buildings yet a Villa designed for rich Parisian clients … the height of modernist chic … love your writings