Unité d’Habitation (Housing Unit)
Wednesday, 23rd November 2005 by Alex Turnbull
This is Le Corbusier's Unité d'Habitation in Marseille, France. Completed in 1952, it's a modernist residential housing complex for up to 1,600 people which features 337 apartments over 12 stories. Interestingly, every apartment is built over 2 floors and is 24 metres long – filling the whole width of the building. The building also has an internal shopping street halfway up, and on the roof – a recreation ground, children's nursery and swimming pool (which you can just make out at the south end).
Le Corbusier actually built 4 more of these buildings; 3 in France and another in Berlin, all of them similarly constructed in rough-cast concrete. Sounds like a block of high-rise flats to me... does anyone know what the residents think of living there?
There's more info on what the French call 'La Maison du Fada' (in English, "The Lunatic's House") over at Wikipedia, and there's a good photo gallery here, which includes some internal shots.
Thanks to Frederic Argazzi and Bertrand Capo.
About the author
Alex has decided that his title will be Senior Vice President of Stuff.
If you’re a fan (which I am) you can stay there – there’s a hotel in the building:
http://www.fodors.com/wire/archives/001185.cfm
If I remember correctly, the Le Corbusier building in Berlin is hugely popular, and it’s next to impossible to rent anything there, the waiting lists are apparently quite long. And that despite the fact that the Berlin building lacks the amenities on the roof, since it was originally built for subsidized housing and a pool was considered unneccessary luxury. Since 1979 the condos can be bought, and some are for rent.
I’m so glad I stumbled across this. I used to live in Marseille and go by this everyday on the bus to school at Luminy… I had no idea how famous it was!