Category: Materials

The Cite des Electriciens was a gridded block of housing built to accommodate miners in the Bassin Minier of Northern France (this type of housing is known as ‘coron’). Fallen into disrepair and with poor sanitation, its future was controversial.

Should it be destroyed as a ruin of uncomfortable past or preserved as important heritage?
The UNESCO World Heritage Site listing in 2012 sealed its fate, with a project started to redevelop the site. What future though for the site? Disused yet historically important sites such as this one tend to have one outcome: redevelopment into a museum. The region is already rife with facilities dedicated to telling the story of coal mining and its impact on the local landscape. This redevelopment could simply have been another name on that list. Located in a small town with otherwise little to offer, a new museum could have seen a lot of money invested with little return.

The project here opts for an alternative, more sustainable route. Whilst it does take its opportunity to offer an interpretation centre for the heritage of the mining region, it also ensures that the project relates back to the mission of the original corons: to house the mining workforce. The project reinstates this aspect of social housing by refurbishing some of the old properties into new social housing. Furthermore, it diversifies this small community by introducing two other types of accommodation, still within the refurbished corons: some housing for artists taking up short- or long-term residency on the site, and holiday lettings. The diversity of the offer, as well as the interpretation centre provide a dynamic mix for the site whilst securing it as a sustainable development.

The landscape is fully connected to the site’s use: the built form naturally creates courtyards which have been allocated various uses. The garden adjacent to the interpretation centre provides play equipment for children, available not only to residents, but also to visitors to the centre and the wider local community. The rest of it is given over to allotments, each plot allocated to the social housing residents. There are no barriers on the site, anyone is free to wander round all the plots. Current and future residents therefore become part of the landscape, part of the story of what is aptly names an ‘interpretation centre’ rather than a museum. A further garden connects past and present, growing an array of plants representative of what mining residents grew in the past. Many of these would have been imported seeds, taken from the miner’s country of origin and replanted in the north of France for a taste of home. The fruit and vegetable grown here now is used in the site’s cafe kitchen (when it is open spring-autumn). The third garden is intrinsically linked to the current occupation of the site as it is managed by the artists in residence. Finally, the garden fronting the street is designed as an urban square, slightly raised compared to street levels, and providing a soft threshold between the built-up areas and the landscape beyond.

Interpretation centre and workshops held by the artists and Managing Trust animate the site and make it an ongoing destination for schools during the week and families at weekends on top of the small number attracted to it for its role as museum. In this, the project has enabled a previously derelict site to be the centre of community activities, of social engagement, and introduction to art, landscape and built environment.