L’ile de Nantes - Transformation Plan

In 2010, after an intense competition with five international teams, the team headed by Marcel SMETS and composed of Smets Consultants (Leuven), uapS (Paris), Proap (Lisbon), SCE (Nantes), Transsolar (Stuttgart) was granted a six year mission of designing and updating the transformation plan for the gradual conversion of the Ile de Nantes. This five by one kilometres island in the Loire river, originally the birthplace of Nantes’ shipyards, and later used for large scale industries, food markets and postwar housing complexes, was to be transformed into a centrally located urban and service area. The mission consisted in drafting the new master plan, advising the transformation process and designing the relevant public spaces. It followed up the famous “plan-guide” by Alexander Chemetoff, who launched the design process in 2001 and was in charge of assisting the public development agency SAMOA until 2009.

While the first phase of the plan was particularly successful in transforming derelict shipyards, for the next steps, a different strategy was needed: rather than looking at the site plot by plot, the team headed by Marcel Smets focused on the different aspects of urban cohesion. This renewed interest in large-scale visioning was mainly generated by the development project of a massive site area (south-west of the island) that was purely too large for the plot by plot approach of Chemetoff.

Through a process of urban analysis, the team identified a great challenge of finding consistency across the Isle of Nantes. Given the size of the area and the historical and morphological structure of the development, it cannot be considered as a single homogeneous island, but rather a group of seven individual neighborhoods, each with its character and morphology. The cohesiveness between these was achieved through the “figure paysagère”, a grid composed of infrastructure elements.

In 2015, Smets Consultants merged with ORG, and Marcel SMETS continued to follow up the transformation process of Ile de Nantes as partner and senior advisor of our company.

Location

Nantes, France

Year

2010-2016

Image / Photo credits

SAMOA/ SMETS CONSULTANTS IN URBANISM –ORG URBANISM

Program

Public Space, Infrastructure, Landscape

Collaborators

SMETS CONSULTANTS (ORG SINCE 2015), UapS, Proap, SCE, TRANSSOLAR (F. BOUTTE SINCE 2013)

Mission ORG

URBANISM, MASTERPLAN, SITE CHRONOBUS, GUIDANCE ARCHITECTURAL DEVELOPMENT

Team

Marcel Smets, Alexander D’Hooghe

Clients

SAMOA, NANTES