Projects

This bookshop in Chinon is situated at a pivotal point within the urban fabric, between two public spaces connecting the city centre on the banks of the River Vienne and the castle overlooking the city.
The location opens up the potential for the shop, visible from the castle looking down over Chinon to become both a nexus of programs and a short cut through the city. The project exploits this in the disposition of spaces, the design of the façades and the relationship of interior to exterior surroundings.

The bookshop, situated on the first floor above the Tourist Information office, has two entrances: On the North side at grade from the upper square via a forecourt shared with the city‘s main nursery school. On the South side from the lower square (Place d'Hofheim) a sliding door and via a staircase.

Photo: © Kapok

The entrance on the south façade is made up of a solid timber automatic sliding door carrying the shop‘s signage sliding behind the adjacent shop window. The movement of the door dramatises the threshold between interior and exterior, passer-by and customer, as, in a single gesture the letters of the sign are recombined, the books on display are recontextualised, the vestibule and display area is masked off, and the staircase leading up to the shop behind is revealed.

The north façade is conceived as a interactive mnemonic element. Sliding panels with letters cut out of them advertising the bookshop allow infinite degrees of closure. The façades various daily combinations respond to the necessities of advertising, security, display, and lighting requirements, privacy, weather conditions etc., integrated into a playful game of scrabble.

Ancillary spaces are situated in a compact block in the northeast corner of the books and incorporate a kitchen opening into the main space, making it possible to augment the program with a café spilling out onto the forecourt in front of the north façade. The entrances create a new connection between the two public spaces.

Photos: © Kapok

The internal organisation has been designed to preserve the open homogeneity of the two large existing spaces. The cladding of interior ceilings and dramatic uplighting celebrate the timber trusses structuring the space.