Subscribe options

Select your newsletters:

Please enter your email address:

@

Your email address will only be used for the purpose of sending you the ITER Organization publication(s) that you have requested. ITER Organization will not transfer your email address or other personal data to any other party or use it for commercial purposes.

If you change your mind, you can easily unsubscribe by clicking the unsubscribe option at the bottom of an email you've received from ITER Organization.

For more information, see our Privacy policy.

News & Media

Latest ITER Newsline

  • Test facility | How do electronics react to magnetic fields?

    A tokamak is basically a magnetic cage designed to confine, shape and control the super-hot plasmas that make fusion reactions possible. Inside the ITER Tokamak [...]

    Read more

  • ITER Robots | No two alike

    More than 500 students took part in the latest ITER Robots challenge. Working from the same instructions and technical specifications, they had worked in teams [...]

    Read more

  • Data archiving | Operating in quasi real time

    To accommodate the first real-time system integrated with the ITER control system, new components of the data archiving system have been deployed. Data archivi [...]

    Read more

  • Repairs | Setting the stage for a critical task

    Like in a game of musical chairs—albeit in slow motion and at a massive scale—components in the Assembly Hall are being transferred from one location to another [...]

    Read more

  • Image of the week | There is life on Planet ITER

    Dated April 2023, this new image of the ITER "planet" places the construction site squarely in the middle. One kilometre long, 400 metres wide, the IT [...]

    Read more

Of Interest

See archived entries

An architect revisits his creation

An architect is like a surrogate mother, giving birth to a child who will be raised by someone else.

"There's a feeling of being dispossessed," said Laurent Bonhomme, as he walked the halls of the completed ITER Headquarters building last week.

Bonhomme, who is based in neighbouring Vinon-sur-Verdon, teamed with colleague Rudy Ricciotti from Marseille to design the office building that will progressively accommodate about half of the present ITER staff, housed in some 250 offices.

"Yes, he mused, it's a strange feeling. The baby you've carried for more than two years is not yours anymore. Now I need to ask permission to visit ..."

A veteran architect, Bonhomme is familiar with such "building blues"... it goes with the job. This time, however, the baby was special. "I've done several projects in the 50- to 80-office range but a 250-office building like the ITER Headquarters is quite exceptional in this region."

What was also special for Bonhomme was to work in partnership with Rudy Ricciotti, one of the most creative (and provocative) architects of his generation. "Ricciotti and I, we represent the two extremes of this profession. His approach is very radical; mine is more down-to-earth, in line with the four principal constraints of the building process—functions, regulations, budget and schedule."

Improbable as it was, the partnership was fruitful. Both men agreed on the essentials: using the shape of the building as a visual pedestal—"a horizontal monolith for the exuberant verticality of Tokamak Building" that will rise in the background.

Vertical slats running the full length of the facade create the ''kinetic illusion'' for the motorists travelling along the Vinon road. (Click to view larger version...)
Vertical slats running the full length of the facade create the ''kinetic illusion'' for the motorists travelling along the Vinon road.
"When you design a building," says Bonhomme, "you must take into consideration how it will be seen from different angles and directions. In the case of the ITER Headquarters it was rather simple: basically, you have two important views, the one from the road to the northwest and the one from the platform to the south."

As the view from the platform is a private one—only people working in the installation will be able to enjoy it—the architects opted for a rather rigorous, no-thrills facade. But on the contrary, Bonhomme considered that the 13,500 motorists travelling along the Vinon road every day should be treated to a more exciting visual experience—a "kinetic illusion" that is created by vertical slats running the full length of the facade.

While some of the building's dwellers consider that these vertical slats are a nuisance ("prison bars" is a term that has been heard here and there ...) Bonhomme explains that, as with a painting or a photograph, "a view needs to be framed," especially in an office setting where concentration is important.

Architects can be tyrants, but only up to a point. "A successful building project is one that achieves a balance between the functionalities that the architect has anticipated and those that the user will develop."

Take for instance the wooden window seats that run around the building's patios: the architects' idea was to "add a different material to an environment dominated by glass and concrete." They anticipated that people would enjoy sitting there for a chat or for a private phone call.

Well, they do. But users have developed another, unexpected functionality: some of the window seats seem to be a perfect spot for potted plants ...


return to the latest published articles