Palais de Tokyo. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

谁是Lacaton & Vassal？关于2021年普利兹克建筑奖获得者的15件事
Who Are Lacaton & Vassal? 15 Things to Know About the 2021 Pritzker Architecture Laureates

由专筑网邢子，小R编译

Lacaton & Vassal，这个获得2021年普利兹克奖的法国建筑事务所，以不同于平常的形式和材料方法，为建筑领域带来了开放和慷慨的全新视野。

在屡获殊荣的作品背后，Lacaton & Vassal因其在住房项目上的努力而脱颖而出，他们不把现有的东西看作是问题，总是以积极的眼光看待现状。探索这对法国二人组的故事、思想和项目背后的15件事，对于所有认为建筑可以改变生活的人们来说，将是巨大的灵感来源。

With a formal and material approach that differs from the scenarios we usually find in Architecture, Lacaton & Vassal —a French practice that marks its influence in contemporary times by being awarded the Pritzker Prize 2021— brings an open and generous vision to the field.
Behind an award-winning portfolio of works, Lacaton & Vassal stand out mainly for their efforts in housing projects, not seeing the existing as a problem and always looking with positive eyes. Discover 15 facts behind the French duo’s stories, thoughts, and projects that serve as a great source of inspiration for all those who see architecture as a life-changing tool.


Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal. Photo courtesy of Laurent Chalet

1. Anne Lacaton（1955年，法国圣帕杜）和Jean-Philippe Vassal（1954年，摩洛哥卡萨布兰卡）于上世纪70年代末在école Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture et de Paysage de Bordeaux学院接受建筑培训时相识。如今两人都在巴黎工作和居住。

2. Lacaton继续在波尔多蒙田大学攻读城市规划硕士学位（1984年），而Vassal则去到西非尼日尔从事城市规划工作。Lacaton经常去看望Vassal，他们的建筑理论就是从那里开始的，深受美丽的尼日尔沙漠景观和谦逊的节约资源态度影响。

“尼日尔是世界上最贫穷的国家之一，但尼日尔人确是如此不可思议，如此慷慨，他们似乎做了什么，又没什么大改变，这里总是缺乏资源，人们却很乐观，充满了诗意和创造力，是第二个建筑学派。”Vassal回忆道。

据Lacaton说，2003年在Oris-no24，他们刚到尼日尔时，感到非常震惊，因为尼日尔没有任何可以称得上教学意义的建筑。看到非常简单和基本的房屋，稻草屋顶和泥土结构，“给我巨大的心理上的震撼”，她补充说。几个月后，他们完全摆脱了所学的知识，开始观察和分析细节，以及了解人们在这种情况下的生活方式，并且改变了他们的建筑概念。

1. Anne Lacaton (1955, Saint-Pardoux, France) and Jean-Philippe Vassal (1954, Casablanca, Morocco) met in the late 1970s during their architectural training at école Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture et de Paysage de Bordeaux. Today both work and reside in Paris.
2. Lacaton went on to pursue a Masters in Urban Planning from Bordeaux Montaigne University (1984), while Vassal relocated to Niger, West Africa, to practice urban planning. Lacaton often visited Vassal, and it was there that the genesis of their architectural doctrine began, as they were profoundly influenced by the beauty and humility of sparing resources within the country’s desert landscapes.
“Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world, and the people are so incredible, so generous, doing nearly everything with nothing, finding resources all the time, but with optimism, full of poetry and inventiveness. It was really a second school of architecture,” recalls Vassal.
According to Lacaton, back in 2003 in Oris - no 24, they were shocked when they first arrived in Niger, since there was no architecture in its taught sense. To see very simple and basic houses with straw roofs and earth construction was "like an earthquake in the mind". She adds that, after some months they were completely free of what they had learnt and started to observe and analyse the details and how people lived in this context, absorbing examples that changed their architectural concepts.


Transformation of G, H, I Buildings, Grand Parc. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

3. 在尼日尔尼亚美，Lacaton和Vassal建造了他们的第一个联合项目，即用当地的灌木枝条建造的草屋，结果令人惊讶的是，草屋并不耐用，完工后两年就被风吹走了。他们决心不拆除可以挽回的东西，而是要使已经存在的东西可持续发展，从而通过加建来扩展，尊重简单的奢侈，并提出新的可能性。

4. 他们在巴黎成立了Lacaton & Vassal公司（1987年），此后，他们通过设计新建筑和变革性项目展现了他们的见解。30多年来，他们设计了众多私人和社会住房、文化和学术机构、公共空间和城市战略。二人的建筑反映了他们对社会正义和可持续发展的倡导，通过经济和生态材料策略，优先考虑空间的宽敞和使用的自由。

3. In Niamey, Niger, Lacaton and Vassal built their first joint project, a straw hut, constructed with locally sourced bush branches, which yielded surprising impermanence, relenting to the wind within two years of completion. They vowed to never demolish what could be redeemed and instead, make sustainable what already exists, thereby extending through addition, respecting the luxury of simplicity, and proposing new possibilities.
4. They established Lacaton & Vassal in Paris (1987), and have since demonstrated boldness through their design of new buildings and transformative projects. For over three decades, they have designed private and social housing, cultural and academic institutions, public space, and urban strategies. The duo’s architecture reflects their advocacy of social justice and sustainability, by prioritizing a generosity of space and freedom of use through economical and ecological materials.


Multipurpose Theater. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

5. Lacaton & Vassal从内到外共同完成一个项目，他们想象人们将如何在空间中活动和生活，这些为他们想要建立的内部和外部关系提供答案，比如“你想不想看与想不想被看”。对于这对创意夫妇来说，外立面及材料往往出现在项目过程的最后。

6. 正如Andrew Ayers在《建筑评论》N°1463（2019）中写道：“这对组合的精神体现在19世纪植物园的适应性玻璃屋，暗示了空间中固有的所有可能性，这是他们作品的标志”。这句话强调了二人的主要灵感来源之一是为人们提供身体和情感上的健康环境。这也是第一个应用温室技术创造生物气候条件的项目，Lacaton和Vassal利用阳光，与自然通风、遮阳和隔热相结合，创造出可调节和理想的微气候。

5. Lacaton & Vassal develops a project from inside to outside. The studio tries to imagine how people are going to move and live in the space. Offering answers to the kind of interior and exterior relationships they want to establish, such as "if you want to see or not, if you want to be seen or not", for the creative couple, the façade and its materials come often at the very end of the projectual process.
6. As Andrew Ayers writes in The Architectural Review N°1463 (2019), “The duo’s mental archive includes the acclimatisation glasshouses of 19th-century botanic gardens, which suggest all possibilities inherent in the intermediary spaces that are a hallmark of their oeuvre”. This statement highlights one of the duo’s main inspirational sources, to provide physical and emotional wellbeing.The Latapie House in Floirac, France (1993) was the first project they worked on after coming back from Niger. It was also the first intervention where greenhouse technologies to create bioclimatic conditions were applied. Lacaton & Vassal used the sun, in harmony with natural ventilation, solar shading and insulation, to create adjustable and desirable microclimates.


Latapie House. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

“从很早开始，我们就研究了植物园的温室，脆弱的植物给我们留下深刻印象，那里有温和的光线和透明的氛围，以及简单地调节户外气候的能力。这是一种氛围和感觉，我们有兴趣将这种精致的感觉带到建筑中去。”Lacaton分享道。

"From very early on, we studied the greenhouses of botanic gardens with their impressive fragile plants, the beautiful light and transparency, and ability to simply transform the outdoor climate. It’s an atmosphere and a feeling, and we were interested in bringing that delicacy to architecture,” shares Lacaton. "


Latapie House. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

7. 通过新建和改造建筑物，尊重原有的建筑是他们工作的真实内容。法国Cap Ferret的一座私人住宅（1998年）建在阿卡松湾沿岸一块未开发的土地上，目标是尽量减少对自然环境的破坏。建筑师没有移走场地上的46棵树，而是培育了当地的植被，将住宅抬高，并在与之相交的树干周围建造，让居住者可以生活在植物间。

Lacaton解释说：“如果你花时间和精力去仔细观察，已有的东西是有价值的。事实上，这是一个观察的问题，用新的眼光、关注和精确的方式去接近一个地方......去了解它的价值和缺失，看看我们可以如何改变这种情况，并保留现有事物的所有价值。”

7. Through both new construction and the transformation of buildings, honoring the pre-existing is authentic to their work. A private residence in Cap Ferret, France (1998) was built on an undeveloped plot along Arcachon Bay, with the goal of minimal disruption to the natural environment. Rather than remove the 46 trees on the site, the architects nurtured the native vegetation, elevating the home and constructing around the trunks that intersected it, allowing occupants to live among the plant life.
Lacaton explains, "the pre-existing has value if you take the time and effort to look at it carefully. In fact, it’s a question of observation, of approaching a place with fresh eyes, attention and precision… to understand the values and the lacks, and to see how we can change the situation while keeping all the values of what is already there.”


Cap Ferret House. Photo courtesy of Lacaton & Vassal

8. 在《Zeppelin》第148期（2019年）对Ioana Zacharias Vultur的采访中，Anne Lacaton谈到了电影摄影对于他们的工作的影响。她解释说：“电影导演将他的电影建立在‘一系列微序列’之上，而且总是保持‘运动’，每个序列都创造了空间。这些序列在现实中一般不具有空间上的连续性，也不具有真实的接近性。蒙太奇作品创造了统一性，制造了一个场所，由所有这些序列组成。事实上，同时存在着很多“空间的碎片”，项目的概念是如何组装一个碎片到另一个碎片？如何创造连接点和门槛？对我们来说，这就是‘空间的生产’和建筑。”

9. Anne Lacaton认为，社会住房“不应构成一个特定的类别”，因为“在补贴业务的背景下工作并不要求人们改变自己的思维方式以及对人民最优生活条件的想象”。

8. In an interview with Ioana Zacharias Vultur in Zeppelin n°148 (2019), Anne Lacaton talks about how cinematography influenced their work. She explains that: “The film director builds his movie upon ‘a series of micro-sequences’ and there is always ‘movement’: each sequence creates spaces. These sequences do not have in general a spatial continuity in reality or the real proximity. It is the montage work, which creates unity, which fabricates a place, composed of all those sequences. Actually there are ‘fragments of space’, and the conception of the project is the assembly and the way we pass from one fragment to the other, how we create joints, thresholds. For us it is “the production of space” and architecture."
9. Most known as one of the inventors of a new approach to conceiving social housing, According to Anne Lacaton, social housing "shouldn't constitute a specific category", since "working in the context of subsidized operations doesn't require one to change his own way of thinking and of imagining the best possible living conditions for the people".


Transformation of G, H, I Buildings, Grand Parc. Photo © Laurian Ghinitoiu

10. 在他们的整个职业生涯中，建筑师拒绝了要求拆除社会住房的城市规划，而是注重从内到外的设计，优先考虑建筑物居民的福利和他们对更大空间的愿望。与Frédéric Druot和Christophe Hutin一起，Lacaton & Vassal改造了法国波尔多Grand Parc的三栋建筑内的530个单元（2017年），改善了功能，更值得一提的是，在施工期间，他们为每个单元增加了宽大的灵活空间，不使其居民流离失所，并保持住户的租金稳定。

“我们从不把现有的东西看作是一个问题。我们用积极的眼光看问题，因为我们有机会利用现有的东西做更多的事情。”Lacaton说，“我们去了一些建筑会被拆除的地方，遇到了一些人、一些家庭，他们对自己的住房很有感情，即使现状并不好。他们反对拆迁，因为他们希望留在自己的社区，这是一个善意的问题。”Vassal继续说道。

这个对三座大型社会住宅的创新改造项目获得了2019年欧盟当代建筑奖——密斯-凡德罗奖，该建筑因“从根本上改善了居住者的空间和生活质量”，以及优化了他们的经济和生活成本而受到称赞。

10. Throughout their careers, the architects have rejected city plans calling for the demolition of social housing, focusing instead on designing from the inside out to prioritize the welfare of a building’s inhabitants and their unanimous desires for larger spaces. Alongside Frédéric Druot and Christophe Hutin, Lacaton & Vassal transformed 530 units within three buildings at Grand Parc in Bordeaux, France (2017) to upgrade technical functions but more notably, to add generous flexible spaces to each unit without displacing its residents during construction, and while maintaining rent stability for the occupants.
“We never see the existing as a problem. We look with positive eyes because there is an opportunity of doing more with what we already have,” states Lacaton. “We went to places where buildings would have been demolished and we met people, families who were attached to their housing, even if the situation was not the best. They were most often opposed to the demolition because they wished to stay in their neighborhood. It’s a question of kindness,” continues Vassal.
This innovative renovation of three large blocks of social housing has been awarded with the 2019 European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture – Mies van der Rohe Award. The building was praised for “radically improving the space and quality of life of its occupants” and for optimizing their economic and environmental cost of living.


Transformation of G, H, I Buildings, Grand Parc. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

11. 两位建筑师也都活跃在建筑教育领域，Lacaton自2017年起担任瑞士联邦理工学院苏黎世联邦理工学院建筑与设计系副教授，她曾在欧洲和美国的其他大学担任客座教授。Vassal自2012年起担任柏林艺术大学副教授，此前也曾在包括母校在内的德国和法国其他大学任教，他们还一起在意大利、法国和瑞士担任过客座教授。

Anne Lacaton曾提到，她和她的学生一起使用的设计方法是基于建立一个空间碎片的集合。事实上，“每一个碎片都能说明空间的质量，例如使用情况、与其他空间的关系、气氛、感觉”。

11. Both architects are also active in the field of Architecture education. Lacaton has been an associate professor of Architecture and Design at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich since 2017, and she has been a visiting professor across other universities in Europe and the USA. Vassal has been an associate professor at Universität der Künste Berlin since 2012 and has previously taught at other universities in Germany and France, including his alma mater. Together, they have held visiting professorships in Italy, France and Switzerland.
Anne Lacaton has mentioned that she uses a design method with her students based on building up a collection of fragments of spaces. In fact, “each fragment speaks to a quality of the space: usage, relation with other spaces, atmospheres, sensations”.


école Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Nantes. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

12. 他们的公司已经构思了几种方法，使建筑成为建筑教育的一部分。除了南特建筑学院的突出设计外，在国际竞赛中，该事务所还为建筑学院设计了不同的提案：NEW AARCH - School of Architecture in Aarhus (2016年)、School of architecture LOCI in Tournai  (2014年)、School of Architecture in Paris Val de Seine  (2002年)、School of Architecture in Compiègne  (1997年)。

13. Lacaton & Vassal项目的精髓部分在于他们对材料的选择，他们在决策中的方法，以及他们对主题的研究。“对我们来说，不是廉价和昂贵的材料问题，而是材料是否有趣。”Lacaton表示。在同一次采访中，她介绍了Latapie House的例子，他们在一开始并不是只想找一种便宜的材料，而是要找一种能完全符合他们意图的材料。在这种情况下，他们选择了塑料，因为可以用很少的结构，拥有非常大的透明屋顶和墙壁，因为非常轻盈和经济。他们研究材料的另一个例子是在2002年，他们提出了陶瓷器在建筑行业的新用途，该项目涉及到瓷器部件，用于覆盖在钢结构上，从而保护它们免受火灾侵害。

12. The firm has conceptualized several ways in which a building can be part of the architectural education. Besides the prominent design of the Nantes School of Architecture, in international competitions, the office has submitted different proposals for architecture schools: NEW AARCH - School of Architecture in Aarhus (2016), School of architecture LOCI in Tournai (2014), School of Architecture in Paris Val de Seine (2002), School of Architecture in Compiègne (1997).
13. Part of the refinement of Lacaton & Vassal projects lies in their choice of materials, the approach they bring to their decisions, and the research they produce on this topic. “For us it is not a matter of cheap and expensive material. Material is interesting or not'', stated Lacaton before. In the same interview she presents the example of the Latapie House where they didn't try at the beginning to find just a cheap material but the one that would completely go along with their intentions. In this case, the plastic material was selected since it gives the ability to have very large transparent roofs and walls, with few structures, because it's very light and economical. Another example of their approach on researching materials takes us to 2002 when they proposed new uses for ceramic ware in the building trade. The project involved the creation of porcelain components for overlaying structural elements in steel, thus protecting them against fire.


53 Units, Low-Rise Apartments, Social Housing. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

14. 2018年，Lacaton & Vassal的作品在Central Pavilion占据了一席之地，成为第16届国际建筑展La Biennale di Venezia的一部分，该展览由Grafton Architects——2020年普利兹克奖得主策划。这个被称为"使用自由"的展览"深入挖掘每个项目，以找到一种新的理解，一种释放潜在的、未被发现的成分的方式，从而使每个项目都具有令人耳目一新的创造性，同时又是快乐和严肃的。对他们来说，空间的慷慨、使用的自由和经济拥有不可分割的价值。

14 In 2018, Lacaton & Vassal were part of the16th International Architecture Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia, by occupying a room in the Central Pavilion, curated by Grafton Architects - the 2020 Pritzker Prize laureates. Called “Freedom of Use” the exhibition was a “dig deep into each project to find a new understanding, a way to release latent, undiscovered components, so that each project is refreshingly inventive, simultaneously joyful and serious. (...) For them, generosity of space, freedom of use and economy are inseparable values” .


House in Bordeaux. Photo courtesy of Philippe Ruault

15. 除了在2019年获得Fundació Mies van der Rohe的奖项、欧盟当代建筑奖，Lacaton & Vassal还获得了终身成就奖，2016年Trienal de Lisboa、2020年BDA大奖，与Druot获得2018年全球可持续建筑奖，Cité de l'Architecture & du Patrimoine，2016年Académie d'Architecture金奖，2016年Heinrich Tessenow奖章，2014年视觉艺术Rolf Schock奖，2011年Villum基金会和Velux基金会的日光与建筑构件奖，2009年英国皇家建筑师协会的国际奖学金，2008年法国国家建筑大奖，2006年Schelling 建筑奖。

15 In addition to the award received in 2019 from the Fundació Mies van der Rohe, European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture, Lacaton & Vassal has been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award, Trienal de Lisboa (2016) and they are the recipients of the BDA Grand Prize, 2020; Global Award for Sustainable Architecture, Cité de l’Architecture & du Patrimoine, 2018, with Druot; Académie d’Architecture, Gold Medal, 2016; the Heinrich Tessenow Medal, 2016; the Rolf Schock Prize, Visual Arts, 2014; Daylight & Building Components Award, Villum Foundation and Velux Foundation, 2011; the International Fellowship from the Royal Institute of British Architects, 2009; the Grand Prix National d’Architecture, France, 2008; and the Schelling Architecture Award, 2006.