La Maison-tour

Mention Orange Prize
Society to save the heritage of Montréal, 2001

Finalist, Prize of excellence
Ordre des Architectes du Québec, 2017
Multifamilial dwelling and building category

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In this project, two buildings were transformed and combined into a home-studio concept.

The small existing residence was turned into a maison-tour (tower-house) by the addition of two floors. Three levels, three open-floor concepts, connected to create “home” in its purest state.

The living space on each floor features a different degree of intimacy, from the most open and welcoming to the most secretive:

• on the ground floor are the kitchen, the dining room, the garden mirroring the interior, and the studio conference room an accessible spaces, open to all;

• on the second floor is the living room, a quiet and intimate retreat;

• on the third floor are the bedrooms, designed as a series of small private spaces.

The studio was built in what had been a garage, and now houses the offices of YH2. It is linked to the house by the garden, which is an extension of the interior spaces.

The architectural purism results from the simplest of spatial compositions.

“Symmetry is the rule and asymmetry the exception,” wrote Donald Judd.

The Maison-tour is our essay on symmetry.