Paris 2012, the organisation leading Paris’ bid to host the XXX Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012, launches a €27,000 international architecture competition on June 1 ^st. The competition is a joint initiative between Paris 2012 and the Pavillon de l’Arsenal, Paris’s information, documentation and exhibition centre for urban design and architecture. Architects from around the world will be invited to submit designs for an Olympic landmark to be erected in Les Batignolles.

 

A jury composed of renowned international architects, as well as sporting and public representatives of the Paris 2012 Bid, will select the best project in October 2004. Construction and erection will take place at the end of the year with the opening to public scheduled for January 2005.

 

Les Batignolles is currently a blighted 50-hectare area of the 17 ^th arrondissement of North West Paris, largely untouched by planners and developers since the 1950s. Should Paris win the race to host the 2012 Games a city-centre Olympic Village will be constructed on the site. Just two kilometres from the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs Elysées and with accommodation for 17,000 people, the Paris Olympic Village will feature a 10 hectare landscaped park and will epitomise the city’s approach to the Olympics – to be ‘contained but not constrained’. The Olympic Village will be the 2012 Olympic’s most important legacy to 21 ^st Century Paris, leaving the French capital with a brand new district.

 

The Olympic landmark will be the first urban project for the 2012 Games, informing as early as 2004 about the regeneration of the Batignolles area. Architects will be expected to submit designs for a landmark that will be part of an exhibition centre showcasing the Paris 2012 concept and that will provide Parisians and visitors with panoramic views of Paris’s principle monuments. It will be accessible to people with disabilities and will meet all sustainable development requirements.

 

“We want this landmark to symbolise Olympic values as well as the savoir-faire, the creativity and the generosity that will infuse our Bid and, we hope, our Olympics”, says Philippe Baudillon, CEO of Paris 2012. “We believe the Games will be an injection of modernity and energy for Paris and for France: a perfect bridge between our past and our future. That’s what this landmark will demonstrate. This international competition will be an invitation to imagine and dare.”

 

The Olympic landmark international architecture competition is open to all designers around the world and will be launched on June 1 ^st through the Paris 2012 website http://architecture.parisjo2012.fr

 

Deadline for submission of the proposals will be 6 September 2004.