In Toulouse, the Seuil group at the forefront of low-carbon architecture
Frugal architecture, massive use of biosourced materials, diagnosis of the management of products and waste from demolition… In just a few years, the Toulouse-based architecture firm Seuil (now the Seuil group) has developed a sustainable architecture approach now recognized in the profession. The agency has just been ranked among the most committed to low-carbon architecture in France. [1]by magazine Wood Sequences.
“We currently have around ten low-carbon projects in progress or delivered, and this has become an essential concern in our way of designing architecture”, explain Leslie and Philippe Gonçalvès, the co-founders of the Seuil group. “This translates into the construction system, the envelopes of the buildings, the frames, the participatory and reuse approach, and finally the budget. »
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In Toulouse, the Seuil group has, for example, just delivered the Woodart tower, at the Cartoucherie, produced with the Dietrich Untertrifaller agency, or even the Creps. “In these two low-carbon projects, we were not in a demonstrative approach. However, the use of wood has been massive”, points out Leslie Gonçalvès. Indeed, behind the terracotta facades of the Woodart tower, all the floors are wooden. Even chosen for the building of the Crepes which, behind its poly-mirror aluminum and corten steel facade, hides a wooden frame.
Managing the ecological transition
In 2019, the Seuil group founded Una Ingénierie, an entity dedicated to ecological transition on construction sites. Among their services, assistance with control of use (AMU), assistance with project management (AMO), diagnostics of resources, reuse and recovery of materials before deconstruction. This is the case for two emblematic hotels in the Mongie resort (le Pourtheil and le Taoulet). “As part of a massive renovation, we were commissioned to support the client upstream. We carried out a selective deconstruction audit with the analysis of what can be deconstructed, resold, what will go to landfill…”, describes Leslie Gonçalvès.
Hall 9: future reuse demonstrator
It is also in this approach that the Seuil group has just been chosen by competition by Decoset [2] to transform the former Hall 9 of the Toulouse Exhibition Center into a place to demonstrate and raise awareness of reuse for the general public and local residents. “We decided to deconstruct a framework of the facade, and to transform this hall into an open space. In particular, Toulouse residents can come with furniture to learn how to renovate it, or modify it for the re-employer. »
The Seuil Group, which currently has twenty-three employees, recorded a turnover of 1.4 million euros for the 2021-2022 financial year and announces a forecast of 3.4 million euros for the financial year 2022-2023.
Beatrice Girard
In the photo: Leslie and Philippe Gonçalvès, co-founders of the Seuil group, which has just been ranked among the most committed to low-carbon architecture in France. Credit: Stéphane Brugidou.
Remarks
[1] 1st in Toulouse, 2nd in Occitanie and 31st nationally.
[2] Joint syndicate for the treatment and recovery of waste from Toulouse Métropole and other local authorities in the department