Cultural Center of French Polynesia of Papeete, TahitiUnder construction

AN ELEMENTARY CONSTRUCTION
The Polynesian Cultural Center in Papeete is the first cultural facility of such a large scale built in Polynesia. This project plays with the sun, the rain and the earth, it settles between the horizontality of the ocean and the verticality of the mountains.

Installed on a long forecourt, one climbs a few steps to reach the large mineral platform, in the manner of a PaePae, on which are distributed the exhibition rooms, an art center, a media library, a library, an auditorium, reading rooms, workshops, a coffee place, a store and offices. At the heart of each space are large, cool, and bright patios. Pôle Pāōfai unveils Polynesian culture between the earth and the sky.

A PAVILION IN A PARK
Positioned between the ocean and the mountains, the cultural center is surrounded by wide embankments planted with creeping vegetation (ferns), medium height (birds of paradise) and tall stems (dwarf coconut). These embankments slope towards the slightly lowered parking lot. One enters the building as in a grove by climbing a few steps to reach a promontory at about one meter forty of the ground of the city. Evoking both the flight of a bird, or the figure of an open book, the roof elements are organized in a rational and repetitive way. They form a frieze effect whose graphics recall many Polynesian motifs.

Spatially, the posts draw large permeable spaces like the coconut groves through which the eye sweeps. The posts delimit the rooms and spaces while allowing the gaze to pass through.

In this apparent forest of poles, patios open up like punctual clearings, each dedicated to a specific activity. Thus, we find the clearing intended for an outdoor exhibition space, the clearing planted in the ground intended for the media library's recreational garden, the clearing opening up to the sky the PaePae installed in the center of the building, the raised clearing for the pedagogical workshops and finally the raised clearing also reserved for the staff within the administration.

SHADOWHOUSE
In the Tropic of Capricorn, the Polynesian cultural center in Papeete sits between the horizontality of the ocean and the verticality of the mountains. This elementary project links the sun, the rain and the earth. It creates a shade area in a garden as an extension of the coastal park. It is a coconut grove made of long grooves which forms a large shade shelter which filters out the frank light of the sun. Open to the sky, the grooves collect the rain that flows through poles of the structure.

This device, combining a pole and a groove, works like a plant that opens up to the sun and collects the water that flows in its stem. The whole is a canopy of metal, wood and glass. The multiplicity of poles forms a dotted plan. Like the traditional habitat, called faré, the spaces are delimited by alignments of trunks forming a primary structure on which is woven a covering of leaves.

These spaces can be indoor or outdoor, in the shade or in the light. They thus constitute a variety of climatic modulations favorable to the different cultural activities of the site.