Olivier Rigal’s Atelier Orra architectural firm based in Espalion won the Béton Pro trophy under the patronage of the Ministry of Culture in Paris.
“It’s recognition from one’s peers which shows that we can do architecture in a rural environment,” declared Olivier Rigal, following the awards ceremony for the 4th edition of the Béton Pro trophy in Paris. . Established since 2019 as an architect with his Orra workshop in Espalion, Olivier Rigal won the Holy Grail with the creation of the Espalion intercommunal crèche. He is thus among the ten winners of this biennial which received 1,200 projects from all over France.
On the theme “Concrete in the right place”, Olivier Rigal and his team were able to attract the promotion and professional associations Bétocib and CIM Béton under the patronage of the Ministry of Culture. “The action of building always has an impact on the environment but the goal is to rethink it, to adapt it through flexible architecture to become virtuous,” explains Olivier Rigal.
To do this, a rammed concrete was developed in a short circuit by recovering stones from the Galibert quarry in Espalion. Based on the idea of the Parthenon, in the spirit of a limestone that is not limestone and with the appearance of a dry stone wall, the architect gave life to a refined and elegant building. His work, which has just been inaugurated (last October 5, Editor’s note), was in competition with the Bonifacio crèche. “It is the use of this process of a compacted, dry concrete, which requires a small quantity of water and not reinforced, which made the difference”, estimates Olivier Rigal.
Tribute to the territory
He who had no career plan when he left his baccalaureate, took to the game of a “exciting but difficult” profession, he confides, which calls on imagination and rigor, exchange of knowledge and skills. A young graduate of the National School of Architecture in Marseille, Olivier Rigal was the winner of the student trophy in 2014 with an auditorium embedded in the limestone rock on the geological site of Bozouls where he is from.
Already at the time, he paid homage to his territory, his landscapes which saw him born and to which he shows with this new distinction, a decade later, that the rural environment is an excellent playground for architecture and deserves its place as a place and quality of life. A symbolic prize finally for Olivier Rigal who obtains this prize, the year of the disappearance of a figure of architecture, namely Paul Chemetov, author in particular of the Ministry of Finance, and officer of the order of arts and letters. Olivier Rigal takes the path although by remaining on his lands in Aveyron, he especially wants to make his name rhyme with his rural country.
Project carried out with Wip Architecture, associated with the design offices OCD and Batiserf. The Bernard d’Espalion company was at the awards ceremony in Paris.
