The La Défense business district near Paris is hoping that transforming more than 300,000 square metres of office space into greener, more flexible workspaces will attract businesses and reduce its high vacancy rate.
With its brutalist architecture and modern skyscrapers dominating the skyline west of the Arc de Triomphe, La Défense is considered the largest purpose-built business district. But like other urban commercial districts, its offices emptied during the pandemic and business declined. Its vacancy rate, which reaches more than 15% compared to less than 10% before the pandemic, is much higher than in the center of Paris, whose vacancy rate stands at around 2%, according to real estate agents. Many of its towers are dilapidated and environmentally unfriendly, but demolishing or converting them would prove too costly.
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The director of Paris La Défense, the public body responsible for managing the district, told Reuters that the plan would be, in the coming years, to launch renovations for tenants who want smaller, but greener, offices. The plan will initially target 300,000 m² of offices, or nearly a tenth of the total surface area of La Défense. Experts estimate that the cost of this renovation will reach hundreds of millions of euros. This budget will mainly be covered by large developers such as Unibail Rodamco Westfield (URW) and Vinci.
Cheaper than central Paris
One of the strong points of the business district is that the average rent, around 550 euros per square meter, is half as high as in the center of Paris, where supply is limited, agents point out.
Attention to environmental standards could thus give La Défense another advantage over the center of Paris, where buildings often date from the 19th century and are constructed of brick, limiting the possibility of using less energy-intensive building materials. .
Paris La Défense already selects real estate projects based on their energy and environmental characteristics. The organization is also in the process of transforming the concrete public esplanade into a five-hectare urban park, which will be inaugurated in 2027. Building management systems have been put in place, making it possible to automatically turn off the lights in the offices at night and regulate the temperature. “We are starting from an extremely energy-intensive and monofunctional neighborhood model,” Pierre-Yves Guice, general director of Paris La Défense, told Reuters from his office overlooking the neighborhood. “Despite what people may say, our ideas remain very rational, very adaptable to business needs, and we can accommodate both large and small businesses,” he added.
La Défense will soon be home to France’s tallest skyscraper, The Link, a 242-metre-high tower that will house the new headquarters of TotalEnergies, a long-time resident of the district.
With Reuters (Mathieu Rosemain; French version Pauline Foret, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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