The Silver Square rewards each year a project owner and a project manager who contributed to the construction of a building completed within the year on French soil. For 2024, the jury, chaired by Iwona Buczkowskaa French architect and urban planner of Polish origin, chose to highlight the rehabilitation of the upper station of the Salève cable carin Monnetier-Mornex, in Haute-Savoie.
The Silver Square rewards “admirable work” renovation of the Salève cable car
Allowing you to climb on 600 meters of altitude difference, at 1,172 meters above sea level In the Haute-Savoie massif overlooking Geneva, the Salève cable car already has a long history since its first commissioning in 1932.
But, out of use, it was entitled to a complete renovation of the two stations and the creation of new spaces and services. The project owner (Local cross-border cooperation group for the operation of the Salève cable car) entrusted the project to French architects from the DDA agency (Devaux & Devaux architects) and to the Swiss landscaper Pascal Olivier, in accordance with the original project of the architect Maurice Braillard.
For the jury, with the renovation of the Salève cable car, “the architects have accomplished an admirable job, of great difficulty. They have restored the image of a building which in reality never existed and which is undoubtedly better than the original project, in particular by the clarification of the program carried out. The infrastructure disappears into the landscape which it magnifies, which is also a feat. Also noteworthy: the work on old concrete for this project primarily made of terraces, now accessible to all.
