Villa Baizeau

Without travelling to the site, Le Corbusier proposed four plans, successsively rejected as showing little respect for Baizeau’s recommendations.

The villa, designed on the lines of the “Maison Dom-ino” and the “Five Points of a New Architecture”, displays an open-plan layout and free facades, to which are added a series of terrace overhangs installed on the three faces of the house to provide protection from the sun. The principle of terrace overhangs, proposed by Baizeau, would later be developed by Le Corbusier, notably in Villa Shodhan in India. The house has blind walls on the side of the access road and, on the Mediterranean side, open terraces with railings reminiscent of the deck of an ocean liner. Le Corbusier also planned a natural ventilation system: “The rooms communicate with each other all the way up from the ground floor to the roof, thus creating a continuous circulation of air.” (Le Corbusier, Oeuvre complète, volume 1, 1910-1929)

Construction began in 1929 using Baizeau’s “Tunisoise Industrielle” plans, until those of “Baizeau 2” were available. It was completed in 1930, the plan having been somewhat modified due to the nature of the terrain. The colours used inside and outside the villa come from Le Corbusier’s Purist palette (blue, light gray, burnt umber, pink, green, medium gray).