Lucien Kroll

Born in Lyon, trained at the School of Arts et Métiers de Paris, Simone Pelosse was, at that time, already established as a recognized ceramist.

[1] Kroll's architectural style involved the use of vernacular building materials and a juxtaposition of forms that gives rise to built environments that look more like they are the product of the incremental development of a village than that of a master-planned city.

Throughout his career, Kroll opposed the industrialization of housing and promoted an architecture that is adapted as closely as possible to the self-expressed needs of the inhabitants, even when there were contradictions and difficulties of communication.

[7][8] In applying the methods of participatory architecture, called "incrementalism" by Kroll,[1] architects are to consult, bring together, immerse themselves in neighborhoods and rely on the expertise of psychologists, sociologists, ethnologists and pedagogues.

[11] Kroll's most famous work is La Mémé—the building complex for the Medical Faculty at the University of Louvain, Belgium, built between 1970 and 1976.

For this program, which covers nearly 4 hectares, the Kroll Atelier asked the landscape architect, Louis Le Roy, to develop the site, which is entirely pedestrian.

The Mémé itself is highly idiosyncratic, involving a vast number of building materials (slate, brique, wood) and a complex, almost fragmented, facade.

[12] The buildings "aroused widespread controversy in the early 1970s (and even today) due to its their fragmented and improvisational appearance—the result of a deliberate participatory design process—in stark contrast to the adjacent massive and repetitive hospital, the embodiment of a centralized bureaucracy.

ZUP is the French acronym for Priority Urbanisation Zone, and the Perseigne development was typical of the many built during France's post-War housing construction drive (apartment buildings consisting of groupings of huge, rectangular blocks arranged around large open spaces.The inhabitants of SUP Perseigne were initially rural families moving to the city and, later, immigrants from such countries as Algeria, Morocco, Portugal, Spain and Turkey.

The site of the ZUP was adjacent to a household appliances factory (Moulinex) and employment tended to be either in blue collar jobs or in low paid office work.

[7] Prior to Kroll's involvement in the project the Brazilian sociologist, Arlindo Stefani, who spent 4 months embedded in the ZUP and helping its inhabitants to formulate their ideas on how to improve it.