Renée Gailhoustet

In 1952, she turned to architecture at the École des beaux-arts in Paris under Marcel Lods, André Hermant et Henri Trezzini, the only section that admitted women.

She followed up with the Liégat (where she lived for many years), which is a large complex combining 140 units of social housing and business premises, furnished with vegetated terraces and planted patios.

In her projects, Gailhoustet sought to instill the pleasure of inhabiting a place (le plaisir d'habiter) – quality of life was central to her mission.

[9] With her emphasis on individual terraces and multi-level and open floor plans, she offered to residents a quality of architecture that is not typically associated with social housing.

Instead of large complexes, she planned varied and idiosyncratic buildings, separated by open spaces, creating new perspectives for the town and its social housing developments.

[3] In Ivry, between the late 1960s and the mid-1980s, Gailhoustet designed the Raspail, Lénine, Jeanne-Hachette and Casanova towers, the Spinoza complex and the terraced apartment buildings, le Liégat and Marat.

Her development of the La Maladrerie district in Aubervilliers, completed in 1984, with its blend of diverse flats, an old people's home, artists' studios and shops, is a typical example of her approach.

"[3] Gailhoustet's projects are to be found mainly in the Paris suburbs – first and foremost, at Ivry-sur-Seine and Aubervilliers, but also in Saint-Denis (renovation of the Ilot Basilique, 1981–1985), Villejuif, Romainville and Villetaneuse.