Osmē – Alexandra alazet

« Osmē,
To build with the non-visiblE »
Master degree of interior architecture Ensad – 2018
With the support of the Bettencourt Schueller ’s Fondation

To deal with the actual needs of the society to take back it health, the goal of this project is to give
a contemporary interpretation of the original purpose of the building : hospitality and health.
Indeed, this former public sanitary building will be soon replace by a residential building and will no-longer benefit the community. That’s why, this project is to create a new center of transmission and healing by bringing alternative medicine as olfactotherapy into the city. For this, the smell has got a convening role
in allowing this new place to be universal, sensible and therapeutique without a verbalisation of the uneasiness.

+ To introduce vegetation in the plot +

The learning spaces and the healing spaces are puting side to side according to two timescales : one short and dynamic is bond with the city and the other one is slow and private. As soon as the door is opened, the use of smooth and passive tactics encourage a curative architecture. New smells welcome the patient. The urban life is paused to reconnect with our sensations and our emotions. For example, from the street, the signage is organised thanks to earthly smells to create a sluice with the district. The city ’s stimuli are slowly excluded to encourage the introspection around the natural rythms.

+ The new entrance, the phytotherapeutic garden +

The first floor is dedicated to the olfactotherapy
which is a new kind of body mind therapy
based on the smells.
In fact, the fragrance is the first medicine of the history. Nowadays, the reappearance of the smell into health field (mainly into hospitals) is stem from both its curative qualities and to its therapeutic aspect.
This floor is an intermediate floor, visually connected with the other ones, on which
learning and healing are blended thanks to
a conference room, a laboratory of smells
and a materials library.
The patients are side to side with the visitors and the experts while the awareness of the city decreases.

+ Porosity and vertical link between the floors +

+ The laboratory +

+ The basement, aquatherapy +

The basement of this building is made of individual therapeutic spaces. Here, the building is bringing back to its initial purpose of care and refreshment through water. Three baths are thinking in terms of temperatures, bathing time and smells. The add of essential oils or medical plant extracts in water is provided with,
for example, a wall in fragrant ceramics.
The attic hangs above the other floors. The spaces are smaller for a more individual practice whithout
any obligations on the individual (no doors, a loop path which brings the visitor to the start point).
All the stimuli of the city are erased. The light is highly filtered by claustras, colored glass and mat materials. Only the copper is used as a visual borders between the pratices by reflecting the light.

+ The attic, hypnosis room +

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