Reconstruction farms

In Cervières, the decision was taken around 1950 to build a large housing estate (130 farming families were to be rehoused), not on the site of the destroyed village, located on the ubac, but on the adret, on land specifically acquired as part of a concerted urban planning operation, after the land had been regrouped. The plans were drawn up by the chief town planner, M. Bues. Bues, who implemented hygienic principles that were new at the time: spacious streets laid out along contour lines, wide plots, sometimes for single-family homes, but more often for semi-detached buildings, allowing maximum sunlight.

The architecture was equally concerned with improving comfort and the quality of life, whether in the living areas of the houses, with their numerous windows and balconies, open-plan layouts allowing rooms to be independent of each other, or shower rooms and toilets, or in the agricultural areas, with stables and barns conveniently located at the front and rear of the buildings and linked by a system of trapdoors to facilitate work, and equipped with easy-maintenance equipment such as cement stalls and troughs, drainage channels, etc.

The architectural style at Cervières is inspired by the sober, functional character of the large alpine houses at Les Fonts de Cervières, combining masonry and timber-framed sections, but also evokes the first spacious, comfortable chalets of the winter sports resorts that became fashionable in the Northern Alps.

Numerous variations on the theme can be observed: long buildings or wide gables, side or central balconies, studied composition of openings, right down to the details of ventilation.

The Cervières project is the most homogeneous and representative of the department's reconstruction projects, and represents a kind of manifesto.

Source :
Service territorial de l'Architecture et du Patrimoine des Hautes Alpes