Built in the immediate vicinity of Les Mélèzes and La Roseraie villas, Les Genévriers villa was constructed in 1911 by architects James Warnery and Léon Le Bel for Antoine Gras, a former merchant in Guadalajara.
The villa has a square floor plan and is covered by a broken-slope pavilion roof that incorporates the veranda, which is no longer treated as an extension. The unplastered elevation is distinguished by the rigour of the openings, which have no moulded frames. This rigour of the raw cement, which also characterises the treatment of the chimney stacks set back on the terrace, foreshadows the research carried out around 1925 against pastiche and the omnipresence of decoration. The only decorative concession, on the east side, is the off-centre entrance porch, which is topped in an original way by an attractive stack of polygonal volumes, glazed on three levels and covered with round slate roofs that extend well beyond the edges.
As with the Villa Campecina in Jausiers, designed by the same architects, this intervention marks a deliberate rejection of eclectic and colourful architecture and betrays a familiarity with contemporary Anglo-Saxon architecture.
As with the Villa Campecina in Jausiers, designed by the same architects, this intervention marks a deliberate rejection of eclectic and colourful architecture and betrays a familiarity with contemporary Anglo-Saxon architecture.
Location
Location
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