Jean Prouvé: École Provisoire Villejuif Temporary School, 1956

Jean Prouvé began to design portable and demountable barracks for the French army during the Second World War. After the war, the French government commissioned Prouvé to design inexpensive, effective housing for the newly homeless, prompting him to perfect his patented axial portal frame to build easily constructed demountable houses. Few of these groundbreaking structures were built, making them exceedingly rare today—prompting Galerie Patrick Seguin’s tireless efforts over the past 27 years to preserve and promote these important designs. The gallery owns the largest collection of Prouvé’s demountables, 22 in total. This volume focuses on the Villejuif Temporary School designed in 1957. It is luxuriously illustrated with archival and contemporary photographs. Though lacking any formal education in architecture, Jean Prouvé (1901–84) became one of the most influential architects of the 20th century, boldly experimenting with new building designs, materials and methods. “His postwar work has left its mark everywhere,” wrote Le Courbusier, “decisively.”