Camondo Méditerranée

Mad Paris and TPM announce the inauguration, in September 2019, of a Camondo school in Toulon: Camondo Méditerranée. Hence, it is with this in mind that the International Festival of Interior Design, Design Parade Toulon, has invited l’École Camondo.

DESIGN PARADE:
The École Camondo will have its first intake in September 2019, on a second campus in Toulon. Why?
ÉCOLE CAMONDO:
The school was looking to expand. Thanks to an invitation from the Métropole Toulon Provence Méditerranée and with the support of the villa Noailles, we’re doing it.
In fact we’re doing it with an gusto, because in putting down an anchor in this coastal town, which is an example of reconstruction, we are giving the school the opportunity to open up its horizons, to increase its field of studies, and to broaden the vision of the profession of interior architect-designer. The École Camondo is putting a stake in a territory that is undergoing a lot change, on the Chalucet site, which will contribute in re-qualifying the town, through its culture and a school of higher education in the heart of its historic centre.

D.P.:
A site which resolutely faces the Mediterranean: is that the project?
É.C.:
Yes, conceiving of a satellite Camondo school on the coast of the Mediterranean is a source
of infinite possibilities: an architectural identity, a link between the interior and the exterior, a relationship with nature, with specific materials that are locally sourced, an art of mobility and tourism, trade and human tides, local savoir- faire, from pleasure-sailing to yachting… The school’s project aims to be groundbreaking whilst upholding the development of a territory that is in permanent construction.

D.P.:
In what way does the exhibition “A map of territories” echo this?
É.C.:
This exhibition project is a gamble. By investing in a territory, a school and its students must observe it, because an interior architect- designer must study all kinds of ecosystems before inhabiting them or creating new uses and new practices for them.
A month, a survey, a plan, an exhibition, this is the gamble that eight students, from all of the different year groups have offered to initiate, under the supervision of Paul Marchesseau (Emilieu Studio) and Sylvain de Rozevire. Their perspective on the territory, as future interior designer-architects, will certainly reserve a few surprises through visual, sound, smell, and why not taste markers: surprises which might be hoped for from a new perspective upon the everyday.
This map, these territories, can be understood as a kind of dream pedagogy such it is the result of their desires to participate, and, why not, change the course of things.
This is the core philosophy behind the future Camondo Méditerranée: to be at the service of its territory.

D.P.:
Is this approach characteristic of the school?
É.C.:
Yes, the school trains designers of both today and tomorrow’s spaces, which are constructed according to what already exists. This awareness of the constructed, of the beautification of the everyday through an approach which is aesthetic, responsible, and prospective, has been at the heart of the school’s pedagogy for over seventy- five years. Camondo Méditerranée has as its mission to share and develop this.