Centro Comunitario Rosa Parks: SPL Marne au bois's Brick Community Hub in Fontenay-sous-Bois

The Rosa Parks Community Center, designed by Atelier MJA (Maxime Jansens) for SPL Marne au bois, opened in 2024 in Fontenay-sous-Bois, France. The single-story brick building sits within a new landscaped park and serves local associations, schoolchildren, and residents with spaces for leisure, cultural events, and cooking workshops. The architecture pays homage to the area's social housing heritage through extensive use of brick, sourced from a factory in northern France. A traditional wooden frame from the Jura region spans the interior without columns, allowing flexible layouts. Reused materials from a demolished pavilion on site—bricks, tiles, stones—were crushed and incorporated into the foundation, while stone was turned into outdoor benches. The building employs passive bioclimatic strategies: natural ventilation via roof skylights and motorized openings, thermal mass from brick walls and concrete floors, and solar shading from roof overhangs and existing trees. The west facade is fully glazed with double glass doors that open onto the park, while east-facing service areas have brick moucharabiehs. Rainwater infiltrates naturally into the park. Interior finishes include hemp wool insulation, linoleum floors, fir wood joinery, and compressed wood wool ceilings. The project team includes Make ingénierie (structure), Wor ingénierie (fluids, thermal, environment), and ATEC (construction economics). Photography by Milena Villalba.