Favoured Façadism
The 7th and 8th Arrondisements of Paris are made all the richer thanks to the architecture of Jules Aimé Lavirotte. His decorative Art Nouveau buildings are the perfect antidote to the restraint of Baron Haussmann’s. There’s no doubting who designed Hotel Elysées Céramic on Avenue de Wagram, one of the broad streets radiating out from the Arc de Triomphe. Among the glazed ceramic sculptures and tiles are two nameplates: “J Lavrirotte Architecte 1904” and “Alaphilippe Sculpteur”. Prize winning architect Jules Aimé Lavirotte (1864 to 1929) hailed from Lyon where he studied under Antoine Georges Louvier at the École des Beaux-Arts. He would later study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris where his tutor was Paul Blondel. Fellow alumnus and prize winner Camille Alaphilippe (1874 to 1934) was the pupil of Jean-Paul Laurens and Louis-Ernest Barrias in the Paris École. The courtyard elevations of the hotel are plain planes in contrast to the frenetic frivolity of the façade. The building is constructed of reinforced concrete. It started life as a maison meublée, an establishment with rented furnished rooms, before becoming a hotel. Jules Aimé Lavirotte, along with Hector Guimard and Henri Sauvage, is now recognised as one of the major figures of Art Nouveau architecture in Paris.
