1. Yvon Delemontey. Reconstruire la France L’aventure du béton assemblé 1940-1955, Ed de la Villette, 2015, 398 p.
This book examines the changes to the industry of construction and architecture that emerged in France during the period directly following the Second World War. In order to rebuild cities after the war, innovative design and building processes were needed, leading to the rapid expansion of prefabrication—made possible by the use of concrete. While prefabrication led to new and exciting technical processes, architects at the time worried about the possible drawbacks of moving towards absolute rationalization of these processes.
2. Pierre Sansot. Paysages de l’existence. Essais, infolio Archigraphy Poche, 173 p.
This collection brings together eight works either previously unpublished or published in journals that are difficult to track down today. Dealing with a material universe constantly in flux, these works capture the distinctive quality of Sansot’s thought.
3. Jean-Pierre Orfeuil et Fabrice Ripoll. Accès et mobilités les nouvelles inégalités, Infolio Archigraphy Poche-Futurs Urbains , 2015, 209 p.
The first of an interdisciplinary book series proposed by LABEX Futurs Urbains, Jean-Pierre and Fabrice Ripoll explore the intersection between social and mobility/access inequalities. Orfeuil addresses the issue by focusing on access to resources and territories, and the social consequences of limited mobility. Ripoll argues for an approach to mobility as a social construction, focusing on the forms of constraint inherent in travel as well as strategies for resistance.
4. Loïc Vadelorge. Retour sur les villes nouvelles: Une histoire urbaine du xxesiècle, Créaphis editions, 2014, 424 p.
This book provides the first historical synthesis of the creation of new cities in France between 1965-1975. Focusing on examples from the Paris region, Vadelorge provides an analysis of the origins and history of the concept of “new cities.” With this book, Vadelorge makes a decisive contribution to the history of urban and land use planning in the last half of the twentieth century.
5. Isabelle Hajek et Philippe Hamman. La gouvernance de la ville durable entre déclin et reinventions: Une comparaison Nord/Sud, PUR, 2014, 283 p.
This book interrogates the concepts of “sustainable city” and “urban governance,” which were first conceived in light of rising concerns of the global environment. With particular attention to European and southern areas of the Mediterranean, the authors examine the paradoxical tension that characterizes the project of “Governing the Sustainable City “: programmed decline, impoverishment and even death, on the one hand, and yet uncertain local reinventions and indigenous alternatives, on the other.