Dante's drive-in: the inventive use of materials and graphics enlivens the interior of this new provincial mediatheque, creating a dramatic inner realm.

The library of Troyes houses one of the four most important book and print collections in France, including a book on Petrarch containing handwritten notations by Dante, and St Bernard's own bible. The town's history often ran in parallel with the history of the book in France and a new mediatheque, designed by the young Paris-based partership of du Bese-Lyon, was commissioned to house these national treasures, as well as provide the more usual civic and cultural facilities. When architect Dominique Lyon first visited the site, however, he discovered, with some dismay, that part of the cleared ground was already under construction. Bordering the main boulevard, this parcel of land would have been the mediatheque's main frontage and entrance. But the local authorities had sold it to McDonalds for a restaurant and 'McDrive'. So for Lyon the project became defined not in terms of making a statement through exterior form (he saw no point in trying to compete with the presence of McDonalds), but through the creati on of an interior realm.

Lyon describes the interior as an 'event space', that acts as an internal, mini-city, vast enough to engulf and negate the neighbouring McDonalds. The primary means of this reversal of interior and exterior is a suspended, gilt metal mesh which covers the entire ceiling of the first floor, creating a glittering artificial firmament. The golden mesh can be tantalizing glimpsed from the entrance foyer, up the main, exuberantly pink stairwell which immediately comes into view once you get beyond the utterly plain, grid-like facade. Plans to extend the mesh to beneath the projected roof of the front elevation -- echoing a similar interior to exterior movement of neon strip lighting on the ground floor ceiling -- foundered when the mesh manufacturer stopped production. However, Lyon hopes that a visit by President Jacques Chirac in late 2002 will rekindle regional, political enthusiasm for the project and help reinstate this important civic element.

The building is divided into four zones. Crowned by the undulating mesh ceiling, the main space is the first floor, which houses a quartet of reading rooms radiating around a central, open corridor and reading space, separated by plain glass partitions. By contrast, the ground floor is made up of striations, a series of three parallel zones and functions. The main foyer channels directly into the eastern striation which combines exhibition and reading rooms with generous circulation spaces. It also manifests the participation of two invited American artists, funded through France's 'one per cent for art' initiative. Gary Glaser advised on the colour scheme, and Lawrence Weiner has produced a text artwork. Strictly speaking, this conceptual intervention starts on the east elevation with a 96m long blue-glazed screen, or 'stripe'. According to Lyon, this is not a facade, but more of an indefinite edge, its colour patinated by computer graphics and an undulating 'tear' along its centre, which Lyon likens to the paper decoupage works of Rodin. Weiner's text (also in blue) is overlaid on the yellow glazing which separates the children's reading zone from the ground floor corridor. At over 50m long, it is as much a peripatetic event as it is about cognition. The text ecrit dans le coeur des objets ('written in the heart of objects') refers to the literal nature of a child's association of word and object as revealed in the work of the experimental psychologist Jean Piaget.

Central and west striations are devoted to the historical collections. Storage racks occupy the centre of the building and continue down into basement spaces. Visually, the main collection hardly registers in the public spaces -- the ends of the racks are just visible from the foyer, through two layers of gridded frames and glazing. Immediately beyond this, however, is a space of pure spectacle. A token historical collection, comprising mainly leather-bound (and, as Lyon Suggests, largely irrelevant) local records books, is shelved in a huge glazed box, 55m in length. This permanently visible selection of the reserves has been framed with theatrical devices of forced perspective within the box, and ramps to either side, rising in a shallow gradient along its length. Ramps and a viewing platform to the rear of the box form part of the circulation of the town's wider tourist route. In the western striation, history becomes an image, its floor to ceiling annals fitted and transformed into a spatial illusion, aro und which people circulate without having any reason to enter. The ramps are like extensions of the drive-in, platforms from which to consume or view. Conversely,

the precious central collection remains hidden, as if within a closed cargo hold, hermetically sealed from contamination -- a quiescent space in the heart of the labyrinth.

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Architect

Du Besset-Lyon, Paris

ProTect team

Pierre du Besset, Dominique Lyon, Alain Chiffoleau, Gary Glaser, Lawrence Weiner

Structural engineer

Khephren

Services engineer

Alto

Facade engineer

Van Santen

Photographs

Paul Raftery/VIEW

1

The sleek skin of the new mediatheque is ruptured by a long tear a long its side, like paper collage. The anodyne glass box contains a sensuous inner realm.

2

One of the building's internal streets, with views through to the children's library on the right.

3

Undulating mezzanine level of the children's library

4

Main reading room, ungulfed by its golden mesh ceiling.

5

Bold graphics and strong colours animate the interior.

6

Antiquarian books line the wails of the historical collection.

7

Antiquarian book reading area in the main reading room.

8,9

The mesh ceiling sparkles and scintillates with light, enlivening the reading room spaces.