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Balzac high school rewilding

An educational ecology

2024 - ongoing
Issoudun - FR
Natur’O Lycée, Région Centre-Val-de-Loire

Program: School grounds renaturation
Area: 4,6 ha
Team: Étienne Maliet Paysage (lead)
Status: 2024-ongoing

Key figures
- 2,400 m² of asphalt removed
+ 6,000 young trees planted by students
100% local rainwater infiltration

Located on the edge of the Champagne Berrichonne plateau, the Balzac high school was designed around a strict architectural logic. The campus is highly mineralised (mainly with asphalt thus creating heat islands) with vast, underutilised surfaces that fail to support either student life or ecological exchange.

The project works through targeted subtraction and biological succession. The primary move is depaving: removing sealed surface to restore the conditions for soil, water, and plant succession, and to make those processes visible to the students whose daily environment this is.