Used to be no-man"s land for ten years in the mid-twentieth century in Paris, France, les Halles is a place that reflects many architectural and urban histories of the capital of France. The decision made by Baron Haussmann to create a new wholesale food market in the les Halles area reaching its peak in the nineteenth century was understood as an opportunity to redevelop this historic area with the construction of twelve cast-iron and glass pavilions which provided the area with its unique character. With the fast growth of commercial activity in the mid-twentieth century, the expansion plan was undertaken to move the market to the suburb of Paris. However, it was not until the 1960s that serious planning policies were discussed concerning what to do with the les Halles. Due to lack of appropriate redevelopment frameworks and to complicated process related to political, economical, social, and cultural aspect in French society, many comprehensive proposals, conducted by architects, urban planners, artists, politicians and even the President of the Republic, were not really implemented. Based on the objectives infinitely debated, the redevelopment plan was finally settled up, covering specific policy-areas including underground transport, RER and metro system, the creation of the Forum, major commercial projects, housing and social facilities. The redevelopment plan of the twenty-first century seems another version of the endless struggles that have been experienced before, trying to implant a new idealistic life for the les Halles of the new century.
In a series of redevelopment plans proposed, it is interesting to recognize that the character of les Halles was closely related to two distinct urban development phenomena called ‘interiorization’ and ‘subterranean development’ of urban space which were dominated in the extraordinarily complicated process undertaken in the nineteenth throughout the twenty-first century. The ‘interiorization’ of urban space signifies a utopian vision of Haussmann with regard to a new emphasis on the interior during the Second Empire(1852-1870) when the Bourgeois manifested their identity as the liberated partisans of new ideas and new urban life. The ‘subterranean development’ of urban space was represented by the underground schemes of, notably, Edouard Utudjian, directly connected to the emergence of fantastical avant-garde French utopianism of spatial, urban culture of the sixties.
Here the study attempts to understand the relationship between the urban redevelopment plans of les Halles and urban phenomena or culture that spans from the mid-nineteenth to the twenty-first century. This will be investigated by, first, tracing the general history of les Halles; second, understanding two urban development phenomena manifested in architectural, urban practice and urban literature concerning the characteristics of the redevelopment of les Halles. Then, the study will try to show that both of these urban phenomena were one veritable thresholds of modernity in architectural and urban history in France, generating a unique parisien life style.