Villa Savoye, Poissy: the machine for living, and what you really look at there

A white box on stilts above a meadow in Poissy. The Villa Savoye is the built manifesto of the five points of modern architecture. You come for the lesson; you stay for the details.

A weekend house that became a manifesto

Commissioned by Pierre and Eugénie Savoye from Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret, the villa was built between 1928 and 1931. Pilotis, free plan, free façade, ribbon window, roof garden: all five points are there. The Savoyes soon complained of leaks, the war turned it into a barn, and Poissy came close to demolishing it. Listed as a historic monument in 1965 and restored in successive campaigns, it entered UNESCO in 2016 alongside sixteen other works by Le Corbusier.

What you look at

The ramp, rising from the hall to the roof terrace. Then the bathroom open onto the bedroom, its blue tiles and that masonry chaise longue that foretells the LC4, designed the same year with Charlotte Perriand. The villa is shown barely furnished: the plan is the furniture. The LC pieces, produced by Cassina since 1965, have had their scan in our pages.

What it teaches

That light is drawn before the furniture. A ribbon window, a bare wall, a continuous floor: the house makes the décor. To anyone furnishing a flat, it is a reminder that one well-placed object beats five lined up in a row.

Visiting

Run by the Centre des monuments nationaux, the villa is open to the public for most of the year.

Spotted a tubular chaise longue in a living room? Scan it on Beyit: Cassina edition or copy, year, vintage rating.