L’Hymne des Trembles

Discipline : Architecture

Categories : Other categories in architecture / Concept & Unbuilt : Gold Certification

Categories : Special Award / Architecture + Wood : Gold Certification

Categories : Special Award / Architecture + Landscape : Platinum Winner

L’Hymne des Trembles is a residential resort in which nature and people become one. Integrated into Tremblant ski resort’s Versant Soleil, this project proposes a new way of living in the territory, combining comfort and life in nature, and harmonizing calm and outdoor activities.

Composed of 36 mountain condos, 28 townhouses and 15 single-family homes, the project also includes a private ski lift and a new ski slope linked to the Tremblant network, hiking trails and numerous outdoor amenities such as a belvedere, a « tree house » playground, and many more.

Concept / tectonics and architecture

The raw material for the architecture of L’Hymne des Trembles is found in the vastness of nature and the indelible marks that its evolution has left on the landscape. Anyone who has ever hiked in Mont-Tremblant National Park, or indeed anywhere else in Quebec, has certainly been intrigued by the incongruous presence of massive rocks. These huge rocks are erratic blocks transported all over the territory by the Laurentide Ice Sheet, a glacier that covered a large part of the North American continent and that retreated gradually until approximately 10,000 years ago.

For the sake of memory and as a testament to the omnipresence of nature, the project echoes what has been shaped since those ancient times. The concept emerges from tectonics and topography: an architecture to inhabit and feel the precedence of nature, an architecture as an ode to its magnificence, a celebration of the reliefs, elements and phenomena that transcend it.

The architectural language of the project has thus developed from that of the territory. The volumes of the different buildings follow the hilly terrain to reproduce the random composition of the environment. The dwellings (single-family homes, townhouses, or condos) are set on a stone base, reminiscent of boulders. Then, the roofs deploy like clever folds, or creases, and draw a line in the landscape that evokes the undulations created by mountains and valleys.

Taking up certain characteristic features of Alpine architecture, the ensemble uses the vocabulary of nature. With their sloping roofs, their wood and stone cladding, their integration into the relief (volume and access road), the various types of dwellings blend in with the scenery, interweave with the forest, and unite with the mountain. Moreover, since each plot of land has a different topography, each building adapts to it through a carefully studied positioning aimed at providing users with spectacular views, generous sunlight, open and vast living spaces… Everything is designed to leave a predominant place to nature, which then envelops each space, preserving the privacy and tranquility of its occupants.

In addition to offering homes adapted to the multiple needs of users, the project strives to create a true living environment by creating spaces that bring people together and foster a sense of community. Within the project, paths and various recreational or landscaped installations unite the different zones and contribute to a rich collective life.

The project in images