The new Campus Avril in Bruz near Rennes is home to a modern research centre for the animal sector. Around 500 employ­ees work in this cir­cu­lar build­ing, which has a diam­e­ter of 84 metres and was designed by the archi­tec­tural bureau Unité de Nantes.

Its futur­is­tic con­struc­tion is con­sis­tently ori­ented to sus­tain­able devel­op­ment, as empha­sised by the solar power sta­tion on the roof, which pro­duces 155,000 kWh of energy per year (equiv­a­lent to the annual cur­rent con­sump­tion of 60 house­holds). The focus on sus­tain­abil­ity is also appar­ent from the exte­rior light­ing. Using our LED lumi­naires, which illu­mi­nate the build­ing and the adja­cent carpark, energy con­sump­tion has been low­ered by more than 70 per­cent com­pared to con­ven­tional tech­nolo­gies. As well as effi­ciency, the plan­ners were also won over by the organic design of the Olivio system lumi­naire, which enhances the fore­court of the entrance area superbly by day.

Notch bol­lards irra­di­at­ing soft, uni­form light, have addi­tion­ally been installed on the pedes­trian foot­paths.

The carpark is lit using Astro lumi­naires cou­pled with D-Tekt pres­ence sen­sors, which only switch on light­ing when required, thereby fur­ther opti­mis­ing con­sump­tion of elec­tric­ity.

client: Avril

architect: Unité

landscape architect: Phytolab

general contractor: Legendre Immobilier

electrical planning: Horizons

electrical installation: Bouygues

photographer: Andreas Stenger