Gaining Ground

La Courrouze, Rennes

The second round of “Gaining Ground” enabled us to move on to the next stage of the project. The objective: come up with a small-scale version of each of the three challenges that received the most votes in the first round.

“Climbing La Courrouze”, “Dancing with La Courrouze”, and “Playing La Courrouze”. Over the course of seven workshops, we worked out, along with colleagues, residents, local stakeholders, urban planners and the developer, the forms these ideas would take. The result? The creation of a “shed zone” in collaboration with the Ferme en cavale ; an open-air dance stage designed by studio Secchi-Vigano for performances by dance troupes and the centre chorégraphique national de Rennes et de Bretagne, a game invented by the GONGLE collective mixing digital tools and urban exploration to explore the neighbourhood in groups, to clear the ground to make way for new spaces and test out different kinds of use — basically to turn La Courrouze into an immense playground. These three goals were made concrete during a wonderful, festive weekend, an event that was an opportunity for many different partners of the project to commit themselves fully to La Courrouze and to propose numerous ideas for activities to animate the public spaces.