Ciguë

Ciguë is a group of six young architects: Camille Bénard, Hugo Haas, Adrian Hunfalvay, Guillem Renard, Erwan Leveque and Alphonse Sarthou. Since 2003, when the collective was established, they developed a joint system of activities, common aesthetics and logic during various projects. It all started with individual pieces of furniture made to measure, made by hand. Then they created the entire series, including housing designs, renovations and art installations. Today, Ciguë is an architectural and carpentry office, based in the suburbs of Paris.

During the workshop, the Ciguë group presented their projects, ideas and form of work on the workshop project. After the discussion, the participants jointly agreed on a project, on which they worked for the next days. The work was presented at the end of the Wola Art 2010 festival.

Action
We like to create using our heads – always, with hands – sometimes, it doesn’t matter what – chair, house, mechanical part, part of the city.

Context
We work in a given context, at a given moment, for someone, for ourselves. There is always a reference point, someone who generates a project – resident, user, neighborhood, adversity.

Raw matter
We work with raw, unfinished materials. They fascinate us because they have enormous potential, they have their weight, there is no artificiality in them. Oak beam, boards, metal pipe, asphalt. We like massiveness, fullness, such a matter that “is aging well”, accepting cracks, scratches, accepting traces of passing time. We work with industrial elements – functional and not corresponding to any aesthetics. We create projects with very basic elements, raw design, sensitive, functional, contextual …