Villa La Pacific à Sanary-sur-Mer dans le Var

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Heritage classified

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Origin and history

The villa La Pacific, located in Sanary-sur-Mer on the tip of La Cride, was built in 1928 by architect Pierre Barbe (1900-2004) as a manifesto of functionalism. Placed on a land formerly planted with olive trees, it dominates the sea with a rectangular low volume of reinforced concrete, organized around a central living room flanked by modular rooms. Its fluid spaces, illuminated by multiple openings to the south and retractable devices, reflect a quest for flexibility and opening on the terraced garden.

Pierre Barbe, an unknown major architect, expressed a rare modernist approach in his work, before turning to a more conventional classicism in the 1930s (as in the Domaine des Treilles). The Pacific, a little transformed holiday villa, retains an exceptional authenticity: original volumes, second work and preserved interior furnishings. Its accessible roof terrace, summer bedroom and adjacent garage illustrate an innovative design, where the circulation of domestic workers could be concealed by mobile partitions.

Ranked a historic monument in 2019 for its ground and its architectural totality, the villa embodies the modest refinement and spatial ingenuity that characterize Barbe's career. Its state of conservation makes it a unique testimony of French modernist architecture, between the legacy of the 1920s and the foresight of contemporary issues. The exact location, on the 39th road to Bandol, confirms its anchoring in the Mediterranean landscape of Sanary-sur-Mer, between pine forest and sea views.

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