Mediating intervention : space, class, and differentiation at Paris North Station

Abstract

This article focuses on the conditions in which the first Paris North Station was built and debated. The unique special design of its waiting room provides an interesting case, as it was a cause of controversy in the mid-19th century. Using diverse archival sources and representa tions, this paper illustrates a previously undocumented knowledge of design and use practices in the making. It is in the waiting room that the categories of social and travel classes were in jeopardy, and where the humanism of the Saint-Simonian architect Léonce Reynaud collided with the fears of class transgressions that needed to be mediated. My hypothesis is that the design of the station waiting room can be understood as an intervention in habits of urban mobility and in the practice and knowledge of the infrastructure of French railway stations. I argue that this intervention operates both symbolically and materially through a series of mediating architec tural elements such as barriers, walls, and doors