The 13th November garden is located in the heart of Paris, its historic core. It is not situated on one of the sites attacked on November 13, 2015. Rather, it stands apart—both as another place and as a spatial synthesis of the six locations targeted that night. These six sites are gathered here, brought into dialogue within a single space. The garden is intended to carry the memory of that event, to reflect the experience of northeastern Paris on the evening of November 13, 2015.
The layouts of the six attack sites and their immediate surroundings are abstracted from the city’s map to form the structural framework of the garden. From the disturbed, fragmented and stoned ground of Paris, a space of calm and clarity emerges. Walking through the garden, visitors may feel a mix of familiarity and displacement. Places once ordinary—cafés, concert halls, street corners—are rendered unfamiliar, echoing that moment when everyday life suddenly fractured. A Paris lived and shared by many that night becomes, here, a space for reflection.
A city turned upside down
It is a place where some can find orientation or become disoriented. A place for walking, reflection, and play for children. After the rain, birds bathe in shallow basins carved into stone. This garden is a space as for remembrance as an homage to life. At night, the garden is softly illuminated. Small points of light shimmer, forming a constellation that recalls the starry sky as it appeared on the night of November 13, 2015—every night of the year.
Data
CLIENT: Ville de Paris – Paris City Council
SURFACE: 3 500 m²
PROJECT TEAM:
Wagon Landscaping (leader)
AREP – technics and structure
JM Dreyfus Historian specialist on memory
Pratiques Urbaines, urbanist
Monono, sociologist
Biotope, environment engineers
Cronos City Lab, Security and Surety
Photos: Yann Monel
