Buvette Prouvé-Novarina
Monument
Buvette Prouvé-Novarina, located in Evian-les-Bains (Département 74), is a modern edifice built in the 19th-20th centuries. The monument is currently closed to visitors.
Key facts
- Type
- autre
- Period
- Modern (19th-20th century)
- Location
- Evian-les-Bains, Département 74, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
- Visit
- Closed to visitors
- GPS
- 46.4009, 6.5962
- Mérimée Reference
- PA00118393
A masterpiece of modern spa design, the Prouvé-Novarina refreshment bar in Évian-les-Bains combines a bold folded sheet metal structure by Jean Prouvé with mosaics by major 20th century artists.
History
In the heart of Évian-les-Bains, the quintessential spa town nestling between Lake Geneva and the Alps, the buvette de la source Cachat is one of the little-known gems of 20th-century French architecture. Built between 1956 and 1958, it embodies an era of absolute faith in progress, when industrial materials became the stuff of beauty. Listed as a Historic Monument in 2013, it bears witness to the creative vitality of a post-war France that was reinventing even its temples to well-being. What makes this place truly unique is the unlikely - yet perfect - meeting of two giants: Maurice Novarina, an architect rooted in regional tradition and humanist modernism, and Jean Prouvé, a visionary engineer-builder whose folded metal sheets revolutionised constructive thinking. Together, they designed a light, almost suspended space, where the cantilevered structure seems to defy gravity with a natural grace. The aluminium cladding reflects the light with an elegance unexpected in a spa building. The interior reveals itself as an architectural triptych: the refreshment room itself, a soothing rest area and a music room, three spaces separated by two folding walls that have become veritable works of art. Raoul Ubac and André Beaudoin have used their mosaics with a chromatic generosity that transforms a hydrating break into an aesthetic experience. Drinking water from the Cachat spring here is as much about history as it is about minerals. The surrounding setting reinforces the building's uniqueness: just a stone's throw from the ever-changing lake, the refreshment room is part of a spa landscape inherited from the 19th century, where palatial hotels and English-style gardens create an aristocratic resort setting. The lightness of Prouvé-Novarina's construction is in dialogue with this tradition, without ever imitating it; on the contrary, it is an assertive and triumphant break with thermal historicism. To visit the buvette Prouvé-Novarina is to hold in your hands a rare fragment of French modernist utopia, a moment when architecture, art and industry were reconciled over a glass of pure water.
Architecture
The Prouvé-Novarina refreshment centre is based on a structural principle of absolute clarity: a framework of folded sheet metal crutches designed by Jean Prouvé, bearing a roof of aluminium troughs. This choice of materials - industrial metal and aluminium - contrasts radically with the spa tradition of concrete and stone, and gives the whole structure an almost paradoxical visual lightness. The sloping supports, characteristic of Prouvé's construction vocabulary, transfer the loads outwards and free the interior space from any intermediate support, creating a remarkable spatial fluidity. The aluminium roof, a material still seen as avant-garde at the time, captures and diffuses natural light with a subtlety more reminiscent of a glass roof than industrial sheet metal. The interior space follows a rectangular plan divided into three distinct functional units: the central refreshment area dedicated to tasting the waters, a rest area conducive to contemplation and a music room reflecting the cultural aspirations of the programme. Two folding walls provide these separations without ever hermetically partitioning the space, maintaining a visual and acoustic continuity characteristic of Novarina's humanist modernism. These walls are covered with mosaics by Raoul Ubac and André Beaudoin, veritable monumental tableaux in which the coloured tesserae dialogue with the coldness of the surrounding metal. The juxtaposition of the traditional mineral of the mosaic and the contemporary industrial of the structure constitutes the founding aesthetic tension of the building, transforming a spa facility into an architectural manifesto of the mid-twentieth century.
Related Figures
Maurice Novarina — architecte principal, natif de Thonon-les-Bains, figure majeure de l'architecture savoyarde et religieuse du XXe siècleJean Prouvé — architecte-constructeur et ingénieur, concepteur de la structure en tôle pliée, pionnier de la construction métallique préfabriquéeRaoul Ubac — peintre et sculpteur surréaliste belge, auteur de l'une des mosaïques ornant les murs-paravents intérieursAndré Beaudoin — peintre français, auteur de la seconde mosaïque décorative de la buvetteLa Société des eaux minérales d'Évian — maître d'ouvrage, commanditaire de l'édifice en remplacement de l'Hôtel de Paris détruit
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Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Buvette Prouvé-Novarina located?
Buvette Prouvé-Novarina is located in Evian-les-Bains, Département 74 department, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, France.
When was Buvette Prouvé-Novarina built?
Buvette Prouvé-Novarina dates back to a period built in the modern era (19th-20th century).
Is Buvette Prouvé-Novarina open to visitors?
Buvette Prouvé-Novarina is currently closed to visitors.