Ferrier Marchetti Studio combines critical thinking and production to pursue useful aesthetics.
We work with available techniques and resources, while crafting a specific language for each of our buildings.
We aspire to reveal the beauty of the ordinary, the everyday, the necessary – the beauty of the senses and of what often escapes words.
Our architecture seeks to expose materiality and renew our perception of common construction devices.
Useful aesthetics calls for mobilizing the technological means at our disposal to imagine a world that is more inhabitable, more durable, and more sensual.
We materialize this vision through a forward-looking editorial production.
Sensual City Papers appears as a free contribution to the debate on rethinking the city:
Throughout the ages and in all cultures, decor has come to express and reflect human society. Polysemic, the medium of many imagination...
Environmental awareness, real estate pressure, recalling landscapes, evolving mentalities in terms of production and consumption… Activ...
Let’s stop building! At a time when it is necessary for cities to drastically reduce their carbon footprint, the intelligent and limite...
Everywhere in the Mediterranean arc, the same questions are being asked, concerning environmental risks, the intensification of uses an...
The desire for an office reappears, transformed, at the very moment when its detractors were predicting its certain death. This is an o...
The question of children in the city has often been approached through the prism of the playful city, and in particular the production ...
For the general public, conventional modes of drawing are abstract. The fictional approach is the one that best reflects the reality to...
To meet the challenge of urban resilience, architecture must give meaning to sustainable ways of living. The balcony is that in-between...
What lasts is what can change. Three examples of constructed situations (ageing of the French population, growing precariousness of stu...
A selection of publications that’ve been edited by the studio:
2025, 14×21 cm, B2 ed.
In 2000, architect Jacques Ferrier published his book Stratégies du disponible. Unlike any other book at the time, it took a look at the reality ...
2023, 12×18,5 cm, Sensual City Books
Réel 2023-1993 is the visual counterpart of the book Essais. It inventories the entirety of the projects the office ever built over the past thir...
2021, 12×18.5 cm, Sensual City Books
Essays 2020-1996 retraces Jacques Ferrier's architectural, urban and intellectual thought through 20 texts compiled in an anti-chronological mann...
2021, 13.3 cm × 18.5 cm, 144 Pages, L'Herne ed.
The pandemic has revealed the inability of cities to take care of their inhabitants. Based on this observation, this essay questions the dominant...
2018, 15×21 cm, 184 pages, JOVIS ed.
Thresholds are anthropological constants: they can be found in every culture and every era. Like limits and borders, they express one of humanity...
2016, 180×28.5 cm, 8 leporello, Sensual City ed.
Between August 17 and September 14, 2015, we went on eight walks, each taking place within a clearly defined area measuring precisely one square ...
2015, 26.5×20cm, 228 pages, Archibooks ed.
The book examines the Mediterranean urban ensemble through uses, sensations, atmospheres and emphasizes the how, from Genoa to Barcelona 10 milli...
2013, 20.5×12.5 cm, 120 pages, Arlea ed.
We are experiencing a profound changes in the urban way of life, a changes that affect most of the population and the entire planet. These change...
2008, 19×30 cm, 264 pages, L'Arsenal ed.
The architecture for a "sustainable society" is a great opportunity for the renewal of architecture and of its very place in our global society. ...
2005, 25×16.6 cm, 148 pages, AAM ed. - Ante Prima ed.
The project is experimenting with the most innovative building technologies adapted to the new ways of working, while ensuring from an energy poi...
2004, 16×24 cm, 256 pages Ante Prima ed.
Built on the metaphor of a train journey, the book lets images parade: "I am looking for a simple and direct response to the programme and a cons...
2000, 17×24 cm, 288 pages, Passage Piétons ed.
Anonymous, often modest buildings, industrial constructions, technical facilities and infrastructures: all sorts of objects, signs and images con...
2007, 19×30 cm, 144 pages, Ante Prima ed.
This book presents the development of two projects for an environmental skyscraper of a new generation. It is not an exercise in style, but rathe...
2010, 24×16 cm, 2008 pages, Archibooks ed.
Following a 2009 colloquium at the Collège de France Paul Ardenne, Alin Corbin, Michel Hoessler, Anne Lacaton, Christian de Portzamparc, Philipp...
To learn more about our research content, please visit our Sensual City archive
Ferrier Marchetti Studio is a Paris and Shanghai based architecture studio.
Our work was awarded with numerous international awards, and has been the subject of several monographic exhibitions worldwide. Since 2024, the firm has welcomed six new partners: Amela Begovic, Marion Bernard, Emmanuel Coudert, Valérie Garachon, François Marquet and Aurélien Pasquier. Long-time collaborators, they now join Pauline Marchetti and Jacques Ferrier in implementing their vision for useful aesthetics, which combines constructive creativity with the exploration of ideas.
In 2010, we launched the research lab Sensual City with the philosopher Philippe Simay.
Ferrier Marchetti Studio implements strategies that transform ideas into actions and develop innovative project solutions. Our approach relies on different kinds of actions that answer and feed each other:
• Articulate knowledge and know-how by bringing together a wide range of diverse fields around a transversal and collaborative methodology
• Materialize research through a forward-looking editorial production
• Share and bring architecture to life through public interventions: installations, exhibitions, conferences, radio broadcasts, etc.
Jacques Ferrier and Pauline Marchetti are further involved in a wider thinking of architecture and the city through teachings and essays.
About
Jacques Ferrier is an architect and urban planner. Following his architectural training at the École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris-Belleville and the École Centrale de Paris, he created his own architecture firm in Paris in 1993 and has since worked in France and internationally. His work aim to create architecture and cities for a creative and sustainable society. Jacques Ferrier is the author of a number of articles and books and has been the subject of monographs, notably The Architecture of Jacques Ferrier, ed. Thames&Hudson. Jacques Ferrier is a Professor, he is a member and at the Academy of Architecture and was named Chevalier de l'Ordre National du Mérite and Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres.
Pauline Marchetti is a qualified architect graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris-Belleville, and a teacher at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs de Paris. She develops a humanist approach to architecture propounding design and research methods which are based on the sensory dimension of space. Pauline Marchetti is laureate of the Europe 40Under40 Award that celebrates the next new talented generation of European architects and designers.
Pauline Marchetti and Jacques Ferrier started collaborating in 2008, when they designed the French Pavilion for the Shanghai World Expo. Since then, they have developed a significant portfolio that combines research and architecture. Their work has been the subject of several international exhibitions including “Impressionismus” at the Architektur Galerie of Berlin; “Non Oppressive Design” at the DOKK1 in Aarhus and “A Vision for the Sensual City” in Beijing, Shanghai, Manila, Singapore, Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur. The Design Center UQAM in Montreal dedicated a monographic exhibition to their work, “Entre-Deux”, in autumn 2019. Pauline Marchetti and Jacques Ferrier lecture widely at prestigious venues and their work and researches have been published in a wide range of books and prestigious magazines.
Work
Innovative Places of Work:
• Grand Central Saint-Lazare, Paris • Paris Region Headquarters, Saint-Ouen • 3M France Headquarters, Cergy-Pontoise • T20 Xujiahui building, Shanghai • La Courrouze Offices, Rennes • Quatuor, Angers • CPAM Morbihan Heaquarters, Vannes • Metropole Rouen-Normandie Headquarters, Rouen • DCNS Campus, Toulon • AMDM Headquarters, Montpellier • Yidian Offices Campus, Shanghai • Hachette Livre Headquarters, Vanves • EDF Offices, Tours • Euralille Offices, Lille • Claude Bernard Offices, Paris • Shopping center Pacific, Shanghai • Sulwhasoo Flagship Store, Hong-Kong • Piper-Heidsieck Headquarters, Reims • Offices Building Les reflets du Drac, Grenoble • RATP Offices, Paris • Commercial Court, Nice • SAGEP Water treatment Plant, Joinville-le-Pont • Total Energie Offices, Toulouse
Mobility:
• The Greater Paris Metro Stations, Paris • Deauville Terminal, Saint-Gatien-des-Bois • Bridge, Choisy • T9 tramway maintenance and warehousing center, Orly • Tramway maintenance and warehousing center, Bordeaux • Airbus Delivery Centre, Toulouse • « Green Eye » Carpark, Soissons • Air France Maintenance Hub, Roissy • Tramway maintenance and warehousing center, Valenciennes • Tenesol Head Office and Factory, Toulouse • Renault Vehicule Testing Facility, Guyancourt
Education / Research:
• Collège de France, Paris • International French School of Beijing, Beijing • Marcel Saupin House of Human Sciences, Nantes • Louis Jouvet High School, Gamaches • Isomer Laboratories, Nantes • INRIA Laboratories, Paris • Interregional Laboratories, Oullins • Rehabilitation Center, Pont d'Héry • Zhuqiao High School, Jiading • University library and building, Lille • Ecole des Mines Research Centre, Evry
Culture / Leisure / Sport:
• CO’Met - Arena, congress and convention center, Orléans • International congress center, Shanghai • La Tuilerie Cultural Center, Limoux • Arena Restructuration, Lunel • Aqualagon Waterpark, Marne-la-Vallée • French Pavillon at the Shanghai World Expo • Eric Tabarly Sailing museum • Emigration Museum, Tourouvre • Multi-purpose Hall, Le Cannet • Palace Heritage Museum, Xi’An
Residential/Hotel:
• La Mantilla Residential Buildings, Montpellier • Jardins de la Lironde Residential Complexe, Montpellier • Matinha Residence and Hotel, Lisbon • Tour Lumière, Tours • 4* Eco-residence for Leisure Activities, Cap d'Agde • Housing Complexe, Romainville
Clients
• 3M • AEFE Ministère de l'Europe et des Affaires étrangères • Air France • Airbus • Amore Pacific / Sulwhasoo • BNP Paribas RE • Bouygues Construction • Bouygues Immobilier • CCI de Nice • Champagnes Piper & Charles Heidsieck • China Fortune Properties • COFRES SAS • Collège de France – OPPIC • Communauté d’Agglomération du Pays de Lorient • Communauté d’Agglomération du Soissonnais • Communauté de Communes du Haut Perche • Communauté de Communes du Limouxin • Communauté Urbaine de Bordeaux • Compagnie de Phalsbourg • Conseil Départemental de la Somme • CPAM du Morbihan • Covico • DDE de Loire-Atlantique • DDE Des Alpes-Maritimes • EDF • Editions Hachette Livre • Eiffage Travaux Publics • Fayat Immobilier • Fondation Arc-en-Ciel • Geoxia • Global Century Exhibition & Travel Development • Groupe Giboire • Groupe Blot Pierre Promotion • Groupe Hydro Building Systems • Groupe Legendre • Groupe Proméo • Groupe SNI • Housing Development Department of Qingpu District • Hudson Advisors • ICADE • Ile-de-France Mobilité • Jinqiao Lingang • Lafarge Holcim • Ligne Roset • Loire Océan Métropole Aménagement • Lujiazhui Group • Métropole Rouen Normandie • Mines ParisTech • Ministère de la Justice • Ministère de l’Economie des Finances et de l’Industrie • Mutuelle des Motards • Nacarat • Naval Group • Nexity • Orléans Métropole • Pitch Promotion • Poste Immo • PSA • RATP – SEDP • Rectorat de l’Académie de Lille • Régie des Transports de Marseille • Région Occitanie • Renault SA • SADEV 94 • SAGEP • SDIS 44 • SERM Aménagement • SEMDO • Semurval • SET • Shanghai East Bund Investment Group • Shanghai Huanyu Pacific Digital • Shanghai Jiading Administration Committee • Shanghai Land • Shanghai Municipal Leading Group for Development of Huangpu River Banks • Société du Grand Paris • SOGEPROM • Tenesol • The Carlyle Group • Urbiparc Management • Villages Nature (Pierre et Vacances / Disney) • Villamoura World • Ville de Boulogne-Billancourt • Ville du Cannet • Ville de Lunel • Ville de Nancy • Ville de Paris • Ville de Saint-Germain-en-Laye • We Love Green • Woodeum • Xi’An Qujiang Daming Palace Heritage
Selected Awards
• ABB Leaf Awards (Shortlisted) • ADC Award • American Architecture Prize • AMO Prize • Architecture Masterprize • Architizer A+Award • BEX Awards • Chevalier de l’Ordre National du Mérite • Chevalier des Arts et Lettres • Harvard's Veronica Rudge Green Prize in Urban Design • Industrial Solar Architecture Prize • International Architecture Award • MIPIM Award • Moniteur Prize • Nomination for the Equerre d’Argent Prize • Nomination for the Grand Prix national de l’Architecture • Trophée Eiffel d’architecture acier • Trophées Bois Ile-de-France • World Architecture Festival Award (Highly Commended Mentions)