la préfecture du Nord de Lille
Simone Ruiter
T2B
25/05/2012
Introduction
On Friday, the 27th of April 2012, I went to Lille. Lille is a city in France, near the border with Belgium. I went together with my classmates and the other second classes. In groups we had to do a search. Due to this, we saw a lot of Lille and during our search we passed a lot of beautiful buildings. The aim of this report is to write about one building from Lille. I have chosen ´La Préfecture du Nord de Lille´. This is a building on the Place de la République, opposite La Palais des Beaux Arts. I choose this building, because it was the first building we saw while we went out of the metro. It was very huge, impressive and nicely decorated that you needed to look at it.
What is ´La Préfecture du Nord de Lille´?
La Préfecture du Nord de Lille is a prefecture. A prefecture is the place where the head of the police is situated. France is divided in 27 regions, which are a kind of provinces. These regions are in total subdivided in 101 departments. La prefecture du Nord de Lille is nowadays the boss of all the police-stations in two departments; Nord and Pas de Calais. These two departments form the region Nord-Pas de Calais. Lille is situated in the department Nord. Owning to this, the building is now called ´La prefecture du Nord de Lille´.
The building of La Prefecture du Nord de Lille
In 1865 there was a competition held in Lille about whose design for this building was the best. The architect Charles Hammer won. However, he didn’t design everything of the building. The garden is designed by George Aumont.
The whole building is made of limestone, just like a lot of buildings in Lille. From the outside I could already see that the building was old.
I could see that the walls were constructed with bricks and very precise masonry. The construction workers used the ‘Lillois-style’. Early 1800 it was forbidden to build wooden buildings in Lille, because they were not safe enough. That is why a lot of buildings, also the prefecture, are built from limestone. La Préfecture du Nord de Lille is built on poles, owning to the fact that there was an unstable ground.
The size of La Préfecture du Nord de Lille
La Préfecture du Nord de Lille is built in an H-form. Both the length and the width are around 93 meters long. The building is four floors high and has in the middle another dome on top of it. In total the building has a surface area of approximately 6600 square meters. The height of the building without the dome is around 20 meters. The dimensions of this building make it one of the biggest buildings of Lille.
The decorations of La Prefecture du Nord de Lille
The building is, especially on the outside, beautifully decorated. The most decorations are carvings and statues in the walls. The decorations are designed by Felix Huidiez. The most decorations are on the upper side of the building and above the windows. Both on the left and the right side of the front façade above the windows you can see a triangle and statue angels.
Personally, I like the decoration in the middle of the building, under the little dome, the most. There is a clock surrounded by a lot of precise carvings in the form of plants and flowers. Moreover, above the clock there is a bow filled with decorations. There are a crown and a lion underneath it.
Function of the building
From the outside of the building I could not tell what kind of a building it was. I thought it was something like a palace of someone. However, the building was meant to be a prefecture. It had always been one, but in the past it had other functions, too. It was also like a little hotel for VIP-guests, the guards and the family of the guards. In 1855 the gardens were built for the ‘Universal Exhibition of 1855’. Nowadays the gardens are just to enjoy the view.
The surrounding of La Prefecture du Nord de Lille
Owning to the fact that the building is built in the same style as the rest of the buildings in Lille, the ‘Lillois-style’, the building fits with the surrounding. This building belongs in Lille. It is still a special building of Lille, because it is one of the biggest buildings in Lille. This makes the building very remarkable.
My opinion about La Prefecture du Nord de Lille
To sum up, I think the building is very intriguing, a kind of creative, a kind of original, very old fashioned and very beautiful. I found it intriguing, because it is so big. It is even bigger when you know that there are another two arms on the back of the building. I think the size of the building makes it really fascinating. Moreover, I think the building is a kind of creative and original due to its shape. This is the only building I ever saw in an H-shape and I think that that it makes it very special. I think the building looks old fashioned, too, but that is not really strange because it is an old building.
I think the buildings which are built nowadays do not have so much decorations. The decorations make the building look old fashioned, but very beautiful, too. I think it is amazing that people can make such a precise sculptures.
Conclusion
I liked it to do my report about La Prefecture du Nord de Lille. I found it very fascinating that the building is in the form of an H and that it is so large. I wouldn’t have thought that when I stood in front of it.
List of resources
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