Autograph By Pierre Jeanneret, 1926

PierreJeanneret (1896–1967)

Autograph,annotations on two working drawings, cyanotype print on paperand pencil annotations. 1926

DrawingNo. 1 (No. 679-1) 50.5 cm x 90.5 cm
PlanNo. 2 (No. 679-2) 39.5 cm x 89 cm

Goodoverall condition. Crease, irregular edges, a small tearalong a fold on plan 679-2.

The twoprints presented here are construction drawings for aswinging metal gate. Bordered by the Parisiancompany “La Manutention Rationnelle,” they are datedFebruary 5, 1926.
On the backof each, the drawing number, the name“Jeanneret,” and a company date stampindicating March 20, 1926. On one, the word“installer” has been added; on the other, a self-adhesive labelreading “Appendix No. 269 .”

LeCorbusier and Pierre Jeanneret in the Bordeaux region:

Aside fromthe Château de Podensac (southern Gironde), a 1917 projectdesigned by the future Le Corbusier, Charles Edouart Jeanneret, whilehe was serving as a consulting architect for apublic works company, the presence of works by LeCorbusier/Jeanneret in the Gironde is owed to the wealthy Bordeaux industrialist Henri Frugès.A lover of the arts and progress, Frugès had already made a name for himself asa patron by commissioning the complete renovation of hisprivate mansion in the center of Bordeaux. The Hôtel Frugès, whoseconstruction would last nearly 15 years (1913–1927), was intended to be modern andreflect the arts of its time. Led by architect PierreFerret, the building was constructed and adorned with works by Jean Dupas,Edgart Brant, Jean Dunand, René Lalique, and René Buthaud …

In 1923,after reading “Toward an Architecture,” published that sameyear, Frugès wrote to Le Corbusier and commissioned his firstproject. It consisted of six houses and a cafeteria tocomplement a sawmill that the client had just acquired inthe forest town of Lège. This small housing development was completed in1925. But as early as 1924, Frugès placed a new commission of a completelydifferent scale: a new residential neighborhood of about one hundredsingle-family homes in the town of Pessac, in the suburbsof Bordeaux.
Duringthe same period, archives held by the Pessac town hallreveal that Le Corbusier and Jeanneret were exploring severalother projects for Frugès, including an unrealized plan tobuild a new factory.

Inthe spring of 1926, Pierre Jeanneret was therefore in Pessac to oversee thecompletion of the Quartier Moderne Frugès (QMF) project, which was delivered onJune 6, 1926.

Provenance:

The twocyanotype prints in question come from a descendant ofthe Frugès family. In the late 1990s, a Bordeaux dealerpurchased from her a file containing the archives of the construction ofthe Hôtel Frugès. Among this thick file, he found our twodocuments bearing the name Jeanneret on the back. Believing that thesedocuments were related to the QMF, he removed them from the HôtelFrugès file.
Afterhaving these documents examined in 2025 by theheritage department of the city of Pessac, it turned out that theseconstruction drawings did not correspond to the Pessac project. However,“La Manutention Rationnelle” is indeed a companycommissioned for the QMF construction site, and this type of annotatedcyanotype print is frequently found in the archives. In the opinion of theCity of Pessac’s heritage department, our documents are indeed related toof Pierre Jeanneret in Gironde in 1926 but must correspond toanother study that Frugès may have commissioned from the LeCorbusier / Jeanneret firm.

Attribution:

Weknow that the drafting of construction drawings is traditionallyentrusted to the contractor responsible for carrying out the work.However, prior to any work beginning, these documents must be approvedby the project manager in charge of overseeing the construction.
Since PierreJeanneret was the architect on site responsible for overseeing constructionof the QMF, and since these documents were found in anarchive file belonging to the project owner, it is highly likely that thetechnical annotations on these drawings were made byPierre Jeanneret.

It isalso likely that this metalwork wasdesigned for the Hôtel Frugès.

References:
-Heritage Department of the City of Pessachttps://citefrugeslecorbusier.pessac.fr/
-Le Corbusier Foundation https://www.fondationlecorbusier.fr/
- CanadianCanadian Centre for Architecture – Pierre Jeanneret Collectionhttps://www.cca.qc.ca/fr/
- MériméeDatabase https://pop.culture.gouv.fr/recherche