Bordeaux: Contemporary landscapes

Bordeaux, often celebrated as the “Stone City” for its mineral streets lined with 18th-century façades and traditional échoppes, is nonetheless a metropolis where more than half of the territory consists of natural and agricultural landscapes. When the city began its major urban transformation in the 1990s, these environmental characteristics became central, guiding efforts to control urban sprawl, reintroduce nature into dense districts for comfort and wellbeing, and rethink the management of the flood-prone, humid soils that shape the region. The visit explores how contemporary landscape design now complements the city’s historic parks—such as the Jardin Public, Parc Bordelais or Parc Rivière—while embracing modern principles of co-construction, educational value, and adaptable public spaces suited to evolving urban needs.

This approach is especially visible on the right bank, once an industrial fringe but now a strategic landscape-led counterpart to the historic left bank. Major projects like Catherine Mosbach’s Botanical Garden and Michel Desvigne’s Parc aux Angéliques have helped establish a green framework that grows alongside the city’s development. Equally transformative was Michel Corajoud’s redevelopment of the quays, a foundational intervention that redefined Bordeaux’s relationship with the Garonne, creating high-quality and varied public spaces that extend far beyond the riverfront itself. At a more intimate scale, projects such as Square Vinet by Patrick Blanc, the Leyteire courtyard by Debarre Duplantiers, and Kléber Street by Friche & Cheap illustrate new ways of bringing nature into the city center, while experimenting with shared responsibility, resident involvement, and innovative maintenance strategies. Together, these interventions illustrate how the common good can be nurtured across all dimensions of urban life.