Here are several photographs of the realization.
The “meritorious” work is this, that it represents a cogent bringing into focus of elements that constitute an architecture, to wit: the structural system, the choice of materials, the method of ventilation: both lighting and ventilation, and of course, the disposition of the plan which, in the case of individual clients, is complicated by small individual details.
In the “time to come” the furniture problem in the entire world shall have its solution terrifying to a transformation of customs and habits. This mutation is happening under our very eyes, touching diversely both social strata and individuals.
Since 1928 (the chaise longue, tome I Complete Works), Le Corbusier has not wanted to deal with the problem of furniture as he has had neither rich nor poor clients finding themselves in the situation of furnishing or of building.
It was necessary to wait again. Already the Unités d’habitation have in themselves achieved an essential part of the solution; one could say by this token that the modern man has become a nomad, a nomad inhabiting apartments with common services, different lodgings conforming to the crucial stages of his life. Was, bombings, have destroyed homes and furnishings,; the new generations can set themselves up in housekeeping without bearing the burden of inherited “family furniture”. Henceforth they shall be able to enter their apartment with their valises in hand, their bookcase, their bedding and their clothing. All that remains is to provide beds (and what simplified beds!) tables (and what concerns table-size, combinations of possible juxtapositions?) and finally the seating (what concerns seating?).
The atmosphere in this matter has been conditioned until now by the furniture manufacturers – an industry taking part in the national economy, which has its chamber of commerce and which, in order to fill its order books, evokes with pleasure the memory of Louis XIV or Marie-Antoinette, or of whomsoever they want, which has absolutely nothing to do with the problem. All this does not help to distinguish the paths of the future. In the matter of furniture it can be affirmed that the future is not sketched out. Everything depends upon truly stating the conditions of life of modern society, of architecture, and of domestic furnishings. The washing machine is on the firing-line while architecture still tries for Rome Prizes.
Here, in the Jaoul Houses at Neuilly, the problem of furniture has not been dealt with.
