The vertical hospital design of Sanatorium Martel de Janville

Who were the masterminds behind the Sanatorium Martel de Janville? Architects Pol Abraham and Henry Jacques Le Même envisioned a structure that concentrated all medical services within a single building. This design represented a shift from the horizontal models that presided over sanatoriums since the 1860s toward a vertical model linked to the rationalization of care devices, prefiguring the modern hospital organized into distinct, superimposed services.

What happened in 1937? This treatment center opened its doors with 170 individual rooms for military officers and non-commissioned officers suffering from pulmonary tuberculosis. The individual treatment rooms, whose furniture was designed by Jean Prouvé and Jules Leleu, were a particular focus for the architects. The building's three wings develop around a double axis articulated on two semi-circular entrances and topped by a sculptural conical chimney, creating a contrast between rectilinear and curved forms.

Did the building survive the changing world? It suffered from chronic under-utilization after a 1970s administrative conversion and finally ceased all medical activity in 2006. Since being converted into housing, the building has been repainted orange, as it was in the 1930s. A military helicopter crashed nearby in 1943; while some suggest it was a rescue mission for young alpine climbers, others consider it more likely that the aircraft was transporting a V2 rocket propeller to a wind tunnel at Mont-Lachat.

What is its status today? The building and its park were inscribed as monuments historiques in 2008. It stands as a significant witness to the evolution of hospital architecture, featuring long collective treatment galleries and individual 'cure cells' that allowed for the unrestricted stacking of levels while ensuring medical supervision of patients in the alpine air.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons