La Cité Oasis: an enchanting photographic journey through France’s most innovative city

Photographers Laurent Kronental and Charly Broyez spent four years documenting Jean Balladur’s architectural marvel, La Grande Motte. We chatted with them about the project’s background and how they went about it.

For four years, photographers Laurent Kronental and Charly Broyez embarked on a visual exploration of La Grande Motte, a remarkable seaside resort on France’s Languedoc coast.

Their series, aptly titled La Cité Oasis [the Oasis city], is equally remarkable. Artful yet accessible, these images do a wonderful job capturing the harmonious interplay between the resort’s striking architecture and lush Mediterranean vegetation and exploring the realised utopia envisioned by its architect, Jean Balladur, in the 1960s.

I chatted with Laurent and Charly to learn more about the city’s history and the development of this breathtaking photographic project.

What makes La Grande Motte special?

La Grande Motte (literally, ‘The Big Mound’) emerged during France’s post-war economic boom, known as the Trente Glorieuses [Thirty Glorious Years], when paid holidays fuelled the rise of mass tourism. Concerned about French holidaymakers heading to Spanish beaches, the government initiated an ambitious project to develop their own Mediterranean coastline.

“La Grande Motte’s creation, led by the DATAR [Interministerial Delegation for Regional Planning], was part of a tourism and urban development project with a name that reflected its ambition of ‘Racine’, meaning ‘Root’,” explains Charly. “The goal was not only to build an ideal city but to bring it to life—anchoring its inhabitants in this paradise, free from both the past and the present, with the dream of happiness as its only anchor.”

In 1962, architect Jean Balladur was chosen to design this extraordinary city from scratch. Alongside Oscar Niemeyer’s Brasília and Le Corbusier’s Chandigarh, La Grande Motte represents one of the few 20th-century cities built ‘ex nihilo’—from nothing.

What was once marshland and sand would transform into a modernist dreamscape, a “garden city” where futuristic architecture and nature would coexist in perfect harmony.

Converging artistic paths

For Charly and Laurent, photographing La Grande Motte represented a natural convergence of their individual artistic interests.

As Laurent explains: “Since 2011, I’ve been passionate about the new towns built between the 1950s and 1980s, particularly the large housing complexes in the Paris region. My images highlight the evolution of these often-overlooked suburban neighbourhoods, capturing the poetry of a universe that seems to age slowly while carrying the memories of a bygone era.”

Charly, meanwhile, brought his own perspective. “Since 2005, I have been particularly interested in abandoned places—silent witnesses of a forgotten past,” he explains. “My artistic work has focused on these deserted buildings which, left to decay, seem to embark on a new existence marked by an atmosphere of melancholy.”

Their collaboration began in September 2019, when they visited La Grande Motte with a single camera, initially with no intention of creating a long-term project. “We were immediately captivated by the charm of this city,” recalls Laurent. “Its spectacular architecture transported us into a science fiction setting. We quickly realised that La Grande Motte offered exceptional photographic potential, with a wealth of iconic architectural elements.”

The city as a sculptural canvas

What struck the photographers most was Jean Balladur’s visionary approach to architecture as sculpture. “His architecture is the work of a sculptor—an artist with an acute sense of form, light and shadow, textures, and depth,” enthuses Charly. “It inspires dreams and escapism.”

The resort’s most iconic features, its truncated pyramid buildings, draw inspiration from pre-Columbian civilisations, particularly Mayan and Incan architecture. But Balladur’s genius extended beyond mere form.

“At La Grande Motte, he redefined modern modénature,” explains Laurent, referring to the ornamental details on building facades. “On his pyramids, he used prefabricated moulded concrete latticework. Aesthetically, it gave the city a rhythmic graphic pattern, a musicality, sculptural profiles, and silhouettes resembling animals, waves, boat sails, sunglasses, or even swimsuits.”

These elements weren’t merely decorative; they also served practical purposes, framing each apartment’s loggia, blocking wind, and providing shade for residents.

An oasis city

Contrary to early criticisms that labelled La Grande Motte excessively concrete-heavy, Jean Balladur and landscape architect Pierre Pillet had envisioned “a green city ahead of its time—one whose vegetation would only fully flourish half a century after the resort’s construction.” Today, that vision has fully materialised.

“Vegetation covers 70% of its territory, and nearly 50,000 trees have been planted since its construction,” notes Laurent. “Umbrella pines, palm trees, laurels, tamarisks, and other Mediterranean species have thrived, creating the impression that nature has reclaimed its space.”

This verdant reality inspired the series title, La Cité Oasis. Each photograph showcases white modernist structures emerging from lush greenery; as Laurent puts it, “beehive-like structures nestling in shrubs and trees peering over walls”.

Capturing the essence

For Charly and Laurent, timing was all important. Over four years and seven separate trips, they deliberately chose to document La Grande Motte during transitional seasons rather than the peak tourist period.

“Our choice of visiting during spring and early summer, as well as the early autumn months, was intentional,” explains Laurent. “These periods offered a unique atmosphere, far from the bustling tourist season, revealing a more intimate and poetic side of the city. During these in-between seasons, La Grande Motte seems to adopt a different sense of time, one that is almost meditative.”

Their methodology was equally deliberate: working with a large-format film camera imposed a discipline that shaped their approach. “Large-format film photography often compels us to anticipate the composition of our images as if they were paintings,” observes Charly. “The large-format camera is an extraordinary tool that requires discipline and patience. It forces us to slow down, make deliberate choices and truly contemplate our subject.”

This methodical process yielded unexpected discoveries about the optimal conditions for capturing Jean Balladur’s architectural vision.

“Although we were both accustomed to favouring soft lighting in our respective practices, we gradually realised that the architecture of La Grande Motte—a city of sunlight—thrived under a stronger, higher light,” notes Laurent. “The unique shapes of the buildings and the intricate modénature of their facades created a dynamic interplay of light and shadow, most visible between 10am and 5pm.”

Beyond the resort: a tale of two worlds

The photographers also expanded their scope to include the surrounding landscape from which the city emerged. “To truly understand La Grande Motte, one must grasp the essence of the soil that supports it—on the threshold of the Camargue, shaped by marshes and wind, where nature is omnipresent,” explains Charly.

This exploration led them to discover a contrasting way of life along the shores of the Étang de l’Or, where traditional fishermen’s and hunters’ huts stand in stark opposition to La Grande Motte’s futuristic ambitions.

“Built from reclaimed materials, they embody human ingenuity and a deep connection to the land, symbolising an alternative, fringe way of life,” Laurent says. “Originally used for storing tools and providing shelter for fishermen and hunters, these huts have evolved over time, transforming from simple utilitarian shelters to secondary or even primary residences.”

By juxtaposing these seemingly disparate worlds—the meticulously planned resort and the organically evolved huts—Charly and Laurent invite viewers to consider “how the evolution of our ways of living influences how we inhabit the land, contrasting older, more modest practices with modern approaches”.

A vision for tomorrow

Fifty years after its completion, La Grande Motte offers valuable lessons for contemporary architects and urban planners. “Balladur did not view architecture as a mere juxtaposition of buildings but rather as a unified composition, integrating landscape, urban planning, art and nature,” explains Charly. “This holistic approach underscores the possibility of designing cities not as fragmented entities but as coherent and harmonious works of art.”

In an age of increasing environmental awareness, his emphasis on integrating architecture with nature seems remarkably prescient. “At a time when urbanisation often came at the expense of the environment and quality of life, he proposed a futuristic and human-centred vision of the city,” reflects Laurent.

Through their patient, meticulous documentation, Charly Broyez and Laurent Kronental have created more than just a photographic record of an architectural marvel. They’ve captured the realisation of a dream, a utopian vision made concrete and green, where the future and past, the natural and the constructed, exist in perpetual, harmonious dialogue.