Art & Architecture

Like its larger neighbour Angrignon, the headhouse of this shallow open-cut station is walled almost entirely in glass, and the platforms are immediately under street level. This fills the central part of the platforms with light on sunny days, providing passengers with a dazzling flash as their train speeds into the station.

From the outside, the station’s headhouse appears as a looming, dark monolith rising from the ground, a stark rectangular shape whose curtain walls of dark tinted glass recall the International-style works of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

The only opaque sections are at the east end of the structure, namely the lower portion of the walls surrounding the station’s two entranceways and on the eastern façade. These portions, clad in concrete bricks set vertically, are separated from the upper part of the façade by an overhang featuring circular lamps on an orange underside. Even here, the upper parts of the walls are glazed, forming a clerestory and admitting sunlight through the entire perimeter of the building. A drop-off loop is provided south of the headhouse.

This austere modernist façade belies the bright, open interior. The use of a steel structure with a space frame to support the roof means that the weight of the roof is borne entirely by the mullions of the curtain walls, with no interior or exterior columns, and conduits are hidden in the beams supporting the ceiling. The result is a wide-open, sunlight-filled space. The yellow corrugated metal ceiling and the planar space frame that supports it seem to float above the floor.

The wide overlook between the ticket hall balcony and the exterior wall provides plenty of room for light to reach the platform level. Besides the startling effect on train passengers, the natural light adds an airy, above-ground feeling to the platform environment for people waiting for their trains.

The platforms are handsomely decorated. The walls, like the outside walls upstairs, are clad in concrete brick set at the vertical; here, though, the bricks are set in a shingle-like pattern, to provide a texture that lowers the noise level. The station nameplates are attractively surrounded by red-orange metal, chosen to complement the colour of the lighting.

The colour is echoed by the benches and by the pattern on the floor: 42 black circles containing orange triangles. These circles, an artwork created by station architect Claude Boucher, were intended as markers helping passengers remember what part of the train they usually board.

Happily, when elevators were added to the station in 2022, the necessary modifications were quite respectful of the original harmonious architectural programme. The elevators from street level to the two platforms stand separately from the original mass of the headhouse, beyond its western end. The original headhouse was expanded on either side to incorporate walkways leading to the elevator shafts; the new façades of these walkways are entirely consistent with the old. The above-ground parts of the elevator shafts are sandwiched between tall concrete walls impressed with vertical wood grain that echoes the vertical concrete bricks. At platform level, the elevator doors are surrounded by wall surfaces in small orange or black circular tiles that repeat those of Claude Boucher’s artworks.

The installation of the elevators was accompanied by the June 2022 unveiling of a new work of art for the station: a sculpture by Chloé Desjardins entitled Perspective. The free-standing circular piece, located on the ground floor overlooking the platforms, features an interlace of straight lines that recalls the International Style of the station’s architecture as well as the space frame supporting the roof. A design in the centre made of brass strips suggests a perspective view of a rectangular building like the headhouse. The two faces of the sculpture repeat the black and red-orange colour scheme of the station’s decor.

In sum, this station’s design is strongly architecturally coherent while remaining attractive and welcoming for passengers.