It’s Tuesday 15 October and we are well into our long first day. The Atelier Recherche in Design and Cognition 2024 will focus on the relationships – or lack of – between the Plateau de Saclay and the surrounding communities which are situated in nearby valleys (Vallée de la Bièvre, and Vallée de Chevreuse).

If you, reader, are not from ENS, University Paris Saclay, or Institut Polytechnique de Paris, the Plateau de Saclay is an area approximately 20km south of Paris, where new university, and R&D facilities have been built during the last decades, among agricultural areas, centuries-old farms, Chateaux. It has a rich history, and yet it is a territory in full transformation.

A 50-meter altitude difference separates the Plateau from its surrounding communities (Villes de Palaiseau, Massy, Igny, and others). This altitude, alongside institutional histories, limits the interactions of people and places.

This year our studio asks what are the links, relationships and experience of the transition between the place(s) of the plateau and the plains, explored through the lens of (empirical) research in design.