Despite its uninspiring Brutalist exterior, Radiant City in Marseille epitomises Le Corbusier's dream of a perfectly engineered and highly functional urban dwelling. "SHOCK! HORROR!" These words sum up my first impression of architect Le Corbusier's famous Radiant City (Ville Radieuse) in the outskirts of Marseille. Exhausted after a prolonged train journey, I arrived on a scorching July afternoon. The moment I stepped out of the cab, the enormous 56-metre-high fortress-like building fell on top of me. Well, it actually didn't, but it felt indeed as if I was about to be squashed by its oppressive raw-concrete Brutalism. The moment I walked through the rows of piloti, concrete columns that prop up the structure like stilts, and entered the semi-dark lobby, I was inundated with memories of similar high-rise concrete dwellings in the Soviet Union. The only thing missing was the all-permeating cabbage-soup stench that used to dominate the doorways, the stairs and other communal spaces of Moscow apartment blocks in the 1960s and 70s. Unlike in the latter, however, the lifts in the Radiant City were all in good order and appeared not to be used as public toilets. I got out on the 3rd floor and checked into my room - one of Le Corbusier's renowned cellules ('cells'), modelled on a monastic cell of Galluzo, a Carthusian monastery in Tuscany visited by the architect in 1907. To reach my cell, I had to walk along a long, dimly lit corridor, lined on both sides with flats and occasional offices.
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