person standing at base of workplace
The renovated Paris headquarters of French insurance company AXA Group comprises four existing structures, including this one housing the atrium, where Saguez & Partners, which oversaw the 200,000 square feet of office interiors, improved circulation by adding upper walkways and furnished with Remnant armchairs by Note, Kaschkasch’s POV high table, and Afteroom Studio stools.

July 3, 2025

Words: Ian Phillips

Photography: Eric Laignel

How French Heritage Defines AXA Group’s New HQ

The 1,300 employees at the head office of the French insurer AXA Group used to be spread across a quartet of Paris sites. Today, however, they are grouped together at one site, but it consists of four structures that are drastically different in size, style, and era. To connect them in a more rational fashion as well as modernize the 200,000 square feet of interiors, AXA called upon Saguez & Partners, the French design and branding firm specializing in large-scale, transformative projects that respect historical context while introducing contemporary and sustainable elements.

Set on a 1 ½-acre plot near the Champs-Elysées in the city’s eighth arrondissement, three of the four entities were built between the mid 20th and 21st centuries: the eight-story 6 Rabelais, renamed Le Switch, built in 1952 by Pierre Dufau, which today features an executive penthouse lounge and several planted balconies; the six-level 21 Matignon, 1957 by Jean-Claude Daufresne, where the reception lobby is; and a five-story contemporary glass wing Ricardo Bofill completed in 2000 that houses a stunning skylit atrium.

Explore French History At The AXQ HQ By Saguez & Partners

A large atrium with a glass ceiling.
The renovated Paris headquarters of French insurance company AXA Group comprises four existing structures, including this one housing the atrium, where Saguez & Partners, which oversaw the 200,000 square feet of office interiors, improved circulation by adding upper walkways and furnished with Remnant armchairs by Note, Kaschkasch’s POV high table, and Afteroom Studio stools.

That wing is connected to and an extension of the fourth building, a grandly classical, 18th-century town mansion called Hôtel de la Vaupalière, named for its original owner, the Marquis de la Vaupalière, who was a lieutenant in the Royal French Army under King Louis XV and an incorrigible gambler. French writer Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais gave a reading of his play, Le Mariage de Figaro, there in 1783. Home now to AXA’s boardroom, three executive offices, and reception rooms, its highly decorated, four-story interiors were restored some 20 years ago by Parisian designer François-Joseph Graf and filled with objects of museum quality, including furniture by André-Charles Boulle and Adam Weisweiler, and a chandelier and silverware that once belonged to King George I of England. “It’s an honor to be received there,” Olivier Riquard, AXA’s director of corporate services and procurement, notes.

Prestige aside, the site lacked architectural coherence. The buildings are at different heights, which meant there were ramps and flights of stairs all over the place. It was also tricky to pass from one to the other; they were linked via the basement, but it was so mazelike that employees only used it when it rained. Otherwise, they would step outside and cross the intermediary courtyards.

Facilitating A Collaborative Hub For Everyone

A dining room with a large table and chairs.
In the boardroom, inside the site’s 1767 mansion, original paneling surrounds a Saguez & Partners custom Corian table encircled by Uno S233 swivel chairs by Francesco Rota.

Working with architect of record PCA-Stream and project-management firm Hauteur Libre, the heart of the project for Saguez & Partners was the creation of a “hub,” executive creative director and partner Jean-Philippe Cordina says, at the basement level of the three modern buildings, which incorporates business and fitness centers, meeting rooms, and an auditorium. Its main focus is a vast, airy café and coffee bar that was also conceived as a multifunctional workspace, with a multitude of lockers, seating arrangements, and tables fitted with charging sockets. “The question was how to attract people to go down there and create ways to facilitate that,” Cordina recalls. The solution was to limit the size of the coffee areas on the office floors above (and offer a more appetizing range of snacks and beverages in the café).

Much of the office floors follow a similar model. Although equipped with meetings rooms and video booths, they are mostly open plan. Each workstation consists of a 55-inch-wide desk with a large relay screen, and different zones are defined by custom wooden bookcases and changes in flooring. Quiet areas have been placed along perimeters, and modular desk systems, also custom and consisting of four distinctly shaped, solid-oak elements, have been installed at the center of several rooms. They can be arranged in different forms to create rectangular, boomerang-, or S-shape tables. “The various configurations forge a different rapport and way of working,” Cordina explains. To create a link with the exterior, walkways inside run along the facades of buildings and upholstered benches have been positioned opposite the new balconies.

Calming Colors Make For A Great Workplace Atmosphere At AXA Group

A large open space with a long table and chairs.
A dramatically angular oak ceiling system caps the café’s coffee bar.

The overall atmosphere is remarkably reposeful, thanks to a palette of warm colors and the omnipresence of wood. The effect is further heightened by an adaptable, museum-quality lighting system, whereby fixtures can be attached to a ceiling rail using magnets. “We didn’t want to have traditional blanket lighting,” Cordina continues. “We needed something more scenographic.” Ecological concerns were also addressed. Carpeting is made of recycled plastic bottles and fishing nets; tabletops are faced in a material produced from salvaged textiles.

The only intervention inside the Hôtel de la Vaupalière by Saguez & Partners, which has expanded its international presence by recently acquiring New York–based interior architecture and branding firm Dash Design, is a custom donut-shape Corian table for the boardroom, its black interior giving it a craterlike look. Cordina was, however, inspired by the painted ceiling in the CEO’s dining room, which depicts a sky. He took a photo of it and had it pixelated to produce a motif that was used not only for the glass partitions of meeting rooms and signage but also for the carpet in a space on the top floor of Le Switch called the creative studio. “It’s a way of linking the heritage of the Hôtel de la Vaupalière with the different generations of the other buildings,” he says.

The new-found harmony certainly seems appreciated by AXA’s employees. “There’s an overall coherence, which means nobody gets the short end of the stick,” Riquard says. “Whatever building they may be in, now everybody is happy.”

Inside AXA Group’s Charming New HQ

A large building with a lot of windows.
The mansion, named Hôtel de la Vaupalière after its first owner, recently served as the headquarters of the French newspaper, Le Figaro.
A green room with a mirror and a chair.
Doors to the boardroom are faced in studded velvet.
A large white building.
The atrium building, designed by late Spanish architect Ricardo Bofill, dates to 2000.
A building with many windows and plants growing on the side.
PCA-Stream restructured the facade of the Le Switch building to offer planted balconies on every office floor.
A man walking down a long hallway in a modern home.
An office area in the fourth building, Le Switch, is delineated by an elm-veneered custom bookcase.
A wooden shelf in a cubic cubic.
An office area in the fourth building, Le Switch, is delineated by an elm-veneered custom bookcase.

Organic Furnishings Give This Workplace A Natural Glow

Two chairs in front of a wall with a quote.
Beneath a motivational saying in a meeting room are Chisel chairs by Andreas Bergsaker.
A table and chairs in a room with wooden walls.
Eave sofas by Norm Architects and Lievore Altherr Molina’s Dizzie table join slatted oak in the employee café.
A book on a table.
Tables in polished steel and walnut stand on a jute rug near reception.
A woman is walking up a set of stairs.
A stairway in powder-coated steel connects two of Le Switch’s eight levels.
A room with a lot of desks and chairs.
An open office area has a serpentine oak desking system by Saguez & Partners, Antonio Citterio ACX chairs, and Silo Trio pendant fixtures by Note.
A living room with a couch and a bar.
The company motto adorns a wall in Le Switch’s executive penthouse lounge, with Jean Prouvé Fauteuil de Salon armchairs, a Soda glass coffee table by Yiannis Ghikas, and another Eave sofa by Norm.
A man standing in a room with tables and chairs.
Oak also composes the floor planks in the café, where some furnishings stand on wool rugs.
project team

SAGUEZ & PARTNERS: MARINE KEMPF; OUMAIMA ELMERNISSI; GAUTHIER LARAT; MAUD LAVIT; SARAH HAMDI; LOUISE MACÉ; SUZANNE BULAT; ANTOINE RIVIÈRE. PCA-STREAM: ARCHITECT OF RECORD. HAUTEUR LIBRE: PROJECT MANAGER. DURIEZ: CUSTOM FURNITURE WORKSHOP.

product sources

FROM FRONT SANCAL: ARMCHAIRS (ATRIUM). TON: HIGH TABLES (ATRIUM, COFFEE BAR). AUDO: STOOLS (ATRIUM, COFFEE BAR), SOFAS (CAFÉ), ORANGE SOFA (LOUNGE). LAPALMA: CHAIRS (BOARDROOM). SANTA & COLE: TABLE LAMP (RECEPTION). BLÅ STATION: SOFA. CARL HANSEN & SØN: ARMCHAIRS. HAY: CHAIRS (MEETING ROOM), ROUND SIDE TABLES (RECEPTION). ARPER: TABLE (CAFÉ). MATIAS MØLLENBACH: STRIPED RUG (RECEPTION). THE SOCIALITE FAMILY: ROUND TABLES, CHAIRS (COFFEE BAR, CAFÉ), STOOLS (LOUNGE) MUUTO: SQUARE TABLES (COFFEE BAR). FREDERICIA: SQUARE TABLE CHAIRS. AYTM: RUGS (CAFÉ). MANGANÈSE ÉDITIONS: PICNIC TABLES. VITRA: CHAIRS (OPEN OFFICE), ARMCHAIRS (LOUNGE). ZERO: PENDANT FIXTURES (OPEN OFFICE). UNIFOR: CUSTOM DESKING. PEDRALI: HIGHBACK SOFA (LOUNGE). MINIFORMS: COFFEE TABLE. MARTEX: HIGH TABLE.
THROUGHOUT EGE: CARPET. KVADRAT: CHAIR UPHOLSTERY. UNIKALO: PAINT.

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