Pierre-Alexis Delamair (pjɛːʁ aleksi dəlamɛːʁ) (Châtenay-Malabry

Châtenay-Malabry

Châtenay-Malabry is a commune in the southwestern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located 10.8 km from the center of Paris.The commune includes the valley la vallée aux loups with green forests and pretty houses including the estate of French writer Chateaubriand. It also includes the Butte...

 1675/6 — Agde

Agde

Agde is a commune in the Hérault department in southern France. It is the Mediterranean port of the Canal du Midi.-Location:Agde is located on the river Hérault, 4 km from the Mediterranean Sea, and 750 km from Paris...

 25 July 1745) was a French architect, theorist and city planner, whose ambitious plan for a rational restructuring the center of Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, 1737, never came to fruition, as it would have required the demolition of the existing city to be replaced with an ideal city

Ideal city

Ideal city refers to a plan for a city that has been conceived in accordance with the dictates of some "rational" or "moral" objective.-Concept:...

.

Delamair was the son of Antoine Delamaire, and received his training in the Bâtiments du Roi

Bâtiments du Roi

The Bâtiments du Roi was a division of Department of the household of the Kings of France in France under the Ancien Régime. It was responsible for building works at the King's residences in and around Paris.-History:...

, directed by Robert de Cotte

Robert de Cotte

Robert de Cotte was a French architect-administrator, under whose design control of the royal buildings of France from 1699, the earliest notes presaging the Rococo style were introduced. First a pupil of Jules Hardouin-Mansart, he later became his brother-in-law and his collaborator...

. Three works on architecture remained in manuscript. In one, Delamair proposed in 1725 enlarging and connecting as one, the three islands in the Seine

Seine

The Seine is a -long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Saint-Seine near Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and into the English Channel at Le Havre . It is navigable by ocean-going vessels...

, the Île de la Cité

Île de la Cité

The Île de la Cité is one of two remaining natural islands in the Seine within the city of Paris . It is the centre of Paris and the location where the medieval city was refounded....

 the Île Saint-Louis

Île Saint-Louis

The Île Saint-Louis is one of two natural islands in the Seine river, in Paris, France . The island is named after King Louis IX of France ....

 and the Île Louvier

Isle Louvier, Paris

The ancient Isle Louvier or Isle Louviers of Paris no longer exists in the River Seine. The island, also called the Île aux Javiaux, was formerly sited in the river slightly upstream of the Île Saint-Louis. In 1408 the island belonged to the prévôt des marchands Nicolas de Louviers, whose name...

, to make a single Île de Paris that would make a more suitable site for the Hôtel de Ville

Hôtel de Ville

Hôtel de Ville can mean any of the following things:*In French, a hôtel de ville or mairie is a town hall or city hallIt can also stand for:* Hôtel de Ville, Paris, France* Hôtel de Ville, Reims*Hôtel de Ville, Nouakchott, Mauritania...

. The idea was taken up by Pierre-Louis Moreau-Desproux

Pierre-Louis Moreau-Desproux

Pierre-Louis Moreau-Desproux was a pioneering French neoclassical architect.Though he did not gain the Prix de Rome that was the dependable gateway to a prominent French career in architecture, his fellow-student Charles de Wailly invited him to share his prize...

 in 1769 and expanded towards the end of the 18th century by Pierre Patte

Pierre Patte

Pierre Patte was a French architect who was the assistant of the great French teacher of architecture, Jacques-François Blondel, whose Cours d'architecture which ran to nine volumes by 1777, he saw through the press after Blondel's death in 1774....

 and by Charles De Wailly

Charles De Wailly

Charles De Wailly was a French architect and urbanist, and furniture designer, one of the principals in the Neoclassical revival of the Antique. His major work was the Théâtre de l'Odéon for the Comédie-Française...

.

Delamair achieved three hôtels particuliers

Hôtel particulier

In French contexts an hôtel particulier is an urban "private house" of a grand sort. Whereas an ordinary maison was built as part of a row, sharing party walls with the houses on either side and directly fronting on a street, an hôtel particulier was often free-standing, and by the 18th century it...

, the Hôtel de Soubise

Hôtel de Soubise

The Hôtel de Soubise is a city mansion entre cour et jardin , located at 60 rue des Francs-Bourgeois, in the IIIe arrondissement of Paris....

 at Paris (1704–1709), for François de Rohan, prince de Soubise, and the adjoining Hôtel de Rohan (1705–1708), built for Soubise's son, Armand-Gaston, bishop of Strasbourg

Armand Gaston Maximilien de Rohan

Armand de Rohan was a French churchman and politician. He became bishop of Strasbourg in 1704, Cardinal in 1712 then grand almoner of France in 1713 and member of the regency council in 1722....

, and revisions to the former Palais Rohan

Palais Rohan

The Palais Rohan is the name of the Hôtel de Ville, or City Hall building, in Bordeaux, France.The Palais Rohan took three years to build and was completed in 1774. It houses the town hall of Bordeaux and is one of the most celebrated examples of municipal architecture in the region...

 at Strasbourg

Strasbourg

Strasbourg is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace are historically German-speaking,...

 (1705–1708, demolished with Delamair's lifetime for the present structure). His replacement at the Rohan houses by Germain Boffrand

Germain Boffrand

Germain Boffrand was one of the most gifted French architects of his generation. A pupil of Jules Hardouin-Mansart, Germain Boffrand was one of the main creators of the precursor to Rococo called the style Régence, and in his interiors, of the Rococo itself...

, at the moment of his precocious triumph, left him an embittered man.