L’écrin du marais > Isabel Claus, 2010

Set alongside the towpath and the stretch of the étang de Clermont, the parcelle Robinson is a long strip of land, a former dumping ground which is now taken over by dense and bushy vegetation. In this place which has been deliberately left to run wild, the landscape designer Isabel Claus has built a delicate wooden path, a fragile asssembly of planks raised 40 centimetres above the tangle of vegetation. The 100 metre long narrow gangway stands on logs and stretches across undergrowth before arriving at the water and a pontoon paved with chestnut wood, opening out onto the marsh. But allowing a human being to penetrate the marshland’s wooded area, inhabited by rare and ecologically vulnerable wildlife and plants, is not without risk. Although after one year of use, the wooden path seems to have been well understood, the rubbish observed on the ground indicated to the designer that the designation of the place as a « haven » for wild nature was not sufficient : so in 2011, Isabel Claus redefined the area to give it more intimacy. The final aim is to make the path durable and install an experimental plot for the Hortillons gardeners.