ESAIL was founded in 1984 by Jean Cottin, a registered architect (DPLG) and a former student of noted architect and city planner Tony Garnier. Its first home was the former Vaise fort, in Lyon. 

To accommodate the steady rise in enrolment, the school was moved in 2004 to its current home at 7-9 rue Jean Marie Leclair, in Lyon’s 9th district. The school has continued to develop to become one of the leading Interior Architecture schools in France. 

ESAIL pursued a new stage in its development at the start of the 2021 academic year when it opened its new campus in Bordeaux. 

Esail

Sharing the art of design

Training for the future

Architecture and interior design are two intrinsically linked disciplines that shape our built environment. They are both art forms and sciences, combining aesthetics, functionality and creativity to create spaces that reflect our culture, lifestyle and needs.  

Campus

Campus

ESAIL is based in Lyon and Bordeaux, two cities steeped in history and influenced by different artistic movements. The school benefits from high-quality infrastructures, ideally located and offering students the best possible conditions for success. 

Lyon

lyon-campus-idrac-terreaux-place-statue

Bordeaux

BORDEAUX-CAMPUS-PLACE-DE-LA-BOURSE

portfolios

Student projects

The work presented is composed of partial extracts from the documents produced by students for their final exams. They demonstrate the skills acquired in interior design and interior architecture project design. 

Get to portfolio of Interior design or Interior architecture
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Diary

Testimony

Aline moved to the United States a few months after obtaining her diploma in Interior Architecture from ESAIL. She worked for the decoration and architecture agency Perianth Interior Design, specialised in refurbishing luxury homes. Then for Design Bureaux, specialised in designing restaurants and bars. She had the opportunity to develop a number of projects in the USA and China, including the Dorsey and Factory Kitchen in Las Vegas. She currently works for ICRAVE, a multidisciplinary design studio specialised in hotel, airport, hospital, work space, bar and restaurant design.
Aline Aguero
Publication

Research department

Publication

Research department

Created in 2013, the ESAIL’s research department ESAIL LAB looks at operations conducted to renovate old buildings. These operations have given rise to discussion on interior architecture, a discipline taught at ESAIL. The objective of using this kind of empirical material as a starting point is twofold. 

The first objective is to analyse the discipline and its practices by looking at projects completed in the not-so-distant past. 

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