Largely inspired by the work of Henri Lefebvre, our approach is based on the dialectics between the conditions of production of urban space and its appropriation by the people to whom it is destined. Therefore, the entire operation of transformation of space, has various effects on the social organisation; effects that cannot be accounted for without basing the analysis on the mechanisms of acceptance or of use of space. In this process, professionals think they have designed a space for certain uses but in reality something different happens. With every new urban organisation, the inhabitants change their way of behaving in urban space and their practices may or may not correspond with the space that was designed. Therefore, they recompose the space according to their representations. The demonstration of this is based primarily on the city of Saint-Etienne, located in the west of France. The project concerned a traditional working-class district and considers the future of its social morphology.
