Courthouse of Créteil, Modern courthouse in Créteil, France

The Courthouse of Créteil is a pale concrete building whose broad facade widens toward the base and narrows to a flat roof, divided into many vertical bays of dark recessed windows. Three thin antenna masts and two small flags stand on the roofline. A low entrance section with a flat canopy on columns sits centered at ground level, flanked by angular stepped concrete sections. Its shape is meant to evoke the book of law and the scales of justice.

Architects Daniel Badani and Pierre Roux-Dorlut completed this judicial building in 1978 following a regional administrative reorganization. The construction was part of broader institutional changes in the Paris area.

The courthouse hears cases that made national headlines, including the Sohane Benziane affair and the Paris and Hauts-de-Seine HLM affairs. The Val-de-Marne bar association, with more than 450 lawyers, has its headquarters in the building. Judge Éric Halphen worked here as an investigating magistrate from 1989 to 2002.

The courthouse holds eight civil chambers, seven criminal chambers, the Val-de-Marne Assize Court and a juvenile court. It is the seat of the Val-de-Marne bar, which has more than 450 lawyers. Hearings are public, but access is controlled as in any court; the building is in Créteil, in the Val-de-Marne department.

The building's shape is meant to evoke the book of the law and the scales of justice, as its architects Daniel Badani and Pierre Roux-Dorlut intended. The pale concrete facade widens toward the base and narrows to a flat roof topped by three thin antenna masts and two small flags.