Overview

The “Exhibition of Rural Habitat, Lyon 1949” (“Exposition de l'Habitat rural, Lyon 1949”) was held in Lyon, France, from September 24 to October 9, 1949. It was a special exhibition under the 1928 Convention, devoted to the theme of rural housing, and it covered 110 hectares in connection with the Foire de Lyon.

Theme and subthemes

The subject was a matter of national policy in France that year. Weeks after the exhibition closed, on November 9, 1949, France's Economic Council adopted a report titled “Politique du logement et de l'habitat rural” (Housing and Rural Habitat Policy), prepared by its commission on public works, reconstruction and urbanism. Like Expo 1947 Paris, which dealt with urbanism and housing, the Lyon exhibition turned the Expo format toward the problems of postwar reconstruction, here with a focus on the countryside.

Legacy

Expo 1949 Lyon was one of two special exhibitions held in 1949, alongside Expo 1949 Stockholm, and it opened less than three months before Expo 1949 Port-au-Prince. The BIE's records do not give participant or attendance figures for the Lyon exhibition.