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Le Volcan (Volcano): this cultural centre for Le Havre and nationally-important theatre, dating from 1982, is the work of the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer. The building includes two separate volumes : above, a theatre and a cinema; below there is a concert hall for modern music. The architectural volumes are developed in white-painted concrete, whose curved forms seek to achieve a poetical expression derived from the modern movement.

The Volcano also called as the Maison de la Culture is situated along the extension of the Bassin du Commerce, one of the strategic landscapes of the city centre. It is set on a square (each side 120 metres) framed to the south, north and west by buildings designed by the Perret Atelier on an orthogonal grid. Niemeyer did not want to conceive buildings whose form would enter into contradiction with the surrounding architecture. An architect conscious of the urban impact of his work, he plays with oppositions of scales, mass and levels. His composition is oriented toward the diagonal axis of the square, but does not extend past the buildings which border it.