Studio project 2020 Autumn semester
In collaboration with Rico Furter
Location: Oerlikon, Zürich
Reuse
In 2020 I was on exchange semester in ETH Zürich. During the semester I participated in Professor Adam Caruso's studio course Making Plans for Living. The studio looked at modernist and contemporary office buildings in Zürich through the lens of reference artists with a goal of finding a more meaningful use to be implanted on the sites. Our site was the office block designed by Max Dudler at Hagenholzstrasse 10 that currently houses the headquarters of Credit Suisse among other companies. We looked at the frescoes of Giotto di Bondone of the life of Saint Francis to find meaning that would counter the current cold capitalist office architecture.
Inspired by the nature relation, communal life and service that Saint Francis embodied, we designed an alternative future for Hagenholzstrasse. When the offices do not meet the latest standards anymore and the companies leave following the trends of the day, the site will be taken over by a community of co-living and co-working. A modern-day monastery that is not built on religion but a devotion of repairing the world from ecological crisis. The community will be built around processing waste textiles, turning them into treasured items that are passed from generation to generation. Typologies of living and production meld together forming a mutually benefiting community.
