3 – 2013

et cetera Bovenbouw

Exuberant forms have always tended to be rare in Swiss architecture. Practically every new building stands in a built context: there is someone everywhere. The autonomous form remains an illusion, at least in the densely populated Swiss Central Plateau. Then there is also the fact that in this country the moderate has always been cultivated and the showy or extravagant rejected. A number of clever people have taken issue with this deeply egalitarian culture but in vain, it appears to be inscribed in the collective DNA. However, globalization is strongly affecting Switzerland, too, and access to open markets offers new seductions from which the small country greatly profits. Under these circumstances it is not particularly surprising that architecture, affected by the prevalent social and cultural mood, also begins to turn again towards tradition. While this yearning for the familiar can be observed throughout the world, it seems to be particularly intense in Northwestern and Central Europe.