4 – 2016

Project Workplace

Currently, reports about job losses, companies closing down and production facilities being moved appear almost daily in Switzerland. The Swiss Franc shock and mega-fusions have speeded up the relocation of workplaces in industry to nearby or distant foreign countries. The buzz term Industry 4.0 promises far-reaching change through the digital integration of entire production and service chains. At the same time a new trend is emerging, the re-settlement of production directly in cities, right outside our doors: in small fablabs and with the help of 3D printers everyday items are to be repaired or even produced from scratch. Through the research work for this issue we arrived at the hypothesis that neither the one nor the other alone gives a complete picture of what we should expect. We believe it is no accident that, in a short space of time, we have recently visited several industrial buildings where production or applied research is combined with office work. The innovation persistently demanded by this kind of spatial proximity must be more than the proverbial straw at which Europe clutches: here our continent still occupies a leading position, behind the USA — and there are deep mental reasons for this. In a number of the examples presented in this issue architecture was assigned multiple tasks: it serves as the representation of a business idea, is a mediator of innovation, and, through clever spatial organisation, directly makes development processes possible — one could also say: through typology. The examples presented in this issue were developed in what is certainly a harsh economic environment — nevertheless there is a discernible optimism. It can be felt from the bubbling entrepreneurial spirit in the shack in the former shipbuilding yard to the business with 23 000 workers world-wide. Subliminally, something important seems to be decisive here: in all the examples presented a search is made for an immediate confrontation with the material that is “to be processed,” a direct connection between knowledge and production. Even if robots are increasingly taking over production, for a long time to come human beings will still define how this is to be done. Even the simplest technical object is so complicated that it still needs human innovation for its development and production.