Lecture by Marcel Meili

 

Marcel Meili, Markus Peter Architects, Zurich

 

“Specificity”

 

This Department Lecture is sponsored by the Department of Architecture.

 

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The book “Switzerland – An Urban Portrait“ by ETH Studio Basel, the Institute for the Contemporary City (ICC) by its authors Roger Diener, Jacques Herzog, Marcel Meili, Pierre de Meuron and Christian Schmid was published a year ago. This book provoked a remarkable resonance in Switzerland as unexpected position in the public discussion over the condition concerning urban potential of the country. “Switzerland – An Urban Portrait” is mainly a descriptive and analytic work.

 

The lecture is to examine possible relations between a conceptional work and design. It will observe a suspicion: that first of all, each project (also for theoretical reasons) is lost, if it is settled too close or too far away by its theoretical bases. And secondly that the book “Switzerland – An Urban Portrait” is in the long run the continuation of our earlier projects with other means.

 

Biographical Notes – Marcel Meili

 

1973–1980 Study of architecture at the ETHZ, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland

 

1981–1983 Research fellow at the Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture at the ETHZ, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland

 

1983–1985 Collaboration with the offices of Prof. Dolf Schnebli

 

1985–1987 Teaching assistant for Prof. M. Campi at the ETHZ, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland

 

Since 1987 Own offices with Markus Peter in Zurich

 

1988–1991 Assistant Professor (constructive and structural design) at the School of Design, Zurich

 

1990–1991 Visiting Professor (design) at Harvard University, Cambridge, USA

 

1993–1995 Visiting Professor (design) at the ETHZ, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland

 

Since 1999 Professor of Architecture and Design at the ETHZ, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland, Department of Architecture, ETH Studio Basel, ‘Contemporary City Institute’, along with Prof. Roger Diener, Prof. Jacques Herzog and Prof. Pierre de Meuron

 

2002 Visiting Professor (Design) at Harvard University, Cambridge

 

 

Major Projects

 

1993–1995 Wooden Bridge in Murau, Austria

 

1993–1995 RiffRaff cinema in Zurich, Switzerland

 

1995–2000 Center for Global Dialogue, Swiss Re, Rüschlikon (Zurich), Switzerland

 

1995–1997 New roofs for the main railway station in Zurich, Switzerland

 

1995–2004 Hyatt Hotel, Zurich, Switzerland

 

2000–2001 Parasite Pavillon Rotterdam, The Netherlands

 

2001–2010 New football stadium in Zurich, Switzerland.