Making a monograph about one’s own work is an act of generosity that goes beyond documenting a series of built projects. It is about sharing a body of knowledge, an approach to work, a way of looking at the world. Here, the Zurich-based practice Roger Boltshauser Architekten share the ideas and interests that lie behind the projects by presenting them in a way that strives for a deeper form of representation.

The first time the work of Roger Boltshauser came to international attention was through Elementares zum Raum (“A Primer to Space”), written together with Aita Flury and published in 2008, which documents Boltshauser’s buildings in the context of the authors’ teaching and research collaboration.1 Focusing on their experimental teaching at the Fachhochschule in Chur, the book describes a powerful and, at the time, unusual pedagogical approach. The production of architectural and urban form is explored through an exacting grammar of plaster casts depicting historical precedents, as well as new proposals. Thematic discussions and thoughtful commentary on Boltshauser’s buildings further explore the relation between teaching and architectural practice. The expressive, rough surface of the white models enters into a dialogue with the exact volumetric articulations and material textures of the built projects. Thus, this architecture came across as a lucid contemporary reinterpretation of the work of past generations of modernists. Depicted through black and white photographs, their deeper kinship is also implied visually.

A similar relationship between graphic representation, construction research and the atmosphere of the built work emerges in the present volume, albeit in a different way. Whilst the question of quality is almost a given in the favourable conditions of Zurich architectural culture, the buildings of Roger Boltshauser stand out as boldly atypical. The work marks its own territory, and effortlessly diverges from the fashionable trends and currents of contemporary Swiss German architecture. Like Peter Märkli, with whom he taught as studio assistant at ETH Zurich and EPFL Lausanne in the late 1990s, Bolthauser seems compelled to explore his own personal fascinations, themes and interests. His work reassesses the timeless fundaments of architecture and challenges the canon of modernism in terms of contemporary construction techniques and environmental principles. The specific, sensuous character of his work arises from a personal sense of proportion and composition. Material surfaces are manipulated with a directness and robustness that are refreshing. Ever a teacher as well as practitioner, Bolthauser’s influence is apparent on the younger generation of students passing through ETH Zurich and the schools he has taught at in recent years.

Combining sketches, paintings and detailed drawings with photographs of samples, mock-ups and of the finished buildings, each project is accompanied by a text explaining the context and architectural concepts explored. Projects are shown in chronological order and the result is a wonderful insight into the fascinations, interests and working method of this architectural practice, and a number of themes consistently emerge in the work produced.

Tectonic building culture

The practice’s studio in Dubstrasse bears witness to the tectonic and construction research that goes into every project. In this case the building conforms to the Zurich tradition of building work spaces in the middle of an urban block. The brick-and-concrete building has generously scaled window assemblies, whose horizontal proportions make it appear heavy and somewhat archaic. The territory of the studio extends from the building to the surrounding courtyard and offers a reminder of the urban task architecture is often required to fulfil – a setting no doubt conducive to reflection and discussions on the interconnection between the architectural and urban dimension.
Grids, order and proportion The studies in relief that Roger Boltshauser began to produce as a young architect gave him a feeling for proportion and the compositional character of building facades. Generally, the elements of buildings produced by the practice are compressed in their proportions, and square rather than upright. The frequent use of glass blocks and tiles reinforces the use of grids as an ordering device in the plans and in the facades of buildings, as in the Hirzenbach school project or the residential building that sits alongside it, two of the many where this constant preoccupation is clearly visible.

Weight and permanence

If there is a general, common character in the buildings of Roger Boltshauser, it is the relationship between massing and a sense of weight. We have the feeling that the energy that has gone into the act of building will last a very long time. Projects evoke a sense of permanence and longevity. This is particularly evident in the Kopfholz School project, the cooperative housing project in Lenzberg, the Allenmoos II School Pavilion and the Rauch House, amongst many others.

Reflections on Mies

A counterpoint to weight and permanence is the interpretation of aspects of the work of Mies van der Rohe, particularly his later work in North America. A number of Boltshauser’s projects explore a different approach to the expression of a facade and the relation between frame and lightweight infill. This can be seen in the St. Gallen town hall project, the Baufeld F building ensemble on Europaallee in Zurich, or the Bleicherweg Office Building, also in Zurich. All explore more fragile skins or cladding solutions in their facade language, offering a subtle critique of contemporary construction conditions.

A social architecture

Many of the practice’s projects are public in their programme: schools, a town hall, research laboratories, a building for a zoo. This reveals an underlying interest in the social and urban responsibility of architecture. Each and every project avoids ambivalence in its relationship to place and strives to be more than an autonomous addition to the wider surroundings, making a meaningful contribution that works with, rather than in isolation from its context. This awareness, together with the practice’s profound understanding of the environmental aspects of building design and construction methods means that the work of the practice always gives more than it takes. In contemporary architecture, this an admirable and necessary position, eloquently demonstrated in the pages of this volume.