Whoever wants to build must have patience, and then perhaps they will be rewarded. Whoever builds, builds a vision of humanity. Whoever builds, builds a concept of nature. Whoever builds, builds into the future, and perhaps also builds the future.
What does that depend on? Whether what you build becomes the future? How does it affect the life of individuals and the life of the community when you design, when you plan, when you build? I'm Philip Koffsche and I'm delighted to welcome you all here to the conversation series UM Politics Talks at Unternehmen Mitte. I warmly welcome this evening's guest on the topic of 'Building the Future,' the architect Jacques Herzog.
Jacques Herzog, born in 1950, studied architecture at ETH Zurich and founded almost 50 years ago, in 1978 in Basel with Pierre de Meuron, the architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron.
When you look at what has emerged over the years, the list of buildings becomes very long. I won't enumerate or name them, for a specific reason: the question is whether the future of architecture still consists of icons, and I've heard Jacques Herzog say repeatedly that the future of architecture is precisely no longer about icons. How frustrating is it when you're introduced through supposed icons at many events. I won't name any today. Are these icons, or how should we understand this? You're mostly associated with large prestige projects and famous buildings, yet perhaps you're actually striving for something very different, and much more.
Good evening. So first, let me step down a notch from this philosophical approach toward everyday life, because fundamentally, we all live in the everyday with all its needs, and building must primarily serve that and function there. Because if it doesn't, it doesn't matter whether it's iconic or non-iconic, famous or not famous.
That is simply decisive. And I don't decide how good my architecture is, nor does the critic decide. The people decide. That means we've actually built so-called important buildings on almost all continents, and most of them, I can say, function well—at least until today. What the future brings, I don't know. Actually, nobody knows. But clearly, architecture is something intended for several generations, because otherwise it's a waste of resources, which it sometimes is anyway. And then that topic is settled.
What is important to me? That's actually not so much in the foreground. I've never really thought about it. We've always simply tried to do the best and be the best, but above all with the goal that people like it, because that is the surest means for architecture to survive. When people enjoy using something, that is the guarantee that it will live long.
We can take this building as an example. It's perhaps not grand architecture, but it was originally a bank—something entirely different in content from what it is today. And it has a second life, perhaps even a third life, because its conception—with these large spaces, these varied spaces: low, high, narrow, wide—fulfills much of what makes great architecture. And that's perhaps a good starting point.
This space here, which will continue to live over further generations—whether it's a bank or now houses a foundation—is perhaps almost secondary. I also want to give the philosophical questions their due, because when you build, when you build this house from over 100 years ago, toward what kind of future and with what kind of vision of human preference does one design something like that? I've now heard several perspectives: wide spaces, large spaces, narrow spaces. What images, what conceptions, what space-defining and space-shaping perspectives have played a role in your work? Is every building, small or large, the beginning of a consideration to make it as pleasing as possible, fulfill a purpose, serve a meaning?
Yes, well first, we had to learn what architecture is. When we started, we were naturally outsiders. Switzerland wasn't an important country in architectural production. Today it partly is, also because of our influence, but the big schools were in London—the AA—or at Harvard. Those were people who came with much more intellectual power and much more support from their home countries into this market.
When you choose a new profession, you're in a market—whether as a lawyer, dancer, actor, or even in supposedly less visible professions—you're always in a market where you compare yourself with others. And we wanted to make a different architecture, to be different. We wanted to find our own path. Only we didn't really know exactly what that was.
I had first worked as an artist and wanted to establish myself in that field. Then I realized I was on a better path with architecture. I felt that. Everyone must find their own way through their own intuition. And gradually, things developed. What is architecture? To this day it's difficult for me to say exactly what architecture is. But what is certain, and this is how architecture already was 5,000 years ago: it's material you extract from the ground, from the forest. It's space you create.
In the past, people didn't really understand what space meant—truly in the sense of a vault, for instance. But whenever you build something three-dimensional, you build space. That's the second component. Then there is ornament, but not in the sense of decoration or embellishment—rather ornament as the idea of the whole. How does it look? And to take that apart and decompose it into conscious parts—that intellectual, analytical work evolved over time and naturally made us fitter and fitter in this market, and also more aggressive.
I was already aggressive early on, though, against other positions—not in a petty way, but in my own way. I wanted to do it differently, see it anew, because in the early 1970s and 80s—that was the beginning of postmodernism, and for me it was a decadent, eclectic effort of bringing forth old styles and the pleasurable combining of them. I found that boring, and we communicated that.
And then the proximity to art helped us, because we came from Basel, and I've been closely connected to art since I was a teenager. Art interested me, and the artists at the time—whether that's still the case today is another question—were more progressive than the architects. They had more progressive and radical thinking, and that matched my thinking very well. And this radical thinking surely helped us find our path.
For instance, I never wanted to define—and couldn't—what the style of Herzog & de Meuron is. We have no style. I hate styles. I also have something against good taste. I've always been somewhat allergic to 'this appeals to me,' and that helped us too, because for me it was never difficult to change something radically, even along the way.
As a student it was completely different. When the professor said 'this is terrible' and 'I don't like it,' your world collapses. Everyone knows this from their own experience, in whatever field. You're at the beginning of your career, your studies, your apprenticeship, and you've crafted something and naturally think it's great. It's your thing. And when people then poke holes in it, that's initially difficult. But overcoming that, dealing with that, was very important.
And we can do that today. That's why we can act so versatilely and everywhere today. It's like open-heart surgery. Midway through the operation you notice something isn't right, and then you have to be able to change it without collapsing intellectually. Do you understand what I mean? That's also a philosophical—architects don't believe in things. No, no, no, not at all. At least I don't.
We've arrived back in the middle of philosophy. Philosophers tend to believe what they say—architects don't. Then we have a problem this evening, because we're talking.
Yes, but I always speak in terms of possibilities. There are things I'm certain are better than others. For example, our initiative Go Basilea Go—I'm certain it's better than everything that currently exists, and I can explain that objectively.
I look forward to hearing more about that later. But perhaps using a single example—a building or this space—what must be right in order to even want to engage with the radical task of designing something? When does it fall away and simply not become a challenge? Because there's also a narrow field of leeway between clients who have certain ideas—perhaps just as problematic as philosophical ideas—and building codes, urban planning initiatives. Then you hand over a work to posterity, to users, to the people who will do with it what they do. You work on an open heart but also toward an open future.
Yes, that all sounds very difficult. It perhaps is, but somehow it's also simple, because as an architect, you're asked—you're in a position where clients come to you wanting a building or an implementation of their program. Very few of them have a clear idea of what they want, otherwise they might not come to us at all. But I also can't say that we force them into a form. In the end, architecture is a form—that's clear. It's a form that determines movement, breathing, one's entire existence. But this existence, the architect must create together with the client. We've never had a problem with that.
Back in the 1970s, many intellectually-oriented architects thought and were convinced that you actually had to make architecture against the client. That is, you always had an agenda behind their back—you played along but actually wanted to push through your own thing. I find that completely wrong. As an architect, you must be mercilessly honest, otherwise you've lost. You have to be honest and open, because if you're not, it all comes back to haunt you later. Sometimes it does anyway, but I have fewer problems with it when I know I was transparent, when I actually knew what I was doing.
Sometimes things happen that we can't all foresee, but mostly any complaints or dissatisfaction can be addressed early, before it's physically built. Today there are technical tools that are enormously advanced—digital tools. You can create immersive spaces. In the past there were only these classical models, which are also good. I think any means that leads to the goal is good. But it's very important that the clients—single-family houses, which we hardly do anymore. We essentially don't do private houses anymore because the effort is too great.
People who live in a private house want the most private, intimate thing. Every person has their own vision, and you have to go that deep into someone's life—into the bedroom, into the bathroom. The one person turns their head to the left in bed, gets up, wants to go right to the bathroom or left. All these things are extremely important. If they don't work, the whole house doesn't work. And having to do all that—that's an incredible task.
But is it easier when you build public buildings—stadiums, libraries?
Much easier, much easier, because a stadium isn't someone's private, intimate space. Allow me—I'm the last to say I'm allowing myself this or that. I have to know how a stadium works. I'm a football fan myself. That means I have to make the stadium so that the experience inside it is truly an experience. That's my greatest goal. Everything else doesn't interest me. And to radicalize that—anyone who's been to St. Jakob-Park knows it. That red with the green of the pitch—we invented that. But no one needs to know, because in the end, either it works in the eyes of people, or it doesn't.
There are stadiums with too much draft—it's never intimate, never right. For example, the Wankdorf Stadium of Young Boys is already an enemy image, and the stadium is also less good. These are essential—I can show where the errors are. So in the stadium ranking, Basel is always in first place. Of course, logically. I'm not saying this out of arrogance, but because we developed this stadium concept. And in Bern, it was copied by the same developer—there wasn't an architect behind it with the same intensity. And this intensity of thinking is decisive.
Not my wish or my style or my ego, but in the end it should become an incredible place. That's what drives me, and it's like that in Beijing, in Hamburg—at these places, in the end it's made for the collective experience of people. That is architecture in the sense of a public idea.
And if I understand correctly, it's easier to keep the concertgoer or the reader in mind for a library than the private individual in their intimate space, which everyone wants to design in a very individual way. So public building—or building by function—becomes easier.
Yes, because when I build a private house, I have to know each individual idea of the people living there. I even need to know about the bedroom and the bathroom—these are all legitimate demands and visions of the people inside. That's why it's difficult. We still do that very rarely.
But isn't it a wonderful way of training perception, to develop the ability to do that, and then to realize it on a larger scale for a particular task and function?
That's a good point. As a young architect, you mainly get those commissions. The first things we could do were attic conversions—converting an attic into a third child's bedroom. That interested me just as much as a concert hall today. We honed ourselves there. As a young architect, you have no idea what architecture really is, and you learn through practice. A doctor should have to learn less on patients because it's much more dangerous—as an architect, in the worst case you make an ugly house, which is bad enough. But as a doctor, you can do more damage. Still, it's the same experience: you have to learn in the business.
And as you rightly say, the private house helped us understand what personal needs of people are and how different they are. Then come the building code and local conditions, and so on. That's all part of the structure, because every building is different, because every place is different, and because the people at these different places around the world are also different. That's why we have no style. That's why we always have different ideas, right up to today, and that's why our architecture is the way it is.
But to play devil's advocate: postmodernism—if you say it was just a mix of styles, combining various things, perhaps not really intentional—then what is the intellectually sharp, conceptually distinguishable difference? Is it an individualism that isn't arbitrary, but very specifically examines the particular tasks of a specific project and doesn't arbitrarily play at artifice and kitsch, but takes seriously what the task is? But the task is always individual. So if there's no style, what is it? I don't want the question of the human image, of the understanding of nature, to fall off the table. Because when I enter a Gothic cathedral, it was built for different people, for different gods or a different god, and in its space and form something unfolds that corresponds to a completely different understanding of human being and becoming. And that's why the question is: in what kind of time do we live? For what kind of time does Herzog & de Meuron build, and for what kind of people? How do we perceive that today, and how do we approach the future?
Gothicism embodies a different image of God than Romanesque architecture, and yet it was probably the same Christian God. To me it doesn't matter whether it's Romanesque or Gothic, or the mosque in Córdoba. The people who made these were driven by an idea, by an image they wanted to express. And you must have that image. You need a narrative—like when you make a film, you have to know where you want to go with your project. But I go to a different place with every project, and we develop this narrative—not I alone, but with the teams—for that specific place.
And when that's right, when this image is strong, when the image then sets free and interweaves materials and spaces and proportions—all these tools of architecture—into something new, that is the architecture I want. Whereas stylistically-oriented architects were bound to a concrete idea of their time, of how things should be. And I always wanted to avoid that.
I'm not saying that every stylistically-conceived postmodern building is bad, but it bored me at the time, it didn't advance me, and I wanted to push back against it. Let me give an example from art. The Museum of Modern Art in Frankfurt—the Hollein building. Jean-Christophe Amann left there, which everyone regretted. A terrible, cake-slice-like building. And yet Amann managed to do something worthwhile in those partly triangular, very strange rooms. Back then I found that impossible and wanted to push back. But today I could imagine showing art there.
What I mean to say is that architecture made with an image that doesn't correspond to ours can also produce something wonderful. I'm not saying only my way is the right one. I'm just trying to understand what path we've taken. It's the same for all of you. You see something—a shop interior, a bakery, a café from the 70s you always found terrible, and the older you get and the longer it stands, you think it's actually still cool—a detail, something—and the moment you've understood that, it's interesting, it gets torn down and something new comes in.
Then you've understood that it all has to do with how you're trapped in your own perception. And that too is a lesson I've learned: to deal with these questions much more calmly. Getting older has an advantage in that sense—you actually become better in terms of perception. And from perception, new work arises directly. Your new actions always arise directly from your perception of the world.
The living space of most people today—and increasingly in the future—will be the city. What is the challenge when the complex life of a city—why don't we take the city of Basel as an example—when you intervene architecturally in such an ensemble, or when you try to change political conditions to reshape an ensemble? Earlier there was mention of the initiative Go Basilea Go, with which Herzog & de Meuron, or at least Jacques Herzog, is involved, and Pierre de Meuron as well.
Well, a city is something that is always changing, and if it doesn't change, it dies. The transformative is actually the idea of the city. The countryside changes more slowly—it also changes, especially more than before. In the past, the countryside was almost a constant. But the city is determined by power and territory, and then by the people who live there. And by power I mean democratic power, or in the past the bishop, the king, the duke—whoever. And the territory is of course the land, which is shaped by that power.
So there are cooperative housing units, or there are only luxury apartments. In the Arab world, power is also connected to land, and it produces a very different urban production than in Basel or elsewhere in Switzerland. But those are general observations. For me it was always clear that I wanted to influence Basel.
Before we even had the office, we went through all the historical archives of the city—every single house—at the state archives. We drew plans of how the city looked during the Celts, during the Romans, during the Migration Period, and so on. We engaged intensively from a kind of naive love for the city that is still there. And this love for the city, this obsession to stand up for a city—that's what drives cities. It takes people, individuals. It's not the people as a mass.
But I must say to those on the left of the political spectrum: what has truly changed cities are individuals who wanted something. The bishop wanted the bridge over the Rhine. Without that bridge, Basel would have remained a village. And Rosshof shaped that area. The monasteries built their places in the city—they were places of knowledge and exchange, and that was decisive. The driver was God, but that was only a pretext—actually it was power over land.
I wish for the same from the people, or from the cooperative idea—to positively change a city. Not by preventing or prohibiting, but by doing something. Cities only happen when people want to do something concrete. But please don't prohibit. I think prohibiting is wrong. Even sins shouldn't be prohibited.
I think it's important that each person, whoever can, is willing to bring up this energy. For us—Pierre and me, or now also Mortatter, whom I actually didn't know before—we're older gentlemen, but we share this common concern. And I hope that all the younger people—I see that Zabel is here—are willing to take this on.
People also want to get involved because they want this city to become better, and the city can become much better. Why are we always second or third behind Zürich, behind Geneva? Even Bern gets more money for its suburban trains. I find that unacceptable. But most people don't care, right? And that's very important to know if you want to understand what drives us—because a city also becomes more beautiful through these initiatives. The 'Gole Go' initiative only removes one tram stop. Tram traffic runs exactly the same. It's not against trams at all, but there will be a pedestrian zone between Barfüsserplatz and Schifflände with far more trees—not double as much, it currently has none at all—with many more trees, infinitely more trees. And fountains, and unsealed ground, sand surfaces. You don't have to be a green to want something like this. It should be a no-brainer. It's so obvious, and if the city achieves this within the next 10 to 20 years, I say it will be the most beautiful city center in Switzerland. If that's not a motivation, I don't understand the world, because this is also a commercial and economic factor—gastronomy will become more interesting, shopping will become more interesting, there will be places. Imagine the Spiegelgasse, one of the most unattractive places today—it's very wide. If the trams leave, you could make a small park. Between Fischmarkt, which has an incredible fountain but is practically strangled by trams all around. Look at that fountain—it's incredible. But you can hardly see it. And in the Spiegelgasse you could create a park-like greening. You could play pétanque there. There are many activities, not just for those who want to shop. For 150 years, city centers were the consumer temples of capitalism and industrialization. The question is not only whether the future of the city is a future of shopping spaces and gastronomy spaces, but will it also be a communal, intimate space—an extension of private living space beyond one's own four walls? And what does that mean for developers, for urban planning? The ecological question exists, the political question exists, and the question is whether the future of city centers means continued commercialization or de-commercialization.
I can't be responsible for that myself, because I'm not the curator of this city. But I can say that the Gole Go initiative is certainly an ecological milestone. There's no need to debate it. Half the area could be de-sealed, and a lot of vegetation could come into the city. The actual limiting factors are the fire department, making sure they can still march through between the trees—there will be a way found for that. And for those who say this opens the door to gentrification—that is completely wrong. As I said, there must be places in this inner city, and in the city as a whole, where everyone can participate. And I'm not saying this to curry favor with underprivileged people, but simply because cities that only represent one social group are simply boring. You need all people for a vital city, and Basel has that. I don't believe Basel is becoming—Basel is not Stäfa and is not Storitz. The greening and the fountain installations we envision will be so attractive for everyone that we can't assume a gated community would emerge. That's rather the case today, when almost nobody wants to go into the city after a certain time—neither the poor nor the rich. Let's continue our tour through Basel. If you go to the Marktplatz, a department store was restored for a quarter billion. Did it bring urban value? Is that the added value? I find it great when billions are invested, but I also find it great when other things are invested. Those who have a problem with this should do something different themselves. The Mitte is of course a foundation—different values and people come together there. I would very much welcome a similar concept being realized at the Hauptpost on the other side of the street. Is that possible with a commercial developer? The city of Basel, the canton has given this property to AXA and nobody else. As an architect, I can't change that. It doesn't matter to me who the investor is, but what I don't want is for returns to ultimately prevent this kind of use. A higher-end gastronomy could work—it's a bit expensive, but at least publicly accessible for everyone. We don't even know exactly what will go in there yet.
But doesn't the architect's influence inevitably end there?
Yes, of course, but we are experienced enough. We ran the ETH Studio in Basel for 15 years—pure urban studies. We studied cities all over the world, in Africa, in Asia, in Europe, everywhere, and we know these phenomena. We tried very early to have an influence on curating, on shaping these places, knowing that it requires one thing or another. We as architects can apply less pressure than the canton, or other players, or a foundation. But we don't enjoy making a beautiful space—everything beautifully renovated and looking pristine—and then there's some boring shop inside. That's not in our interest.
But are there certain clients with whom you would absolutely refuse to build, even if the architectural challenge is right there in front of you, fascinating, essential for a country, for a city? What are your no-gos? Where does the 'no' come in?
That's actually a simple question. We build and work where Switzerland also conducts trade and business. That means there are terms that may not please you, like Qatar. There was an outcry—Qatar bought Art Basel and that should have been about human rights. Most people have no idea what Qatar even is. Let me share a personal experience. For 15 years we've been working on a project in Qatar. It started when an Arab student came to us in jeans—a brilliant young woman—who wanted to build a museum with us because she was very interested in art. It turned out she was the daughter of the then-emir—Sheikha Mayassa—one of the smartest women I've ever met in the art world, essentially the culture minister of Qatar. Should I have nothing to do with this person just because she's from Qatar? Qatar has become a hub between East and West, a place of mediation. The museum we're planning—which still hasn't started, I must say, everything is very slow—should be about Orientalism, an art movement about the fascination of the West for the East and the East for the West. It's incredibly interesting—for example, Rembrandt's entire Orientalist period. Most people who judge these countries or other political systems have no idea what has historically transpired. We just have our values and say 'I like this, I don't like that. They have migrant workers, they treat people badly.' We will ensure that on our construction site things are done correctly—I can say that for certain. And in this contact with Sheikha Mayassa, I've learned an incredible amount, also in dealing with other people. We were active in China too, and I wouldn't want to compare. But we would never work with countries at war, or in occupied territories like Crimea. There are many Western architects who built in Crimea—occupied territory—and those are absolute no-gos, because as an architect you occupy the territory. You build on a concrete place. If you build for an invader, for an usurper on land that belongs to others—that simply doesn't work. We had many projects in Russia, and one week after Russia invaded in 2022, we canceled all contracts. That was incredibly difficult, because as an architect you can't simply walk away from a contract—contracts are valid even during war. We set everything in motion to have those contracts annulled. But I want to say: if you think you should only build in the West, only with people who think like you and me—I think that's wrong. And especially now, in a time where we see movements in the West that shake our values and our sense of security, the question of where and with whom we should be active is more in question today than ever. But that makes it all the more important to have a clear position and to be able to discuss it. That's why it's important to me to proactively address these topics and not avoid them with evasive nonsense.
