Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends, first of all I wish to apologize for the absence of our perpetual secretary Laurent Petit Gérard who would have loved to be here as he loves architecture so much, which he would have made his profession if music had not seized him. After Saramoun in photography, Willem in engraving and drawings, Gérard Tracandi in painting, George Apergis in musical composition, Germaine Acogni in choreography, Robert Carsen for stage direction and Agnès Jaoui in cinema. It is a pleasure for me to welcome under this dome the first ceremony of the Grand Prix of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in architecture. I will not encroach on the words that Dominique Perot will pronounce in a few moments, but I will nevertheless recall that this is not the first time that the Swiss Confederation has been honored in this matter since we had the joy of receiving Bernard Tschumi at the end of 2024 for a magnificent conversation and an exhibition reviewing his career. Note that with Lausanne, it was not the same region and I also salute with our two laureates of this day Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, the exceptional international artistic radiance of Basel, their common city of origin and of which they are leading actors. Just in case, I point out that I am also, through my grandparents, originally from Basel. It will not have escaped anyone that Pierre de Meuron is not here with us this evening. He is a little unwell and we send him all our wishes for a speedy recovery. I will quickly return to a principle that all the people present under this dome do not necessarily know. Each distinction proposed by an artistic section must be submitted and ratified by all the other sections, which places interdisciplinarity at the heart of the functioning of the deliberations of our institution. I will not hide from you that in the case of a personality as unanimously recognized and respected in the architecture sector, objections were quite rare. Ladies and gentlemen, I thank you warmly for your presence under this dome and I pass the floor without further delay to Dominique Perot for the first part of this evening.
Thank you Madam President. Thank you dear colleague. Indeed, it is a joy for us to celebrate architecture this evening because this idea of launching Grand Prix for the Académie des Beaux-Arts was born a short time ago and it is a beautiful idea because each section awards over the years since there are nine sections in our Académie des Beaux-Arts. So each section awards a Grand Prix each year in turn. So that means architecture today is the first time, in three years it will be the second time, etc. And this celebration has a certain importance also in the process because we have, by common agreement, all the members of the academy and the correspondents of the Académie des Beaux-Arts, we have together imagined a prize that is obviously a Grand Prix but also a prize that is useful to others and in particular to younger generations. And so the prize that Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron will receive this evening is a prize that they will redistribute to three beneficiaries that I will call later after the presentation of the Minerva that I will call to join us. Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron. They are obviously very, very great and important architects. They were born in 1950. They studied architecture at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, that is, next door, not very far even if Jacques says that architecture and the school of architecture is in Basel and not in Zurich, but perhaps he will tell you about it later. Nevertheless, they founded their agency in 1978. They were inspired by an initial collaboration with Joseph Beuys at the creation of their agency. They work regularly with artists, the painter and longtime friend Rémy Zaugg, also Thomas Ruff, Michael Craig-Martin, but also with Ai Weiwei in China for the National Stadium in Beijing. I cite a few notable names and collaborations that are obviously quite exceptional, but you know that but it is important to recall that the Tate Modern marks in their career an emblematic moment, so to speak, in the year 2000.
Then, more recently, and this is very interesting, there is the Elbe Philharmonic in Hamburg which is also a very emblematic building. The residential tower at 56 Leonard Street in New York in 2017 and also, by the way, the M+ cultural center in Hong Kong, a magnificent museum. I forget about 200 or 250, but Jacques will correct me with the list he has in mind of all their production over several decades. I would just like to mention the Kinderspital in Zurich. A very beautiful project delivered recently. An extremely delicate, intelligent, luminous project with a lot of empathy, humanity. A project with a lot of wood, a material that returns very stubbornly in the work of Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron. A very beautiful project, I recommend it. It is truly for me certainly one of their masterpieces of recent months or years. Also a very interesting project, this one in Geneva with the Lombard Odier bank. I am giving some news of recent deliveries of buildings by Herzog & de Meuron. A very nice building as well. A work on concrete with also interior fittings that are quite organic in relation to a fairly abstract work even if it is poetic but still quite abstract of a layering of concrete leaves pierced, so to speak, on dozens of thin columns. And recently Jacques returns from Philadelphia where there was the inauguration of another project, the Calder Garden, so the Calder Foundation in Philadelphia, a fairly unprecedented work in a way that uses rather the topography, the earth, the ground as being the founder or at least the foundation of this project. So matter for them is something extremely important, the notion of materiality and also precision obviously, but especially materiality.
And I must say that when we talked about it together, we oriented ourselves and I will call later the beneficiaries who also have this very strong relationship with materiality, with matter and therefore with an architecture that is embodied and has this sensitive, sensual dimension and which is also obviously a dimension of beauty. So my dear Jacques, you are alone this evening. We obviously think of Pierre, but I will invite you to present you with the Minerva, the emblem of the academy which is a work by Jean Anguera. Jean Anguera is a sculptor who is a member of the academy and must be among us this evening. So if you want to join me so that I can offer you, on behalf of the entire Académie des Beaux-Arts and in particular the architecture section, this Minerva, this small sculpture that I place here and also the diploma that goes with it. So we will stand there for the photos. There, for the photos. So there, the floor is yours and I will take it back to continue the launch of this evening because the most important part of the evening, I haven't said it, but it will be the discussion, the conversation between Francis Rambert and Jacques Herzog.
Thank you dear Dominique. Thank you everyone. Good evening. Good evening everyone. I can't say much because I think the conversation with Francis will give us the opportunity to express ourselves a little more broadly on concrete themes. So for now, I would simply like to tell you that receiving a prize as you get older, it accumulates a bit, it's a bit normal but it's still exceptional to do this or to receive this in Paris. It's a city and I don't want to flatter you, it's a city perhaps the most beautiful city in the world. A city with incredible, almost supernatural beauty. It's not really the fashion of our time, but we'll talk about that maybe too. But when I come here, I am truly dazzled by this city, by the architecture of this city. It's almost like an architectural project. There is no city like this, truly like architecture. And we were able to do a project very early in our career, a project that is still dear to us, the Rue des Suisses, the housing building that I find a piece of Paris that I find very nice, very modest and I recently, not long ago, I went to see how it lives without the architect because architecture must always survive without the author. We take ourselves a little too seriously at the beginning, but there are so many years that architecture must live and must prove that the architect was right or the architect didn't make too many mistakes. So this project is still dear to me and as you know, we are currently realizing the Triangle Tower project which was very criticized but I believe that what I see now will be a beautiful project in the almost classical sense of Parisian architecture. It will be very monumental, very precise in the Haussmannian axis almost. And I believe that even if it's not fashionable, it's not an example of sustainability. I don't know the word in French, durabilité. Durable is difficult, it's different from sustainable. Durable is truly architecture that lasts. So I really like durabilité, it's very important. Architecture must be durable and I hope this project will not be a reason not to return to Paris in the future.
Well then, we'll talk again. Don't move, don't move. Stay with me. Stay with me because now when we evoked the principle of this prize together, effectively with the identification of beneficiaries, I didn't mention it but I wanted to keep it for now. In 2015, you created in Basel the Fondation Jacques Herzog et Pierre de Meuron. For the academy, this is an extremely important point because it is in fact a non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation and valorization of your archives in architecture, art, and also photography. And this notion of transmission is something very dear to us, very important. And when we evoked the identification of our beneficiaries, you told me it's a French prize, choose French people. I won't come with Swiss proposals. And so effectively we chose French people who work, as I said earlier, on quite different materials from each other. I will therefore call Ophélie Dosa to join us. There, Ophélie Doza.
There, Ophélie is therefore co-founder of the agency Matera Matang. She was also a resident at the Villa Medici. She was last year, among other things, visiting at EPFL at the School of Architecture in Lausanne. She develops various projects and in particular a work on stone as a material, also wood. She also developed research work on the notion of retaining walls. A work that interested the academy and which gave her a residency among other things. So there, it is truly a fascinating approach and that we wanted to identify in this specificity of matter and materials: stone and wood. Now I will call Galade Vandal. Am I in order or not? No, no, I'm not in order. There, sorry. There, everything is there, so I will call Marc Leschelier. There, there.
There, Marc Leschelier who works in a completely different way with other materials. He was born in 1984, lives and works in Paris. He is an architect and teacher at the School of Architecture of Paris-Malaquais. That's quickly. But above all, and this is what interests us, he develops work that is at the limit of art and architecture. He exhibits and effectively creates from raw and industrial materials installations that are based on materials that are hidden in construction. Let me explain because I had the opportunity and the interest and the joy because it was quite exhilarating to visit his workshop and he works with fabrics, I will express myself very badly but we will correct, fabrics that are a bit like carpets. Imagine two carpets placed side by side and which sandwich a bed of concrete or cement to put it quickly. When you shape these carpets, they are flexible at the start and then you water them and as you water them obviously the cement and concrete set and solidify in the posture that was given. There. So I say all this to excite your curiosity a bit, so that you can consult the work of Marc Leschelier which is very interesting and which delights us in this relationship perhaps more raw, more direct with concrete and metal. There. Bravo Marc.
Effectively the last beneficiary, Galade Vandal. So Galade Vandal is also obviously an architect. He is an architect who teaches in Zurich. So effectively, you had words together between Basel and Zurich earlier and effectively Galade Vandal has just completed his thesis in architecture on a subject that is quite particular since it is in fact the question of reducing or at least rereading the boundary between nature and culture. And so this thesis applies to work that develops from writing on a geological history in particular, it is the subject of the thesis, of the Grotto at Grand Dé, an artificial grotto erected in Florence in the 16th century. And so there is a work, I would say, rather of layers, so to speak, and also, I must say that Galade Vandal works on questions of fabric and we had the opportunity to get to know him here at the academy as a resident or at least he benefited from support from our academy to develop his work. So thank you Galade and you have there wood, stone, concrete, metal, fabric and sedimentation. I think we are quite spoiled this evening from the point of view of matter. Thank you and bravo.
Yes, you go back down. So now the most substantial part, so to speak, of our evening is effectively the discussion between Francis Rambert, which is not really a discussion but I prefer the term conversation between Francis Rambert and Jacques Herzog. So the floor is yours, gentlemen. There, so that we will also have on the screens images that will circulate, not so that they are commented on but so that we are surrounded by the works of Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron.
Well, good evening everyone. It is an immense pleasure to receive Jacques Herzog and unfortunately Pierre is not here to perhaps contradict him sometimes because we don't really know how you function. It would have been interesting to see you in a little dialectical game to see how you bring contradiction. Does all that fabricate the project or do you immediately bring all your teams and then you drop an idea on the table? But we won't wait for the answer on that. There. But in any case, I wanted to say how much Pierre is missed this evening and that we never isolate one from the other. It's a team. It's still quite fabulous the career, when you see it. We talked about art and we'll talk about it right away, it's the Académie des Beaux-Arts. But still, we didn't talk about Aldo Rossi. Aldo Rossi was also one of those mentors who, I was going to say, perhaps fabricated the thinking of the agency since each of you had this dual training, one might say, of an artist and an architect. That's not bad, this duo. So to talk about art, it is obvious that you are among those who are not art collectors in the sense that you may do it but that's not what interests us here, it's how art precisely intervenes, I will say, in your architectural production. And there, we see that there is a completely unique iteration between architects and artists. And we don't forget at all, it was 30 years ago, that is to say, but the Rémy Zaugg when he did the exhibition at the Centre Pompidou which remains one of the great moments of how to show architecture, comma, differently. That is to say, do you remember that moment?
Ah yes. This exhibition, I didn't mention it at the beginning, it was very important and I think it was a demonstration of a different attitude in architecture and that's what I was always looking for. In the 70s, architecture was in a situation between modernism and post-modernism, and I hated that phase, the heroes of that time, I didn't feel comfortable. So obviously, we had to find another path. And I felt closer to art because Basel is rather a city of art. There are many artists and I myself was more interested in art than in architecture. And that was the reason why, let's say, the art world became so important in our career. I myself hesitated between art and architecture for 15 years until the mid-80s when I finally decided to focus solely on architecture. But since the 70s, I knew museums like the one by Deine, by Stirling, and they were architectures that were rather against art. Architects who tried to be artists, who were almost independent of artists, and the artists of the time, I knew them well, I was very close, they hated this architecture. So the first steps we took in architecture were works for artists and in collaboration with artists. It was never to be inspired by art, it was rather to have another perspective. So that's a bit of an explanation of the reason why we always sought collaborations and the things we did with Rémy, even with Ai Weiwei, we always started from zero. We always wanted to do something that neither the artist nor the architect could have done independently. So that's very important at the beginning and the first projects we did, like the Goetz Collection, was a demonstration of another way of doing things. Goetz in Munich, I recall, is a first example of minimalism. The word minimalism didn't exist. Block of concrete, glass, glass. There, it's wood. It looks like concrete but it's actually, there is a quite interesting subtlety. Yeah. Yeah. Of course, it was a demonstration of several things. We wanted to create a kind of space for art that was truly made for the artists of the time, minimalism, abstraction and all that. And a demonstration of a different attitude, a minimalism in architecture that didn't exist at the time. And the term minimalism came from art and I used it but I found it in Donald Judd and minimalism became like the DNA more or less of Swiss architecture but the beginning was obviously that. So there are so many things to tell, we need to focus otherwise we get a bit lost.
That's for sure, that's for sure. The subject is immense. But still, I would like to say in passing that with people like Thomas Ruff, the library in Basel, we see that you twist the neck of Adolf Loos on ornament is no longer a crime at all. That is, you put it back on the table this question with this work for Ricola, this work for all sorts of very interesting things and there, that's new in architecture.
Yeah but people said you are rationalists, you are minimalists and then we work with ornament which was completely the opposite. So for some critics, it was a shock. They criticized us a lot but I always didn't care about that because I knew we had to find ways to do architecture. It's not obvious because architecture no longer lived in a tradition where, let's say, we learned from an uncle or grandfather what architecture is. We had to find new means for architecture. And ornament, which was criminalized by Loos, was something that interested us at a certain moment. Very strongly, we wanted to do things that didn't exist before. And I also found Loos's texts very racist and many texts that we find in people we admire like Le Corbusier, actually if you read them with precision and attention today, they no longer tell us much and many of these texts are a bit absurd if not stupid. No, but that's why it's interesting to go back to that time because when you launched into this story, you knew you were taking a risk. The risk of criticism, you say you don't care, okay? But nevertheless, it was there, it was more in the debate. We came out, you recalled, from this postmodern friction and we saw architectures emerging that could be frightening at the end of the day. And as I get older, I discover that the instruments of architecture are the same. Ornament plays a role. Ornament in a more general sense. We discussed this a lot with Jean-François Chevrier. I don't know if he is here among us. We greet him if he is there. Ornament is in fact the definition of the whole of architecture. It's not, let's say, a decoration. I'm not talking about ornament as decoration, but it's an idea of the whole that has to do with the facade and everything, etc. Ideally, we have made architectures where ornament, structure and space are one thing. Gothic architecture is like that, for example. And the Prada project in Aoyama, Tokyo is an example of this attitude. So we discovered step by step what architecture is. At the beginning, we had no idea. We just wanted to work against a trend, a spirit of the time, and postmodernism was that, it was a dead end. And I think that young architects, that's why I think it's very good this prize given to young people, each one must find their own way, their own path and maybe they find it, maybe not. It's a risk.
So, we see very well that in your work, form and matter always, you always question that in projects. If we take this very quick list between the Schinus, the Signal Box in Basel, still a signal box that becomes almost a work of art, a sublimation of function quite extraordinary. The Schaulager in Basel, the Prada Epicenter in Tokyo to take only four. We see that each time you confront this question of matter that you put back on the table each time. So that's the influence of Beuys. That's it.
Yeah but Beuys was a bit fetishistic. I don't like, let's say, one material more than another. I accept materiality even if ultimately it's thought that produces architecture that is durable. But you need the material because at the end of the day we are physical, we are human beings and we still have the five senses. Fortunately because architecture needs a strong materiality because we touch it, we feel it and it's inevitable. And if you don't accept the materiality of architecture, you are lost. You are done for as an architect. That's it. But I am not a fetishist, let's say. I don't talk about this wood being so beautiful. Of course, it's so beautiful, but there are so many things that are beautiful too. Here, we are surrounded by stone. These limestone stones that we find in the cities of France, it's magnificent. But ultimately, it's the form and the definition and the precision of the forms here that surround us, that makes the game, that makes the music. It's completely different. So if you decide on something, you have to go all the way. You have to go, you see now the Dominus, it's transparency. It's the paradox between what is very firm, solid, that remains and this transparency almost like a negligee. You see, it's this paradox and these contradictions that are a very important element, I think. We also find that in the very recent project that you discovered, that Dominique described, the Calder project. There, each space is a surprise. If you go through the project, it's a project that I couldn't have done 10 or 20 years ago. And it's a project that was done now, totally different from what we were looking for 30, 40 years ago.
Let's stay on the idea of this matter and which brings me to the question of experimentation. So we suspect that with the agency you have, with the tool it represents, you launch into experiments, prototypes, we know, the more you have the right clients who have the means to experiment all that. So it's still a formidable story. Is it really about research? We often hear that research in our universities is not in agencies. But I think it's in both personally. There is a type of research at the university and then there is the type of research at the agency, one feeds the other and precisely when we see the AA School in London, which was perhaps one of the models of that, research was in agencies. On this plan, what is your point of view?
I taught at the school in Zurich but we taught in Basel because we worked in Basel and the research we did was research on cities. So it was not architectural projects but we did research on cities as architectural projects. So it's a bit of a contradiction too. I think that real research is in agencies because architecture at the end of the day is not theory, it's practice, you have to prove it on site. And schools in the United States are very far from agencies, that's why it's a bit complicated. In the United States, there aren't many great architects, young ones, because it's very difficult to enter the market if you come from a university school in the United States. So there are almost only large agencies that are capable of launching into the architecture market, into production. In Europe, it's still different. But I think that apart from this research on cities, on the analysis or visit of cities, we have always visited sites. We have always studied the life of people, the life of people in cities as a basis. So theory was an empirical theory. It was empiricism, not abstract theory because there is no abstract theory in architecture. There is no theory in architecture. The theories that exist in architecture no longer work. It's absurd. It's stupid.
I don't know any theory of architecture that still works. It's interesting historically, but it means nothing for practice. It gives no instruction to the young beneficiaries today, to students, to schools. You have to find things in the street. That's where you find inspirations, ideas. For me, it was always like that. In the street, on the street, everywhere. For me, architecture never inspired me in the classical traditional sense. I never preferred a great architecture to a banal architecture because it's the perspective that I as an author, as a visitor, cast on architecture that inspires me. It's my creative gaze. It's also something I learned in art. You, as someone who perceives something, make a creative effort, creative. You create this vision, this idea of what you see. If you are told 'Ah, that's important, that's important, that's important.' You are done for. You see what I mean? That's why in architecture theory doesn't work. The Four Books were good only to understand how these classical architectures were made, but apart from that, it's not interesting.
So precisely, maybe there are contradictions but I am very relaxed about answering all the contestations. Precisely one point, I come back to experimentation, the story of glass because it's interesting, you talked about Prada, it's true between the convex, concave side, everything that is a kind of magnifying glass on the city and others. And the work you do at the Elbe Philharmonic, we feel that there is always an idea of working on not on the facades but precisely what constitutes them. But there is always a concept. The idea of this undulating surface is to give the glass to remove the uniform reflection of glass.
No, the uniform reflection can be interesting in a fashion store. You see yourself or you see how it goes with the clothing you wear or that you try on, but the facade had to be something else like a glass rock, something that has a certain solidity. So it was an idea, a physical concept, let's say psychological because it's like a personality, a building speaks to you, it's like a face. So that's where the idea of a material comes from. That's why I have no preference. I have no preference for stone or wood or anything. That doesn't interest me at all. But I use it to give, to create something concretely at a very concrete place in a very concrete moment. And that's architecture. It's now and the paradox is that we talked about durability. It must last, survive generations. But if you do it correctly, if you do it well now, it will still be good in 100 years. That's why museums, the great museums, are still great museums now, great architectures. There is no 21st century museum that is totally different, let's say, from the Louvre, isn't it? Because the great museums, the Louvre, you could show in that building, you could show the great masters of painting, but it would also work very well with any installation or performance art. You see what I mean? There must be a strong character in a concrete time and that's all you can do.
That's why you are also done for as an architect if you already think 'Ah, I think that now architecture must reflect this, this, this.' You see, it's a lousy perspective. Young students must not believe that there is something that expresses the spirit of the time. You must express your own perception of time, but not an abstract idea of new. Not a theoretical idea. So no ideology either. Especially not. Especially not. No but it's important to say that because ideologies destroy the world as we see. So it's the same thing in architecture. It's absurd.
But coming back to Paris, Paris was built according to a very strong idea but it was concrete. It was very concrete and it still manifests itself now. And it's a 19th century city but it works perfectly well in the 20th century.
So the young, let's come to that. You often talk about Trojan horse when talking about architectural strategy, that in fact when you design a project, you have to come with something that will bring the client to, how to say, to seize your architectural approach. I find that very interesting to be something that will not surprise, I was going to say in a clever way, but on the contrary to bring people to this because architecture is very complex. So in this relationship with the client, tell us about the Trojan horse. But it's a very important point. We never do anything behind the client's back. I like that. You have to have a very open and sincere relationship with the client. The architecture you propose must be very strong and convincing for the client. I believe that the architect must be like a character, a very sincere being. I am very sincere, I have nothing to hide. I sleep better at night and above all, it's even more important, I say this not for moral reasons, I say this for health reasons and I say this for the sake of architecture itself because architecture does not like to be part of a betrayal. Because if you betray architecture or if you do something like 'I am inspired by something but I don't want to say it. I act as if, you know, things like that where I do behind the back, the client has no taste so I do it anyway.' That never works because it shows, it's obvious. Architecture always betrays you if you are not sincere, if you don't do things with an open presentation or vision. You must be able to say what you want to do, to express what you want to do, to communicate what you want to do. Otherwise, if you are not capable, you have no conviction, it doesn't come from your interior. And that shows. Architecture does not forgive. Architecture is visible. You can go around. A painting is two dimensions. Maybe a little bit a third dimension. Sculpture is already more complicated but architecture, it's really there, it's very big, you can discover all the corners. You can't hide corpses somewhere, you see. You really have to be very open, very sincere also with the client.
The best projects were done with clients who became accomplices, who wanted to use their project to go somewhere that they themselves didn't know before. If the client wants to repeat what he already knew, he doesn't need the architect.
Yes, that's the Trojan horse. That is, it arrived. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely.
It's the Trojan horse. I often used that because I found it very interesting in the sense that basically, the Beijing stadium is a bit like that. We made a stadium that is both, we were told it expresses the glory of an empire that is being born, presenting itself for the Olympic Games and all that, it's possible. But that doesn't interest me much. It doesn't interest me to express a political vision. Not an ideological architecture, but this grandeur, this dimension and especially this structure, I often compared it with the Eiffel Tower, with people walking underneath the Eiffel Tower, with this space underneath the Eiffel Tower, it became so iconic, it attracts people and it remains important also after the World's Fair or the Olympic Games today. Today the Beijing stadium, I said this to my architect colleague before, there are many also. Yeah. No. Who made the big stadium? Yeah. The big stadium in Paris that an Olympic stadium is basically a bit stupid because the Olympic Games are very short but we designed it as a structure that attracts people, so it is visited by tens of thousands of people every day, like a public park. And the Trojan horse comes from the possibility of an architecture that attracts the public, that is like a social platform in the sense that official debate, public debate will always be possible. Of course today, you can supervise, as they say, supervise or control everyone by camera, but you can gather, you can create public spaces outside the official program, let's say. So architecture always has the possibility, with the client of course, with the client's agreement, to do something that was not planned in the program. If you see that, which adds things even if this stadium was made for the Olympic Games. If you see the space it offers, it has nothing to do with the Olympic Games, but it is simply interesting architecture. Interesting in the sense that people want to be there, it's an attractor.
Politics. It's not ideological, it's political. Political in the sense that it wants people and the masses to see themselves, even if it's for birthdays or weddings or whatever. But architecture has a great role in our societies, in our democracy. I believe that architecture continues to play an important role, even though we said that before too when you were building the great National Library—imagine, that would be impossible today—but it remains a very important monument for the city. And we are now going through a very different time; other things matter now, fortunately, sustainability, all those things, but that doesn't exclude what I was saying before, that architecture must also be sustainable, even in the sense of the idea of the monument. The idea of the monument is not bad. It's not something we should exclude. We should continue to think the city according to, let's say, Aldo Rossi. No, the permanence of monuments, and it's true that monuments still play a role in cities today. We visited Verona a week ago, exactly the Arena, which is there since 2000. It's fantastic to have that monument in the city. Maybe in 100 or 200 years, the library will be gone, but there will be the four towers, that space, that there, I think we must never forget that.
So, you've done, you've done several stadiums anyway. We feel that it's a thing starting with the stadium in Basel. It's interesting the stadium in Basel because you're going to redo it soon. You're going to redo your own copy. You're going to take back your copy, sorry. So it's an interesting exercise for an architect to say, 'So I'm redoing it, does that mean you were wrong or that it needs to evolve? Obviously the brief has changed? What does that mean?'
That's a good question. So the stadium is very successful. It's the best team in Switzerland. Yes, yes, we know Switzerland, obviously that's the main thing for me. So the stadium allows people to gather. That's also a very interesting theme, but today compared to 20 years ago, there are many more women, many more families, many more children. So obviously we need slightly different spaces. We need to widen the public platforms. That leads to a possibility that gives me, as an architect, the possibility to rethink the whole stadium. So instead of making a facade, we make a roof. So the roof replaces the facade, so to speak, but it's not done yet. We need money, it's complicated, but in Switzerland there's no problem with money actually. It's not, we always find maybe, but let's say the owner of the stadium and the organization, the club, we have to find, that has nothing to do with architecture but it's a theme that obviously interests me. That's clear.
