Areal Bruggeten, Samstagern
2018
Allmendkorporation Richterswil
Samstagern, Switzerland
Residential, day care
13’000 sqm
Selected competition
Hiromi Hosoya, Markus Schaefer, Valentin Ott, Martyna Michalik
Koepflipartner Landschaftsarchitekten BSLA
Surrounded by gardens with a view of the Höhronen mountains of the Schwyz Alps, six solitary point-house buildings form an ensemble around an internal sequence of squares and paths. The volumes and living spaces are offset from each other in such a way that privacy and views of the landscape open up from each apartment. This dialogue is enhanced through direct access of all the rooms of each apartment onto a spacious green balcony creating a link to the garden.
In this way, the promise of idyllic countryside living—proximity to nature, relation to the landscape, village meeting places, human scale—is fulfilled despite the site’s location between industrial buildings and larger apartment blocks. The project offers a small oasis on a hillside with a high quality of living and a feeling of belonging, complemented by necessary privacy.
The buildings are ideally south-facing, loosely staggered but efficiently organised thus creating their own reference system. They allow the neighbors to see through and avoid façades that are placed in front of them. The architectural expression and materiality aim to complement this theme – the volumes are staggered and offset to maximize extension into the green space for each apartment. Massivity—clad in industrial undulated Eternit—responds to private areas while filigranity; steel balconies and french-windows; respond to the exposure to shared green space.
The groups of trees flow quite naturally from the slope into the interior of the settlement and organise the open spaces. Gardens around the apartments are generous yet remain intimate thanks to clever planting, offering enough privacy and protection from prying eyes. Fences are avoided wherever possible. Despite the high density, the settlement appears relaxed, green, often continuous and scenic.
An intricate balance of private vs public space is achieved throughout the scales—the urban staggering, landscape density, architectural volume, materialistic expression and internal sequence of living spaces.
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