As part of the swisspeaksFESTIVAL, Hochparterre, an editing house for Swiss architecture and design, will present the exciting “Swiss Design” exhibition at Totem Design Gallery. The exhibition will showcase the unique and excellent achievements of Swiss design, illustrated through objects and images of everyday life.

The Swiss are known for being fastidiously attentive to detail in their daily life; certainly a result of being one of the wealthiest nations in the world. Public space in Switzerland is rather clean and orderly, and the people who move in that space are often well groomed. All these dapper people need furniture, clothes, sports gears, bags, china and cutlery—not just as mere utensils for their daily habits, but as a sign of “belonging.” The cleverly arranged section “Mobile of Lifestyles” will illustrate those daily routines of many Swiss with objects from the past ten years.

The section “The museum of Design” conveys another distinct Swiss characteristic. Today’s designers don’t consider tradition as a stifling burden but as an inspiring source. They take a “traditionally progressive” stance by appreciating and renewing the standards and values of the Swiss manufacturers, designers and architects of the 20th century. Switzerland has not experienced any serious ruptures in its history and culture (there haven’t been any wars in Switzerland in a long time), nor have today’s fast lifestyles been able to cut off all links to memory and tradition. The resulting sense of security and continuity reinforces in a transformed way the Swiss’ conservative values of being frugal, practical, and measured.

The exhibition “Swiss Design” establishes an important link between contemporary designers and manufacturers’ rich diversity and innovation, and the equally rich legacy of their tradition. The objects will be exhibited in their original size, inviting the audience to touch them. The “history” of these objects will be documented in photographs, drawings and films. The viewer will come to understand that the Swiss love for unassuming luxury plays just as much a role as the know-how of their engineers and manufacturers in creating practical, yet stylish, gadgets.

And yet, it would be wrong to talk about Swiss design as a homogenous style. It would be just as much a clichÈ as Swiss precision and Swiss cheese. As if the Japanese weren’t as precise and the cheese from France not as delicious. Switzerland is a small but very diverse country; its people speak four languages and inhabit hunderts of valleys that are separated by tall mountains. Each valley, each canton is starkly independent and marked by its distinguished local tradition. As anywhere in the world, design in Switzerland doesn’t speak a national language; the lifestyles and habits of the people depend on their cultural and social conditions. It is the particular achievements of the designers, engineers and manufacturers from Switzerland that made and still make them renowned worldwide; they can and want to be measured at world fairs. Products from companies like Maggi, Toblerone, USM furniture, the Swiss Federal Railways SBB and even the alpine holiday paradise St. Moritz have been shaped and developed over many years. The great success of Swiss industrial design in the past 10 years, such as the hearing aids by Phonak, the computer mouse and mini cameras by Logitech, and the watches by Swatch Group, happened thanks to a combined effort by Swiss entrepreneurs, engineers and designers.

Producer: Swiss Peaks
Curators: Ariana Pradal, Jakob Gantenbein, Roland Eberle (Hochparterre, Magazine for Swiss Architecture and Design, Zurich).