Zurich Primer: A Propositional Planning Vision for the City

The Zurich Primer addresses urban growth and transformation in relation to urban codes and proposes densification scenarios for the city of Zurich in the context of the projected population increase.

The Zurich Primer is structured around the five thematic areas of – “Housing”, “Mobility and Public Space”, “Existing Fabric and Continued Construction”, “Public Buildings and Spaces”, and “Work”. It addresses urban growth and transformation in relation to urban codes and proposes densification scenarios for the city of Zurich in the context of the projected population increase. In addition, through five visual essays, it offers a photographic survey of Zurich and highlights in short guest contributions how other cities in Switzerland (Basel, Geneva) and Europe (Brussels, London, Berlin) handle similar issues.

Jonathan Sergison is a founding partner of Sergison Bates architects. Since 2012 he has been based in Switzerland and has been directing the Zurich studio. He graduated from the Architectural Association School of Architecture in 1989 and worked for David Chipperfield and Tony Fretton. Jonathan has taught at many schools of architecture, including the Architectural Association in London, the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale in Lausanne (EPFL), the Graduate School of Design (GSD) at Harvard, the Oslo School of Architecture and Design and the Kyoto Institute of Technology (KIT) in Japan. He has been Full Professor at the Accademia di Mendrisio, Switzerland since 2008, and in 2019 he was invited to establish the Institute of Urban and Landscape Studies (ISUP) in Mendrisio, which he has since directed. He is particularly interested in urban questions and the role housing plays in the changing conditions of the contemporary European city, has written and lectured on research conducted in both teaching and practice, attended reviews in schools of architecture and served as member of competition juries across the globe. Giulia Scotto is an architect and urban researcher based at the Landscape and Urban Studies Institute (ISUP) of the Università della Svizzera Italiana. Giulia received her PhD in urban studies at the University of Basel in 2022 with a dissertation on the infrastructural expansion of ENI, the Italian national hydrocarbon agency, in post-independence sub-Saharan Africa. Giulia is currently coordinating the SNSF project "Codes and Conventions for Future Zurich: A Propositional Planning Approach to Qualitative Densification" and is a visiting postdoc at the Chair of the History and Theory of Urban Design at ETH Zurich.