a project in collaboration with Jan Schweizer
“A cloister without a bookcase [armarium] is like
a fortress without weapons.”
As a crucial community reference, Abbaye de Sénanque is a Cistercian monastery that well demonstrates a timeless model of autonomous collective dwelling. Their monastic life is gravitated around its own steady time, regardless of the linear society time that ceaselessly aims for progression, accumulation and expansion. For centuries, the monks were able to perform a set of timely programs in the configuration of rooms. Their minds oscillating between the individual work and the collective work, centering around the cloister space.
----Lectio Divina, cited in Leroux-Dhuys, Cistercian Abbeys
As a crucial community reference, Abbaye de Sénanque is a Cistercian monastery that well demonstrates a timeless model of autonomous collective dwelling. Their monastic life is gravitated around its own steady time, regardless of the linear society time that ceaselessly aims for progression, accumulation and expansion. For centuries, the monks were able to perform a set of timely programs in the configuration of rooms. Their minds oscillating between the individual work and the collective work, centering around the cloister space.
Embedded in the dense, paralyzed heritage fabric of Zurich old town, Spiegelgasse 5 offers an opportunity to sketch out a new plan for living together. As the retail apocalypse induce the commercial to retrieve, we look forward to fulfilling those spaces with relevant daily occupations that engage the local community. Armarium, a place to read, gather, and inscribe new local histories.
The house is currently divided into two, a front and back condition. Two staircases are inserted to finish two sets of circulation, forming a conceptual translucent core of the shared uses, namely “the cloister.” The renovated house offers a set of new programs including “Chapel” (children’s theater, gathering space), “Refectory” (kitchen and dining space), “scriptorium” (study and library), a few beds and workshop spaces.
The house is currently divided into two, a front and back condition. Two staircases are inserted to finish two sets of circulation, forming a conceptual translucent core of the shared uses, namely “the cloister.” The renovated house offers a set of new programs including “Chapel” (children’s theater, gathering space), “Refectory” (kitchen and dining space), “scriptorium” (study and library), a few beds and workshop spaces.
1.refectory
2.chapel
3.scriptorium
4.dormitory
5.cloister
