ETH Zürich   Studio Adam CarusoETH Zürich  Studio Adam CarusoETH Zürich  Studio A. CarusoETHZ   Studio Caruso

Linthal, located at the end of the Glarus valley, carries a rich agricultural and industrial heritage that is still visible in its built environment, marked today by many underused or vacant buildings. Once a vibrant rural hub, it now bears the character of a transit zone, with essential services found only further down the valley. Yet within this apparent emptiness lies the potential for renewal. The unique landscape and close-knit scale of the village invite new ideas for how people might live, work, and engage with nature. Linthal is not defined by the anonymity of cities but by community spirit, resilience, and a deep connection to the land. Qualities that can become the foundation for a future shaped by sustainable agricultural practices and a strengthened rural collaboration. 
In order to create and maintain such a regenerative farming concept a new actor is introduced that concentrates the responsibility for administrative and organizational as well as distributary questions in one figure. Various agents are part of a regenerative farm and ask therefore for the orchestration of the system cycles. With the One Roof Cooperative a contact point occurs. Combining two associations under one large roof: the farmer’s and the gardener’s association, the cooperative fosters dialogue, support, sharing and negotiations. Located in a former farmhouse, it connects Linthal’s traditions on several levels. Remnants in the ambient land evoke the presence of hidden networks and practices that are then illustrated by these artefacts. Some of them still fulfilling a purpose, some being reprogrammed and others standing their ground as artworks. 
All together form a composition that allows people to experience natural landscapes and agricultural practices in a humble way without being disturbed. The scenery is about celebrating what is already there, identifying the potential and making it productive again. This does not solely imply economic profit, but more significantly the enhancement of communal identity and the collective appreciation of rural traditions and crafts. 
Architecturally speaking, the former housing unit is transformed into the administrative interface of the cooperative, while the barn part gets a clear communal and production or processing based orientation. Together they break with the linearity that was predominant in Linthal before and where everything passed through. Now it invites us to stay, learn, exchange knowledge and spend time appreciating the land and its advantages. Increasing energies all over the village come together in the farmhouse, get refined and then distributed to customers and interested parties. The large roof provides not only symbolic shelter from weather conditions for the program. It is also offering a space for gathering, for festivities and workshops, allowing for engagement in agricultural practices and the celebration of simple but honest joy of high-quality products. It is embodying the love for nature and tradition and shows its appreciation for handicraft, in architecture and in agriculture.
By not being fully insulated, the building questions the spatial needs architecture has to provide in a rural and food processing setting. Therefore, the project challenges how architects could work with existing buildings and proposes settle adjustments that blend in seamlessly while still showing that something is happening. 

 The logbook ‘Klausenpass: Between two distinct valleys’ was created during the research phase on the topic ‘Switzerland at a Crossroads’ in the Klausenpass region. It focused on the similarities and differ- ences between the Schächental and Glarnertal. With several interviews, we explored the infrastructure in the landscape, living systems and the migration to the centres.

The resulting project ‘The Glarus Alps Battery with Algae Cultivation’ deals with the question of how existing infrastructure systems, vacant buildings and agriculture can be used to create a post-fossil production and at the same time a qualitative place with added value for the local population with just a few tweaks.

The Linth-Limmern pumped storage power plant produces energy using hydropower. The power plant network makes it possible to collect turbid water and pump it back up when the energy price is low in order to generate energy again. In addition to the high-Alpine Muttsee and Limmernsee reservoirs, there are the Tierfehd and Linthal compensating reservoirs in the valley. These are monofunctional con- crete reservoirs, which are fenced in and offer no added value.

After the collapse of the textile industry, the valley is characterised by vacant industrial buildings, which are underused. Due to the vacancy and the location, there is little economic pressure on real estate compared to urban areas. This provides cost-effective space for projects and innovative ideas. Besides the former industrial buildings, the valley is very agricultural. In Switzerland, 270,000 tonnes of animal feed are imported from soya every year. Agroscope is currently researching alternative sources of protein, such as algae. These can be produced on uncultivated land and have a higher protein con- tent per kg. Growth occurs through photosynthesis and CO2 in a closed system.

The project combines a floating algae production facility on the compensation basin built for energy generation with a public swimming pool as an additional function and added value for the local popula- tion. The algae will be processed in the nearby former Bebié wool spinning mill, which will be converted with minor interventions. Both the construction of the bath and the installations in the industrial building are made of unused hardwood.

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The Memories of the House Museum is devoted to the domestic spaces of textile industry related housing in Ennenda, Kanton Glarus. This museum spreads all over the village, like a fabric of spaces, each giving a specific impression of a domestic space.

The main exhibition is located in the former industrial site of the Jenny factory in Ennenda. It is situated on the ground floor of a Hängeturm, a reconstruction of a historical local building typology, specifically created to dry freshly printed fabrics. The exhibition consists of 1:1 reconstructions of 19th century domestic spaces from Ennenda. Copying, relocating and rearranging the rooms allows to compare the conditions of dwelling between different social classes that were all involved in the textile industry. It is an attempt to revise the way the local history has been written and to counterbalance the inequality of documentation and preservation of local buildings and stories. The reconstructions are built in timber, each with one section as a plaster cast of the original space. The exhibition of physical spaces is accompanied by pieces of local oral history in the form of specific stories told over speakers.

The Museum spreads into the village and the interventions at Kirchweg are the most direct extension of the museum programme. The row of houses at Kirchweg is under heritage protection and despite having survived for almost two hundred years, some of the houses have started to decay after losing the uses of the ground floor spaces. Previously some of those spaces were used for commercial functions. The houses had stayed relevant because they had the necessary room for adaptation: physically in the form of extensions on the northern side, legally in the form the law. Today this adaptation is partly hindered by heritage protection. With my interventions I aim to find a method to adapt three of those ground floor spaces and to restore their former use, whilst providing a programme that is needed by the museum whilst also becoming a cultural and public space for residents of Ennenda.

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The canton of glarus was strongly influenced by the industry of the cotton manufacture in the 19th century. The former cotton printing plant on the Löntsch in Netstal, Canton Glarus is representative of the industrial ensembles that were built at that time. Unfortunately, many of these have already been destroyed and this ensemble is also not sufficiently protected and is therefore threatened with demolition. The Stöckli AG company, founded around the same time 200m further downstream, has had consistent growth and is therefore strongly interwoven with the village today. However, its possible expansion is limited by the river, the cantonal road and an interwoven residential area. In 1976, the company Stöckli AG bought the old industrial ensemble with the idea of demolishing it if necessary and integrating the area into their production with a new building. In order to prevent this, the potential in preserving this ensemble has to be shown to the company on various levels. Their offices, reception as well as an exhibition space could be brought under one roof in the beautiful interiors of the old industrial ensemble and together with the remaining buildings of the ensemble, the inner courtyard could be made into a village centre for Netstal. This would clarify their corporate identity as a traditional, innovative family business that has grown together with the village to its current size. But before this scenario becomes credible, a new spatial organisation of the site must be sought. The old industrial building, or more precisely the location of the ensemble, must be freed from its function as a potential production space or storage area, as this would inevitably lead to demolition. This is where this diploma project comes in. With a punctual intervention that functions like a catalyst, a rethinking of the company's strategy and a new organisation of the site is initiated. By significantly improving the logistical situation of the heterogeneous Stöckli site (with a new, efficient high-bay warehouse and a new axis that connects production, warehousing and shipping), it opens up new thinking space for the sustainable development of Stöckli AG into a shared future with the village of Netstal.The canton of glarus was strongly influenced by the industry of the cotton manufacture in the 19th century. The former cotton printing plant on the Löntsch in Netstal, Canton Glarus is representative of the industrial ensembles that were built at that time. Unfortunately, many of these have already been destroyed and this ensemble is also not sufficiently protected and is therefore threatened with demolition. The Stöckli AG company, founded around the same time 200m further downstream, has had consistent growth and is therefore strongly interwoven with the village today. However, its possible expansion is limited by the river, the cantonal road and an interwoven residential area. In 1976, the company Stöckli AG bought the old industrial ensemble with the idea of demolishing it if necessary and integrating the area into their production with a new building. In order to prevent this, the potential in preserving this ensemble has to be shown to the company on various levels. Their offices, reception as well as an exhibition space could be brought under one roof in the beautiful interiors of the old industrial ensemble and together with the remaining buildings of the ensemble, the inner courtyard could be made into a village centre for Netstal. This would clarify their corporate identity as a traditional, innovative family business that has grown together with the village to its current size. But before this scenario becomes credible, a new spatial organisation of the site must be sought. The old industrial building, or more precisely the location of the ensemble, must be freed from its function as a potential production space or storage area, as this would inevitably lead to demolition. This is where this diploma project comes in. With a punctual intervention that functions like a catalyst, a rethinking of the company's strategy and a new organisation of the site is initiated. By significantly improving the logistical situation of the heterogeneous Stöckli site (with a new, efficient high-bay warehouse and a new axis that connects production, warehousing and shipping), it opens up new thinking space for the sustainable development of Stöckli AG into a shared future with the village of Netstal.

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In unmittelbarer Umgebung des Hotels Marriott entwichkeln sich in den 70er, 80er und 90er Jahren um und auf dem Platzspitz verschiedene Szenen. Züri brännt 1980. Das Marriott ist Teil des gescheiterten Infrastrukturprojekts Ypsilon und dem Milchbucktunnel. Welten treffen hier aufeinander, voneinander entkoppelt. Die Strategie des temporären Besetzens und Nutzens von Freiräumen in der Stadt wurde in der Jugendbewegung der 80er Jahren oft genutzt. Mit leichten Interventionen wird an unbeachteten Orten Unerwartetes geschaffen. Sie spielen sich in unterschiedlichen zeitlichen und räumlichen Grössenordnungen ab.

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It is time to ask the right questions. Because our world as we know it is in deep crisis. The one I ask myself calls in question the field of architecture irself.

This project has the aim to name and interrogate the motivations that push to destroy, to build new, always more, again and again, to throw away the faded, the preference to replace instead of repair. In other words, our very capitalist way of doing architecture.

And to propose an alternative.

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Der Zürichberg – Ein zweifacher Aufstieg
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