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At the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, an acclaimed Swiss architect is hoping to pull off what an acclaimed Dutch one could not.
Next month LACMA will publicly unveil a $650-million plan by Pritzker Prize winner Peter Zumthor for a dramatic new museum building along Wilshire Boulevard.
— latimes.com
At the age of 69, he has only built around 20 projects, but each one has caused ripples. He is now courted by millionaires around the globe – from Spiderman's Tobey Maguire to Qatar's Sheikh Saud al-Thani – each desperate for a piece of his pure, unadulterated vision. He is the architect every architect wants to be, the inspiration every student cites. So how did the myth of the mountain man come to be? — guardian.co.uk
"In 2009 we built two timber houses, the Oberhus and the Unterhus, in the hamlet of Leis, just over 1,500 m above sea level in the community of Vals in Grisons. From 1 December 2012 onward we are letting out the Unterhus for vacations. A third timber house, the Türmlihus, will soon complete this little ensemble. The Türmlihus will welcome its first guests in autumn 2013.
We are very much looking forward to having guests in our timber vacation homes in Leis.
Annalisa and Peter Zumthor"
— ZTH blog
peter and annalisa zumthor are, apparently, getting into the hospitality business. one - and soon to be two houses, designed by zumthor and located in the small town of leis, will be able to be leased out beginning next week. both houses appear to be located adjacent to a house designed for... View full entry
[Zumthor] runs a small office from his mountain home in Switzerland; he doesn't give interviews by telephone; he rarely makes public appearances; and his projects—like the ghostly luminescent bathhouse he created for the Swiss town of Vals—emanate a high seriousness that could only have come from this oracle of the Alps. Yet recently, the typically solitary Zumthor has taken to palling around with another prominent designer: celebrated garden designer Piet Oudolf. — online.wsj.com
Zumthor’s work has nothing coldly functional or academic about it. He doesn’t deal in stacks of Lego or Zaha Hadid-style computerised ziggurats.
Instead he seems to warm bricks and mortar into subtle poetry, and whether he is dreaming up thermal baths (as at Vals), sheltered housing (Chur) or a place of worship (the Bruder Klaus chapel near Cologne), one invariably senses a powerful spirituality inspiring and informing the design.
— telegraph.co.uk
Pritzker-winning architect Peter Zumthor has been announced as the recipient of the 2013 Royal Gold Medal for Architecture. Given in recognition of a lifetime’s work, the Royal Gold Medal is approved personally by the Queen of England and is given to a person or group of people who have had a significant influence on the advancement of architecture. — bustler.net
Wim Wender's studio has informed us that the information relayed the other day, was not entirely accurate, due to misinformation in Suedostschweiz, the source article as cited in our recent news post. It is correct that Mr Wenders is currently working on an artistic interview film with Peter... View full entry
"The internationally-renowned director Wim Wenders devotes his new film to Graubünden architect Peter Zumthor. Work on the project will take several years to complete. A taste of the film will be available August at the Venice Biennale." — Suedostschweiz
ok - the translation's mine (and my german suspect) but apparently wim wenders is doing a long term documentary on zumthor's work. the primary gist of the movie will be to document - fully - one of his projects from sketch to completion. this could either be brilliant or maddeningly overdone.... View full entry
Swiss star architect Peter Zumthor has lost a battle for ownership of the spa and hotel complex in Vals, eastern Switzerland, which he designed.
The commune, which owns the complex, decided on Friday night to sell it to 35-year-old property developer Remo Stoffel.
— swissinfo.ch
So who did Zumthor call upon to provide the garden, the green hortus at the centre of his conclusus? Piet Oudolf, of course, foremost exponent of the new perennials movement, a low-key Dutchman with the build of a rugby player who has practically cornered the market in high profile planting projects: the Lurie Garden at Chicago’s Millennium Park, New York’s Battery Park and the wildly popular High Line are among his best known works. — telegraph.co.uk
Peter Zumthor's first completed building in the UK opens this Friday, July 1: the 2011 Serpentine Gallery Pavilion. The concept for this year’s Pavilion is the hortus conclusus, a contemplative room, a garden within a garden. One enters the building from the lawn and begins the transition into the central garden, a place abstracted from the world of noise and traffic and the smells of London – an interior space within which to sit, to walk, to observe the flowers. — bustler.net
While Norman Foster and David Chipperfield issue pitiless streams of press releases about their fabulous projects, wins, achievements, awards, honours, Zumthor does not cultivate journalists. On the contrary, he tends to be ever so slightly disobliging to reporters. — telegraph.co.uk
Take a first look at this year's Serpentine Pavilion on The Telegraph's YouTube channel. View full entry
Peter Zumthor has unveiled his plans for a secret garden for this years Serpentine Pavilion. — Guardian
In collaboration with the Dutch designer Piet Oudolf, Zumthor will create a contemplative garden courtyard enclosed by lightweight black-clad structure. View full entry
