Peter Zumthor

Completed in 1997, the Kunsthaus Bregenz is clad in glass panels resembling—in the words of Swiss architect Peter Zumthor (*1943 in Basel)—“lightly ruffled feathers.” During the day, it is a semi-transparent glass structure, while at night it becomes a thirty-meter-high glowing cube, a statement in light. The interior of the building—a stack of three rooms offering an exhibition space of 1,800 square meters, with a highly sophisticated air-conditioning system that both heats and cools—is constructed in smooth concrete, terrazzo, matt glass, and indirect natural light. This reprint of the monograph from our Werkdokumente series presents the architecture of Peter Zumthor’s museum with texts by Friedrich Achleitner and the architect himself, as well as with floor plans and photographs by Hélène Binet.