Rôtillon Lausanne - A neighborhood comes to life

After several attempts in the^mid-301s to make the area one with the land, the local urban development plan drawn up by the Town Planning Office of the City Hall ended up being based on the historical structure of the cultivated plots. This defines the public space and allows individual architectural pieces to be assembled, in the spirit of Colin Rowe's collage ^city2. The architecture of the new buildings consciously departs from postmodern aspirations and historicizing formal languages.

The result is a differentiated scale of space and urban density that departs from current attempts at densification of surfaces in ^Switzerland3. The connection between interior and exterior space, the variations in scale and the mutual visual connections challenge the experience of urban density both among the public and the ^private4.

1 For example, a 'covered square' by Jacques Favarger, 1939, three towers by Pierre Bonnard, 1957, and Ernst Gisel's housing structure, 1981.

2 'Collage City', Colin Rowe and Fred Koetter, Birkhäuserverlag, 1984.

3 See, for example, Selve Areal Thun, hochparterre 10/13, or a series of sustainable communities.

4 The view towards certain landmark urban objects, such as the cathedral, the subway bridge, the Metropol skyscraper block, contributes to better orientation and creates meaning, in the spirit of Camillo Sitte and philosopher Markus Gabriel's "fields of meaning" in "Warum es die Welt nicht gibt", Ullsteinverlag, 2013.

After several "tabula rasa" attempts since the ^{mid-thirties1}, the local urban plan prepared by the city planning office is based on the historical grown plot structure. It defines the public space and enables the assembly of individual pieces of architecture, in the spirit of Colin Rowe's Collage ^City2. The architecture of the new buildings consciously breaks with post-modern aspirations and historicizing formal languages.

The result is a differentiated scale of space and mainly urban density that is far away from current densification exercises in Switzerland 3. The interlink of indoor and outdoor space, the scale jumps and mutual visual links induce to both the public and the private space the experience of urban density ^4.

1 For example a "covered market" by Jacques Favarger 1939, three towers by Pierre Bonnard, 1957, and the housing structure by Ernst Gisel, 1981.

2 "Collage City", Colin Rowe and Fred Koetter, Birkhäuserverlag, 1984.

3 For example Selve Areal Thun, see hochparterre 10/13, or several sustainable communities.

4 The view to urban reference objects such as the cathedral, the metro bridge, the Metropol skyscraper, help orientation and create meaning, in the spirit of Camillo Sitte and the "fields of meaning" of philosopher Markus Gabriel in "Warum es die Welt nicht gibt", Ullsteinverlag, 2013.