EXPERIENCE Chris Marker Residence - Le Fond de l’air est rouge A social condenser built on top of a public bus amenity sets a new standard for student accommodation, emphasising spaces dedicated to communal living. From infrastructure to housing, technical complexity is mastered to the benefit of an environmental and social ambition. This creates a simple, formal and operational device, which makes urban density an opportunity rather than a promiscuity. Communal lounges on each floor and a variety of circulation modes give the building more the fluidity of a cruise liner than the harshness of a commuter town. The apartment's …

SCHEIDEGGER KELLER Studenthouse Rosengarten The house with loggias and halls renders the street’s noise invisible, while creating collective spaces at multiple scales. Christian Scheidegger studied architecture at ETH Zurich from 1998 to 2004. In 2004 he was awarded the ETH Medal for the diploma thesis project «Leuk Congress Center» and received 2002 the Swiss Steel Construction Award (Schweizer Stahlbaupreis «Prix Acier») for the «Office Tower on the Jelmoli Parking Garage» in Zürich. From 2004 to 2009 he led the «Leutschenbach Schoolhouse» project in Zurich at the architecture firm of Christian Kerez. He then opened his own architectural office in Zürich. …

UNE ÉDUCATION AU RÉEL L’ATELIER CANTÀFORA 18.03-05.06.2026 Opening! Tuesday 17 March 6.30 pm This exhibition explores the vast field of graphic representation in architecture through fifteen years of teaching architectural representation at EPFL at the turn of the 2000s. It presents around a hundred paintings on wood, didactic works produced between 1997 and 2007 in the teaching units of the painter Arduino Cantàfora. They suggest a possible way of making, between thought and actio, where drawing and painting structure a concept and become an essential language for expressing the founding idea of a project. Despite the transition to digital technology, …

11.02.26 - On the occasion of the fourth edition of the Master Prize in Architecture, awarded by the Swiss Society of Engineers and Architects (SIA), two projects from EPFL Architecture received an Honourable Mention, recognising the quality and commitment reflected in these diploma projects. Among the awarded works is the project by Léa Guillotin, Re-fabricating Sévelin: The Image of Industry in the City Centre. Located in Lausanne’s Sévelin district—today largely shaped by the service sector—the project questions the role of industry in the contemporary city in light of current ecological and logistical challenges. Building on the last remaining industrial complex …

14.01.26 - Emmanuel Rey, an architect and associate professor, founded EPFL’s Laboratory of Architecture and Sustainable Technologies 15 years ago. He was one of the first at our School to bring environmental and climate issues to the realm of architecture. Today, he’s working tirelessly to forge synergies among teaching, research and practice. For as long as he can remember, Emmanuel Rey has been fascinated by architectural spaces and how they can be transformed. His interest in the field dates back to his childhood, when his parents built their family home in Valais Canton. Alongside this budding vocation, Rey also became …

12.11.25 - For her EPFL master’s project in architecture, Léa Guillotin outlined a plan for restoring an industrial district in Lausanne while promoting the reuse of construction materials. Léa Guillotin, who grew up in a village in Normandy, developed a taste for architecture early on. She got her first experience with it as a teenager, when she helped her parents renovate their family home. Then an optional architecture class she took during a high-school exchange year in the US convinced her of her calling. After graduating, she applied to EPFL so that she could study not just the theory and …

14.10.25 - An EPFL study shows red light, like blue, causes stronger glare than white, challenging the century-old and globally used function that describes how the human eye responds to different light wavelengths. The findings have implications for standards and research, as well as for the comfort of building occupants. Glare from sunlight can be a major source of discomfort for building occupants, especially when the windows have inadequate shadings. New smart glazing technology aims to provide protection from overheating in summer and from glare by changing the tint level to reduce the amount of solar radiation that passes through. …

EPFL architecture graduates, Vincent Digneaux, Solène Guisan and Vincent Kastl, were crowned winners of the Sustainable is Beautiful student architecture prize for their modular footbridge over the Chamberonne river. Designing the structure, which serves as both a crossing and a meeting place, gave them their first taste of life as an architect. Several years ago, the Laboratory of Architecture and Sustainable Technologies (LAST) at EPFL’s School of Architecture, Civil and Environmental Engineering (ENAC) launched Sustainable is Beautiful, a competition run in partnership with public and private organizations involved in green-transition projects, to help equip budding architects for their future role.

WINNER OF THE 2023 RIBA CHARLES JENCKS AWARD

The Dogma practice, founded in 2002 by Pier Vittorio Aureli, associate professor at the EPFL Architecture Department (ENAC), and Martino Tattara, has been awarded the prestigious Charles Jencks 2023 Prize by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA).

Created in 2003 to reward an individual (or office) who has recently made a major contribution to both the theory and practice of architecture, this prestigious prize has distinguished architects such as Peter Eisenman, Zaha Hadid, Rem Koolhaas, Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron over the years.

Housing is a major contributor to Switzerland's carbon footprint and energy consumption, but it is also a basic need. Research on climate change mitigation strategies has so far paid insufficient attention to households' preferences and their contribution to housing sustainability. Depicting residential preferences requires an understanding of the multilevel, context-specific, and interrelated determinants of the match between households and dwellings, which are made explicit in the residential mobility process.