Karl Egender

With his first major project, the vocational school and today's Museum of Design Zurich, Karl Egender (1897–1969) entered the stage of New Building in Zurich alongside his office partner Adolf Steger. Their emblematic building, opened in 1933, sparked intense debates. A place among the top ranks of young modern Swiss architecture seemed assured for them. However, the pathos of the avant-garde was foreign to Egender; he did not commit to a programmatic or stylistic line. Open and undogmatic, he focused on accurately capturing the task at hand and on artistically conveying his vision of architecture that was both appropriate and original: exhibition and fair buildings, community centers and neighborhood casinos, theaters and cinemas, commercial and department stores, cooperative housing developments. Sports and political cabaret, fashion and stage art, worker culture and popular education were the environments in which the architect felt comfortable and for whose concerns he engaged with solid craftsmanship and a spirit of experimentation.