Three Architects in Switzerland: Beat Consoni - Morger and Degelo - Valerio Olgiati, a book written by Markus Breitschmid, assistant professor of architecture in the College of Architecture and Urban Studies at Virginia Tech, has recently been published by Quart Publishers in Lucerne, Switzerland.

The architects featured in this volume, Beat Consoni, Meinrad Morger, Heinrich Degelo, and Valerio Olgiati, belong to a select group of internationally known architects who have produced seminal architectural work. The book explains the historical background of contemporary architecture in Switzerland and presents the architecture-theoretical themes that allowed numerous architects from Switzerland to produce important buildings.

‘There is a robust consensus among architectural critics that the 1980s were a turning point that began a process of coalescence for an architecture that alternatively has been labeled with ‘New Simplicity’ and ‘Minimalism,’” said Breitschmid. “None of the important Swiss architects is entirely comfortable with such labeling because any penetrating look into their work demonstrates a high degree of independence with little appetite to belong to a group or an architectural movement. Beyond an architecture that appears to be simple at first glance, there unfolds a theoretically ambitious architectural discourse that facilitates the succinctness, rationality, constructive and material ingenuity, and beauty of many structures built by the best architects during the past two decades.”

Breitschmid, a registered architect, received a doctorate from the Institute of Building History, Architectural Theory and Building Preservation at the Technische Universität Berlin in Germany. He received his Master of Architecture degree from Virginia Tech and a Ph.D. from Technische Universitåt Berlin.

The College of Architecture and Urban Studies is one of the largest of its type in the nation. The college is composed of three schools and the Department of Art and Art History, part of the multi-college School of the Arts. The School of Architecture + Design includes programs in architecture, industrial design, interior design, and landscape architecture. The School of Public and International Affairs includes programs in urban affairs and planning, public administration and policy, and government and international affairs. The Myers-Lawson School of Construction, a joint school of the College of Architecture and Urban Studies and the College of Engineering, includes programs in building construction and construction management. The college enrolls nearly 2,000 students offering 24 degrees taught by 153 faculty members.

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