The appeal of hidden places on the Hönggerberg campus
The winners of the photo competition for ETH members "Favourite places on the Hönggerberg campus" have been selected: Nicolas Ochsner won with a photo of the archive room of the Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture (gta).
The organisers were looking for images of what ETH members considered were their favourite places on the Hönggerberg campus. Sixty-seven photographs were submitted and assessed by a jury from the Real Estate Management, Services and Corporate Communications departments.
The photos were judged on how well they depicted the unique atmosphere and particular aspects of the Hönggerberg campus, as well as on their technical quality.
The winning photograph by Nicolas Ochsner is of a room on the Hönggerberg campus: he imbued the Heinz Isler archive room of the Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture (gta) – which he shares with his Civilian Service colleague Nils Franzini – with an atmospheric treatment. The photo shows ETH members appropriating a room on the campus and filling it with life. "I wanted to show that even little-known and hidden rooms on campus have their appeal," says Nils Ochsner, who is delighted with his photo prize.
Second place went to Philip Verwegen, a physics Master's student who works in the HPF building. His photo depicts the relationship between work space and outdoor space:
mature trees such as the large oak on Wolfgang-Pauli-Strasse provide amenity value as well as a sense of identity.
Taken from the laboratory, the photograph also shows how green roofs and gardens constitute additional landscaping on the campus. "I wanted my picture to make the campus appetising," declares Verwege.
The third-placed photo by Kim Gloor and Riccardo Montecchi, a doctoral student at the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (D-CHAB), had a different approach:
their submission focuses less on a specific location than on a particular campus atmosphere and a motif that represents the "ETH spirit" exuded by the Hönggerberg.
Gloor and Montecchi were surprised to have been singled out for a prize, as their photo was actually a spontaneous snapshot.
The remaining images depict characteristic activities or interior scenes on the Hönggerberg: the bouldering facility as a typical use of sports and outdoor space; the after-work ambience on the central piazza in the middle of the campus; the interplay of landscape architecture and staircase geometry around the 1960's Steiner buildings; 3D-printed cone figures in an inner courtyard of the Fünffinger Dock – as an example of how ETH members appropriate campus spaces and make them their own.
The prizes consisted of three restaurant vouchers worth 100, 50 and 20 francs for the Fusion coffee cafeteria and Coop to go shop. The vouchers were presented to the winners at the Hönggerberg campus on Tuesday morning.
Other photos from the competition
For formal reasons, the original photos submitted were partly cut to size in the photo gallery.