{"id":466538,"date":"2026-05-03T14:59:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-03T14:59:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/466538\/"},"modified":"2026-05-03T14:59:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-03T14:59:15","slug":"bernard-tschumi-winds-helical-slides-through-philo-science-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/466538\/","title":{"rendered":"Bernard Tschumi winds helical slides through Philo science centre"},"content":{"rendered":"

A skylit atrium<\/a> traversed by staircases and slides<\/a> forms the heart of Philo, a ring-shaped science centre at a school<\/a> in Switzerland by international studio Bernard Tschumi Architects<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Philo sits on the campus of the Institute Le Rosey boarding school in Rolle, near Geneva, and contains five storeys of classrooms, laboratories and social spaces.<\/p>\n

\"PhiloBernard Tschumi Architects has created a ring-shaped science centre<\/p>\n

The centre is positioned alongside a metal-domed music venue called Carnal Hall, which was completed by Bernard Tschumi Architects<\/a> in 2014.<\/p>\n

They are described by the studio as “two circular semi-twins”, which deliberately contrast with the architecture of the rest of the campus.<\/p>\n

\"It sits next to Carnal Hall at the Institute Le Rosey boarding school<\/p>\n

“The client’s request was to differentiate the new buildings from the historical campus and its vernacular pitched roof buildings,” said studio founder Bernard Tschumi.<\/p>\n

“Dynamic circulation and movement vectors activate the building inside and outside. The central atrium acts as a covered public square and the project’s centre of gravity,” he told Dezeen.<\/p>\n

\"PhiloHelical slides feature in the central atrium<\/p>\n

Three concentric layers organise the plan, with a central ring of rooms opening onto communal spaces that overlook the atrium from deep balconies, and an outer ring with views out to the landscape from planted terraces.<\/p>\n

These are punctuated by a central glazed corridor, which spills into what the studio calls “collision spaces”, designed to encourage social interaction.<\/p>\n

\"AtriumThe building contains five storeys of classrooms and laboratories<\/p>\n

Philo’s classrooms were designed with maximum flexibility in mind, featuring movable partition walls that allow for its 90 individual rooms to be reconfigured and combined.<\/p>\n

Four circulation cores are positioned evenly around the circular plan, while at its centre, the atrium has a spiral staircase and two helical metal slides that wind around each other, accessed from its fourth and fifth floors.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Exterior<\/p>\n

Glazed “street” cuts through university science centre in Paris by Bernard Tschumi Architects\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

To the north and south of the plan, large segments have been given over to a stepped entrance area and a flexible hall with a fully glazed wall.<\/p>\n

The material palette combines predominantly white and glazed surfaces in the classrooms and labs with timber surfaces for shared social spaces and the hall.<\/p>\n

\"PhiloThe building features a flexible hall with a fully glazed wall<\/p>\n

“Philo uses a similar material palette to its earlier companion Carnal Hall: steel, glass, concrete, and wood,” explained the studio.<\/p>\n

“The shared vocabulary unifies the two buildings yet allows each to express its own identity and relationship to their common context,” it added.<\/p>\n

Another educational project by Bernard Tschumi Architects is a glazed science centre for Paris-Saclay University in France,<\/a> which features a large atrium overlooked by social mezzanines and bridges.<\/p>\n

In 2022, we interviewed Tschumi for our deconstructivism series<\/a>. He said the style’s legacy makes him “want to retreat to the back of the room”<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The photography is by Iwan Baan<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A skylit atrium traversed by staircases and slides forms the heart of Philo, a ring-shaped science centre at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466539,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[267],"tags":[365,362,363,364,4919,366,2597,18,117,19,17,4172,10357,10358,130068,26879,2423],"class_list":["post-466538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-bernard-tschumi","tag-design","tag-education","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-schools","tag-sectionall","tag-sectionarchitecture","tag-slides","tag-staircases","tag-switzerland"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116511242679560011","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466538\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}