How much of this neighbourhood’s former quality can be carried forward into the city’s future – a city under pressure from noise, density and heat? Steiner’s Ville Verte remains forward-looking even today in terms of heat stress – but when it comes to density and noise stress, it requires a radical overhaul. Where this has already taken place, oftentimes little remains of the former sense of space. To ensure this does not happen at «Innerer Dreispitz», we are seeking as much landscape-like expanse and depth as possible for the central area and, in contrast to the masterplan, are shifting some of the building density from the centre to the edges. Consequently, the edges, provided as two-storey in the masterplan, will be the same height as the four-storey blocks in the centre of the site, and the two will merge to form a horseshoe shape.
The gradual transition from urban space to neighbourhood space, to settlement space, to courtyard space, and finally to domestic space gives rise to new situations that require definition. Following the principle of fractal repetition – that is, the recurrence of structural patterns across different scales – «Innerer Dreispitz» acquires a formal exterior and an informal interior. The building plots, laid out in a horseshoe shape, repeat this structure with streets and lanes on the outer sides and inner courtyards. The sense of temporal continuity conveyed by the mature trees plays a decisive role in reinforcing the feeling of «this is home». That is why the urban design is conceived around these trees, most of which can be preserved. It is these existing trees that lend the outdoor spaces their site-specific character; they run through the generous open-space axis within the settlement and, through their size, they create landscape anchors in the surrounding area.
The overall plan is clear and robust: two prestigious urban open spaces line the two long sides of «Innerer Dreispitz». On one side, Saatlenpark serves as an organic extension of the Schörli green corridor. On the other, Dreispitzstrasse, a spacious avenue, functions not merely as an access route but also as a place to linger. Both – the park and the street – clearly convey their public purpose to the city’s residents. Rows of trees and clearly defined sections within the park emphasise its formal, public character.
However, the horseshoe shapes do not simply follow the site’s boundaries, but break away from them wherever the cross-streets connect. Thus, the paths widen here into small squares, which we call «stepping stones» because they form places of transition between communal and urban space. The «stepping stones» respond formally in different ways to their surroundings: with an extension into the square plaza as a gesture defining the address on Dreispitzstrasse, and with a spreading out of the path network and an internally oriented entrance plaza to Saatlenpark.
The «neighbourhood square» at the centre of the triangle is a softly shaped, fluid meeting place: nowhere is «Innerer Dreispitz» more akin to Steiner’s Ville Verte. There are no territorial boundaries, for here one is «among one’s own»! The ASIG Pavilion will find its future role in the centre of the square as the hub of community life.
