Teaching
ETH Zurich Seminar Week: What is Next?
New Material Developments
Studio Adam Caruso, ETH Zurich
20 October 2020
with Marlise Blaser, Katharina Lehmann, Summer Islam & Paloma Gormley
To achieve the net-zero greenhouse gas emissions objective, and keep the global temperature increase to 1.5°C, the building sector needs to shift its goals towards carbon-negative construction materials. In the first talk of the seminar week, the studio invited Marlise Blaser (Elementwerk Istighofen), Katharina Lehmann (Blumer Lehman Holzbau), Summer Islam & Paloma Gormley (Material Culture) to discuss the future of construction materials.
Marlise Blaser is owner and director of Elementwerk Istighofen since 2002. The company specialises in fabricating facade elements and other bespoke precast concrete elements, using their own mix of concrete. Marlise Blaser studied business management and civil engineering in Bern and worked for Zeltner Ingenieure AG and Walo Bertschinger AG before becoming director of Elementwerk Istighofen.
Katharina Lehmann studied economy at HSG and is the CEO of the Lehmann Gruppe since 1996, where she runs Blumer Lehmann AG. Blumer Lehmann has extensive experience in the design, production planning, fabrication and assembly of timber constructions and are leaders in developing know-how about working with wood. They are investigating technical innovations to achieve sustainable and durable solutions.
Summer Islam & Paloma Gormley are both young architects based in London, running their own practices Studio Abroad and Practice Architecture. They are the founders of Material Culture, a non-profit research organisation working at the intersection of low embodied carbon and high efficiency off-site construction, where they are working with ARUP to develop prototypical designs for low and high density housing, commercial and cultural uses
Related news
Exhibition & event
Tendenzen at 50
Panel Discussion at ETH Zurich
gta exhibitions, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
25 March 2026
Fifty years after the landmark 1975 Tendenzen exhibition at ETH Zurich – which first brought the Ticino architectural movement to international attention – Tendenzen at 50 revisits the original event through archival research, unpublished materials, and new photography to examine how it shaped architectural discourse and why it remains relevant today.
As part of the exhibition's public events programme, a panel discussion will take place on Wednesday 25 March at ETH Zurich. Adam Caruso will join Linda Schädler, Adam Szymczyk, and Roland Züger for a conversation moderated by Irina Davidovici and Frida Grahn.
Students from Studio Adam Caruso at ETH Zurich present their projects to a panel of guest critics including Marianna Charitonidou, Fredi Fischli and Niels Olson.
Students in studio Adam Caruso at ETH Zurich will spend their Autumn semester exploring the sensibility of the interim; looking to the long history in the built environment of improvising and adapting.
The Architecture Foundation presents a week of seminars from 19-22 October 2020 curated by Studio Adam Caruso at ETH Zürich exploring the architecture of crisis. Invited speakers include Carolyn Steel, Summer Islam, Paloma Gormley and others in the disciplines of architecture, politics and economics. Across 9 talks over 4 days, panelists will be asked to reflect upon the unit's posed question: What is Next?
On Saturday 26th of September there will be a public viewing of the newly completed Im Gut residential estate on Gutstrasse in Zurich. Developed in collaboration with Lütjens Padmanabhan Architects, the project for the housing cooperative im Gut renews the existing housing stock with around one hundred apartments, a kindergarten, and cooperative offices.
Exhibition
Haussmann Studiolo
Bündner Kunstmuseum Chur
Chur, Switzerland
14 November 2026 – 14 March 2027
The Bündner Kunstmuseum Chur presents Haussmann Studiolo, an exhibition dedicated to the pioneering Swiss architects and designers Trix and Robert Haussmann. Returning to Chur, where Trix Haussmann was born in 1933 and spent her formative years, the exhibition celebrates the couple's influential contribution to 20th-century Swiss design, architecture, and interior design. The exhibition is curated by Adam Caruso and Stephan Kunz and designed by Caruso St John Architects.
Exhibition
Out of Service?
Swiss Sacred Architecture in Transition
ZAZ BELLERIVE, Zurich
18 September 2026 – 7 February 2027
The exhibition Out of Service? – Swiss Sacred Architecture in Transition opens Friday 18th of September at ZAZ BELLERIVE, the centre for Architecture in Zurich. Through an exhibition of Swiss projects, this initiative highlights how sacred buildings that were once central to community life can be transformed to preserve their architectural and cultural value for future generations. Caruso St John is showcasing their work for the St Gallen Cathedral.
Newport Street Gallery won the Stirling Prize in 2016. To mark thirty years of the award, RIBA is hosting a celebration ceremony at Old Billingsgate, where the 2026 winner will also be announced. Members of the public are invited to vote for their favourite Stirling Prize-winning project of the past three decades via the RIBA website.
Royale Belge, a collaboration by Caruso St John Architects with Bovenbouw Architectuur and DDS+, has been shortlisted for the RIBA 2026 International Prize. Four projects were shortlisted from the 34 schemes given RIBA International Awards for Excellence in June.
The jury will visit the projects next week and the winner will be announced at this year's Stirling Prize ceremony on 15 October 2026.
Newport Street Gallery has been shortlisted for the Brick Legacy Award at the Brick Awards 2026. The new category celebrates projects of enduring architectural quality that have stood the test of time.
Veemgebouw has won Gold in the Housing and Residential category of this year's Erich Mendelsohn Award, which recognizes architecture built in brick. The project was chosen for its sensitive transformation and adaptive reuse of a former Philips industrial warehouse. The intervention integrates a new residential volume on top of the original brick structure, establishing a clear dialogue between the historical facade and contemporary construction.
On Thursday, 10 September, Hospitalfield will host an afternoon in conversation at Custom Lane in Edinburgh. Titled The Site Conscious Practice of Artists; the Problem of the Rural Landscape is its Beauty, the event explores how cultural organizations can create hospitable, porous environments that nurture slow artistic practice while engaging broad public audiences.