This second volume in Caruso St John’s Collected Works is published this month by MACK. The publication traces an interlacing set of themes through the practice’s work over the first twelve years of the twenty-first century. Its unique approach to history is revealed as a rejection of the myth of relentless novelty in favour of an understanding of the past as present and an interest in working with the existing. The influences of Milan, Chicago, and Rome on understandings of the city are explored, as well as the use of ornament and the place of Switzerland in shaping the practice’s evolving trajectory. Throughout these contexts, collaborations with contemporary artists including Thomas Demand and Damien Hirst continue to shape the practice's relations to the materiality and drama of space.
This volume encompasses some of Caruso St John’s most renowned projects, including works on historic buildings such as Tate Britain and the Barbican and new projects such as Hirst’s Newport Street Gallery and Europaallee Mixed-use Building in Zurich. These are presented along with exhibition designs, competition entries, and lesser-known projects, all with an unprecedented range of materials including unseen drawings, references, and new commentaries. The cultural environment in which this work took place is captured in reviews and essays from the period and a diverse range of writings that informed Adam Caruso’s and Peter St John’s thinking and teaching, from T. S. Eliot to Rosalind Krauss to Louis Sullivan. Between these projects and lessons, references and buildings emerges an invitation to attend to the ‘alchemy of the everyday’ – one with the potential to transform our understanding of the world and the ways we continue to build it.
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Volume 3 of Caruso St John’s Collected Works is out now. Between 2010 and 2020, Caruso St John expanded its reputation for sensitive and characterful architecture through a remarkable range of projects. Major buildings in the heart of Swiss, German, and Belgian cities explored the role urban landmarks can play in the present day, while smaller domestic projects provided the opportunity for experiments in restoration, materials, and colour. Transforming buildings for reuse – from beloved public institutions to long-abandoned industrial sites – became a focal point for the practice as it sought to emphasise its work with the existing rather than contribute to the escalating production of new construction. Their designs for memorials, exhibitions, and museums further developed this engagement with memory and an aliveness to the past.
Book launch & talk, London
Collected Works: Volume 3, 2010-2020
Adam Caruso, Peter St John & Owen Hatherley
ICA, London (sold out)
26 March 2026, 6:30pm
Adam Caruso and Peter St John will be in conversation with Owen Hatherley at the ICA in London, to celebrate the release of the book Collected Works: Volume 3 2010–2020, published by MACK Books. Tickets for the event are now sold out.
Book launch & talk, Zurich
Caruso St John: Collected Works Volume 3, 2010–2020
Salim Umar & Adam Caruso
Hochparterre Bücher, Zurich
19:00 CET 20th March 2026
Adam Caruso will be in conversation with Salim Umar to celebrate the release of Collected Works: Volume 3 2010–2020. Free to attend.
How can we build today so that housing becomes affordable, social and sustainable again? ‘Wohnen/Housing’ published by DETAIL, shows 33 projects from the fields of social housing, cost-effective construction and building in existing buildings. Veemgebouw by Caruso St John Architects features in this publication with detailed construction drawings, alongside text and photographs.
Royal Belge is featured in the 63th issue of a+t, which is the first in the new 2ndHAND series. The issue discusses buildings in Belgium, France and Switzerland that are hybrid in program as well as construction.
The Butterfield Student Center for Downing College, Cambridge features in the recent publication Building in Stone Today, written by architect and researcher Natalia Petkova. The book explores what the choice of stone in structure does to contemporary architecture.
A book launch and conversation with Hugh Strange will take place at the AA Bookshop in London on November 4th at 6pm.
In a recently published essay in Forum #2, Adam Caruso writes about gleaning in architecture and the need for architects to discover new ways of working with the structures and materials already present in our built environment.
Adam Caruso has been interviewed by architect and writer Nile Greenberg for the September issue of The Brooklyn Rail.
Opia Store Sihlstrasse is featured in french architectural magazine d'architectures. Issue n°335 focusses on workspaces/hotels/restaurants/shops.
A new publication about Hospitalfield is out now. Published by Fondazione Benetton Studi Ricerche on the occasion of the 34th Carlo Scarpa Prize for Gardens. The book tells the story of Hospitalfield, from its 13th century origins as a hospital to an art school founded by Patrick Allan Fraser, and to the current program of artist residencies and community programs.
Gavin Hale-Brown, architect and co-founder of Henley Halebrown, reviewed Caruso St John's Collected Works Volume 3 2010-2020 for BD Online. He reflects on the book's thematic arrangement of projects, found texts and contemporaneous interviews, noting how it draws the reader into a literary game of connections across the decade.
'It is hard to think of another practice that has managed to maintain this level of rigour and invention without becoming a brand.'
Laboratorium, the calisthenics gym that is inside the Swiss Caruso St John headquarters, is published in About: Sportscapes, a magazine by About: platform.
When a big part of the office remained empty after the pandemic, an opportunity to turn the empty space into a gym arrived. Frida Grahn argues that this unexpected combination of uses - an architectural office and a work-out space - doesn't feel out of place, and demonstrates how design can enable diverse activities to co-exist.