Built in 1913 for a local politician and engineer and beautifully situated on the shore of Lake Zurich, this handsome villa today is home to the Jacobs Foundation and the Johann Jacobs Museum. It was acquired in the 1980s by the Jacobs family, who had been in the coffee, tea, and cocoa trade in Bremen since 1895 but eventually sold the business to an international conglomerate in the 1990s. The Johann Jacobs Museum focuses on the history and present of global trade routes. Its exhibitions and educational program revolves around cultural hybrids that develop sometimes intentionally, sometimes incidentally along the main routes and byways of trade. This new book tells the story of the Jacobs House and offers an introduction to the goals of the Jacobs Foundation and the museum. It also documents the building’s extensive reconstruction by Basel-based architects Miller & Maranta, who have made major changes to its structure with equal measures of radicalism and sensitivity while entirely preserving its character and style.
Text in English and German.
AUTHORS: Roger M. Buergel has been Director of Johann Jacobs Museum since 2013. Zeuler R. Lima is an architect and Associate Professor at Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts, Washington University in Saint Louis. Kathrin Meier-Rust is a Zurichbased journalist. Sophia Prinz is a scholar of Cultural Studies working at European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder) and at Johann Jacobs Museum. Martin Tschanz is an architect and lecturer for Theory and History of Architecture at Zurich University of Applied Sciences in Winterthur. Felix Vogel studied Art History, Media Theory, and Philosophy. He currently pursues a PhD and also works as a freelance curator. Andreas Zangger is a publicist with a focus on Switzerland’s global relationships and the history of the country’s textile industry and design culture.
38 colour, 71 b/w illustrations