Zurich Business School

Zurich , Switzerland

Photo © lightsphere

Lighting Designers: lightsphere GmbH

Location: Zurich , Switzerland
Year: 2019
Client: Kaufmännischer Verband Zürich
Architect: S+M Architekten AG
Wlectrical Engineer: Schmidiger Rosasco AG

The KV Business School at Escher-Wyss-Platz is the largest commercial vocational school in Switzerland and is one of the greatest educational institutions in the German-speaking world. Over 4000 students study there. In 1974, the commercial school moved to a new school building on the Limmatstrasse at Escher-Wyss-Platz. The aging school building no longer met the user requirements and the state of the art was also outdated. Therefore the 4 gymnasiums and the central access corridor including the fitness room were renovated in the first stage of modification. During renovation, the architects paid special attention to maintaining the original appearance and material concept of the space. For a better understanding and structure of the access area, emphasis was placed on vertical wall-washing with the general lighting in the access corridor.

To optimize guidance and orientation, additional ceiling integrated round luminaires mark the crossing axes of the gym hall entrances. The main goals for the updated general light in the gymnasium was glare reduction and enhancement of the illumination levels.

As the gymnasium is frequently used for association activities in the evening a second layer of dimmable accent lighting was integrated into the updated infrastructure.