Description

In the fifties, sixties and seventies, roadside chapels were built along almost every major motorway in Germany. In Switzerland, however, despite the heavy through-traffic and high level of tourism in the country, there is only one single building of this kind. Its position could hardly have been better chosen. Those travelling southwards will find this “place of contemplation” between the exits Altdorf and Erstfeld, on the southern perimeter of a motorway service station with two huge restaurants, some 20 kilometres before the entrance to the busy St Gotthard tunnel.

The building is situated like a clasp between technology and nature: on one side the cars rush past, on the other the waters of the river Reuss stream by, framed behind by the massif of the Alps. The dimensions of the building – 29.26 metres long by 10 metres wide – betray its calculated proportions. The path from the car park leads into a courtyard enclosed by walls with benches all around and a raised elongated water basin in the centre. A relief cast into the in situ concrete walls displays symbols of Jewish, Christian, Moslem as well as Hindu and Buddhistic faiths, including prayer rolls, prayer beads and a tablet with engraved texts from the scriptures of the different faiths. The “chapel” itself is located at the eastern narrow end of the courtyard. Its dimensions give it the appearance of a pure cube. Its gridded subdivision atop a solid, closed base gives the chapel the impression of being firmly seated, impervious to the rush of activity around it.

Whereas outside the flush arrangement of the walls and windows form a geometric whole that reflects with different qualities during the day, the impression from inside is very different. Here the concrete skeleton, with a 72-centimetre cross section, is very apparent creating a strongly modulated appearance. In the depths of the window recesses, box windows filled with broken shards of green glass are positioned such that their frames are concealed behind rebates in the concrete framework. It is as if one can reach out and grasp the greenness of sunlit leaves in a deciduous forest. The space can accommodate about 50 persons. Benches are integrated into the solid recesses at the base, their seats and backrests clad with beechwood. A glass cabinet stands in the centre of the room; it contains a crystal.

The chapel is a place of contemplation, a place of silence, for retreat, for rest and reflection. It offers drivers passing through one of Switzerland’s busiest motorway routes a counterpoint to the hectic mobility of the world outside, answering its disintegration of space and time with an invitation to contemplate the here and now. The “chapel of world religions”, as it is termed by the architects, has a sacred quality without religious specificity. Its hermetic architecture corresponds to the spread of non-denominational, almost roving spirituality that has arisen since the nineties.

Architecture and Urbanism, no. 2/2000, p. 32- | Archithese, no. 5/1997, p. 70- | Arco Team: Minimalismus. Geschichte, Mode, Möbel und Design, Architektur, Inneneinrichtungen, Königswinter 2006, pp. 594- | AV Monografías, no. 83/2000, p. 64- | Bauwelt, no. 1/2/1999, p. 56 | Dworschak, Gunda, Wenke, Alfred: Metamorphosen. Neue Material- und Raumkonzepte in Stein, Holz, Metall, Glas, Textil, Kunststoff, Düsseldorf 2000, pp. 118- | Kunst und Kirche, no. 1/2007, p. 50 | Schirmbeck, Egon (Ed.): Raumstationen. Metamorphosen des Raumes im 20. Jahrhundert, Ludwigsburg 2001, pp. 148- | Stock, Wolfgang Jean (Ed.): European Church Architecture 1950-2000, Munich 2002, pp. 306- | Stock, Wolfgang Jean: Architectural Guide Sacred Buildings in Europe since 1950, Munich 2004, pp. 270- | Wöhler, Till: Neue Architektur. Sakralbauten, (n.p.) Berlin 2005, pp. 206-

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Originally published in: Rudolf Stegers, Sacred Buildings: A Design Manual, Birkhäuser, 2008.