Dolder Grand Hotel - Renovation / Extension
2008
Foster + Partners with Itten + Brechbühl
19th-century hotel with new Spa, accommodation & sports faciltities



The Dolder Grand transformed into Zurich’s new luxury city resort: opening April 2008

All Photographs © Nigel Young, from Foster + Partners



Towering above Lake Zurich, the historic The Dolder Grand has been reinvented to form a luxury-class city resort. Foster + Partners’ scheme integrates a substantial new extension, more than doubling the hotel accommodation and reconnecting it to the surrounding forest and resort, which includes the four-star Dolder Waldhaus Hotel and Dolder Sports (golf course, tennis courts, outdoor pool and ice rink). The Dolderbahn cog railway station has been reinstated, enabling the local community to enjoy the site while experiencing something of the building itself.



The scheme restores the logic of the original hotel, designed in 1899 by Jacques Gros, and the external fabric has been restored and rendered in the original red and ochre palette. Internally, the planning has been transformed.



The most significant moves have been to create a linked suite of grand public rooms, including a new ballroom, and to reinstate the grand southern entrance – which had been relocated to an unsatisfactory position at the back of the hotel – so that arriving guests now enjoy breathtaking views across Zurich and the Alps.



Two new wings frame the historic Dolder, complementing the addition of a spa and a new ballroom. The new wings are fully glazed; and stencil-cut aluminium screens line the facades to form balustrades and provide shading, their tree pattern resonating with the surrounding forest. While the geometry of the new elements is fluid and organic, the colour palette echoes that of the existing building to harmonise the overall composition.



The Dolder Grand Redevelopment architects : Foster + Partners

Zurich Apartments


Zurich community centre

Photo © Hannes Henz

Zurich theatre

Photo © Hannes Henz

Zurich tyre shop


Zurich Railway Station

Photo © Hannes Henz

Swiss buildings



World Architecture : e-architect - a guide to key buildings across the globe

Swiss restaurant

Zurich Apartmenthouse : Siewerdtstrasse

Comments / photos for this Lake Zurich Hotel Building page welcome:
info@e-architect.co.uk

Dolder Grand Hotel - page : adrian welch / isabelle lomholt