von Erlach Bernhard (Bern)

Bernhard von Erlach, an ETH SIA architect, has been running an architectural practice in Bern since 1998. He reconstructs historically significant buildings and develops new buildings largely derived from the existing situation. Finally, he prepares concept and feasibility studies and participates in competitions. In the urban planning office of Bern, he designs and manages a part-time area and site development as an urbanist.

Contextualizing a design is at the heart of his work: layer by layer, he reveals the history of an existing house or building site. He combines this careful reading of traces with questions of usability and the urban environment.

He transfers his immersion with the context and the site as it is currently used as a living space to color, light and sound. With place, light and material, he creates a sensory, atmospheric architecture that always refers to the genius loci.