Interior with a sense of mission

SRF Campus Zürich

The new SRF News & Sport broadcasting building is part of the Swiss Radio and Television’s main campus in Zurich-Leutschenbach. It is used for current affairs reporting and has both an independent technical center for campus supply and a side underground parking garage under a park open to the neighborhood, which was named “Media Garden”. Penzel Valier, the planning architectural firm, realized the complex as a striking head building with a basement, a two-story base plinth, and three upper floors and two smaller attic floors.

On the one hand, an open office landscape for about 500 people was to be accommodated, in which the SRF journalists can interact optimally in different ways as teams that are constantly changing in terms of content. This is combined with a computer center as well as, among other things, a gastronomic offer for the operating hours extended throughout the day. On the other hand, the building accommodates a large “broadcasting landscape”, combined with various smaller studios of radio and television. These include editing suites, the entire national broadcasting operations and a central newsroom.

Insights and workshop character

Via transparent studios and moderation rooms, which sit in the middle of the editorial offices, the audience – if desired – gets a glimpse of this work, with the high-quality room constellation and design being visually integrated in the background. The floor design, which is column-free outside the circulation cores, allows for flexible interior disposition and large open spaces on the ground floor.

The “workshop character” of the interior, with its visible static and concrete surfaces, is incorporated and emphasized in style through the use of a sophisticated palette of materials – steel, Corian, leather, fabrics and charcoal pigment. Orientation in the large-scale floors is provided by carpets designed together with artist Tobias Hantmann. The heart of the complex, both programmatically and spatially, is formed by the television studios on the first floor, surrounded by a spatial layer of broadcasting equipment, visitor room, restaurant and bar. Broadcasting, the newsroom with its atrium, and the editorial offices in open work landscapes – including meeting islands, coffee points, and glazed retreat and meeting rooms – occupy the upper floors.

What do you consider to be the supporting qualities of a good workplace?

Penzel Valier: A good workplace combines contemporary furnishings with a modern spatial impression, open areas for flexible working with closed spaces for concentrated meetings and, last but not least, robust structures with warm materials.

Do you see any comparability in interior design for living and for working?

Both design tasks require holistic design concepts that encompass structural, technical as well as haptic and comfort-related issues and also include the design of furnishings and lighting.

Which material-related aspects do you consider to be the decisive ones in the future development of the Workspaces?

We are already working on topics that will accompany us in the coming years. We developed sustainable design concepts, such as the separation of structure and finish, and are testing the use of new sustainable materials that have a positive aspect on the working environment.