G59 – 1st Swiss Horticulture Exhibition

The G59, 1 Swiss horticultural exhibition was the first of so far two Swiss horticultural exhibitions. It took place from April 25 to October 11, 1959 in Zurich held and extended to an area of ​​approximately 150,000 square meters of different spaces on the left and right bank of the lower Lake Zurich. The two exhibition halves were connected by shuttle boats and an installed specifically for the G59 cable car.

And 1980 the Green 80, the 2nd Swiss exhibition for gardening and landscaping, near Basel on the municipality of Munich stone instead.

Purpose and content

Driven by the commercial and creative professional bodies, which sought a reorientation in light of the economic crisis, the G59 offered a varied exhibition of theme gardens, garden types, plants and their application, special shows of plants and vegetables, equipment and specialized areas of gardening and garden design as well as numerous side events and a rich entertainment program.

Objectives of the G59 were to campaign for the Swiss horticulture and to promote careers in the nursery industry and garden architecture.

It was modeled on the one hand, the German garden shows who had contributed in the period after the Second World War to promote the profession and to the reconstruction of war-torn cities, on the other hand, the Swiss National Exhibition in 1939, the "Landi", who had also acted identity in a time of crisis. The parallels to the 1939 National, especially the cable car over the lake, the G59 contributed in the vernacular before the opening of the name " Flower Landi » a.

Plan

The overall planning of the G59 was for the garden inspector Pierre Zbinden, Head of Horticulture Office of the City of Zurich ( today: Green Zurich city). Under the architectural direction of Werner Stücheli and Paul R. Kollbrunner emerged on both lakeshores numerous temporary facilities as well as a few long-term buildings.

In spite of the overall plan, the two exhibition shore distinguished by their individual designs: one hand, because the configuration of different planning agencies was transferred, on the other hand, because the local and topographical conditions of the two lakefront were very different.

The left lakeside was designed by Klaus Walter and leather as well as by Johannes Schweizer. You were dealing with different types of rooms and also had to take into account local circumstances, such as a steep slope and the bridging an arterial road. The theme gardens reminded by their clear forms of concrete art and fell through colored, changing planting on. One of these themed gardens was a geometric scale flower parterre, which was seasonally replanted each. The draft " Country Home and Garden» tried and Klaus Walter Leder the spatial logic of the garden to extend it to the house and not to extend the house into the garden.

On the right bank side of the landscape architect Ernst Baumann and Willi Neukom could plan an even and nearly contiguous premises. On the road out of town leading Seefeld exhibition halls and pavilions were built, while the lake facing surfaces were reserved for special gardens and entertainment purposes. The rational -scale road network of the exhibition space, which was also meant for deliveries was supplemented by more varied walks.

The special architecture of theme gardens Willi Neukom explained as follows: " were deliberately selected topics from the romance which was given by the use of modern building materials, concrete, glass, stones, as it were a modern version. Under ascetic simplification of form, which is limited to what is essential to them is direct and immediate impact statement certainly. "

With the perennial garden between Blatterwiese and Zurich horn they realized a new piece riparian zone that would affect the style. Novel it was the flowing transition of the shore into the lake with stepping stones between fine gravel and a routing that made the water directly experienced. The embankment design came with the audience very well and therefore was expanded in 1963 to a lakeside path.

At the organization involved organizations

Swiss Association of Master Gardeners, Master Gardeners Association Zurich, Association of Horticulteurs de la Suisse Romande, Swiss Florists Association, Association of Swiss potted plants nurseries, Swiss Association of nursery owners, the Association of Swiss Architects

The garden of the poet

The most controversial design of the exhibition was the minimalist " Garden of the Poets ."

The landscape architect Ernst Cramer, who himself because saw themselves more as artists as a gardener, shaped with mounds of earth, water, and a modern iron sculpture of an abstract landscape. The entire system was created under the aspects of abstract geometric laws. While the general public was irritated by the design, the scientific world reacted with enthusiasm.

The architect, artist and former director of the School of Applied Arts Hans Fischli wrote in a letter to Ernst Cramer: "They create a sense of space, I 've never felt under the open sky. They prove that need not be necessarily so created with an intelligent mind and accurately handle the craft, with the precious material earth, as do the forces of nature elements. Do not create the imitation of a natural given but you produce a work like we abstract painters and sculptors try this with concrete means for years. "

Good shapes and New Graphics

The breakthrough of new forms and materials in garden design is mainly due to influences from art, architecture and design. The ideas of the Swiss Werkbund, the emphasis on the functional form as well as experiments with new materials such as concrete and fiber cement were reflected both in commercial and in artistic fields. In 1954, the designer Willy Guhl its famous beach chair made ​​of Eternit in the form of a loop before.

Developed with minimal shape and material costs according to ergonomic criteria garden furniture received by the Werkbund was voted " The good shape ." The creative possibilities of neuarteigen Eternits, a material made ​​of asbestos cardboard and cement as a binder, prompted the exhibition management together with the Eternit AG to advertise a competition for garden furniture and planters. Stools, trays and pots with contemporary design were the result.

Also for the new graphics, the G59 became a testing ground. Brochures, posters and signs were created by constructive-concrete design principles that enabled a logical combination of typographic and pictorial elements. Signet and graphical appearance of the G59 corresponded to the typical modern Swiss style, which was also internationally groundbreaking.

Art at the G59

In addition to gardens and plants look the G59 offered an extensive program, which ranged from fashion shows to art exhibitions to philatelic events.

An organized by art historian Willy Rotzler open-air exhibition on the site of the G59 showed non-figurative sculptures by Swiss artists such as Max Bill and Walter Bodmer. This art exhibition was not intended as competition for the horticultural and landscape architectural presentations, but aimed primarily at an aesthetic education of the viewer.

Aftermath

Some gardens, works of art and buildings have been preserved until today. On the right bank of the perennial garden, the Azaleental and the nymph garden with stepping stones remained in the fishing lodge, and there are some plastic pieces of art.

On the left side of the pergola, water games Belvoirpark as well as parts of the hexagonal honeycomb gardens were integrated with the port tightness in the waterside scenery.

In the 1980s, the once controversial and therefore worn the same after the exhibition " Garden of the Poets " by Ernst Cramer was recognized not only as an artistic achievement, but also as an opportunity to rehabilitate the formal design of the landscape to the natural garden movement.

The G59 called awake and modern urban planning visions. Ernst Baumann and Willi Neukom, were commissioned to create a design plan for the future use of the two G59 - site. Here, they imagined a residential development in the style of Le Corbusier. Although such creative utopias have been widely discussed, the quarters Seefeld and narrowness ultimately retained their development structure of the 19th century.

Gondola

Since the G59 took place on both shores of lakes, it was necessary, from one bank to another to ensure a direct and rapid transport of the visit ends. As in the 1939 case came a flotilla of shuttle ships. Also turn a gondola was built, the 55 meter high columns constitute a very special attraction. The resulting by architect Werner Stücheli in collaboration with the engineer Max Walt pillars were praised highly in the Swiss Bauzeitung by Walter Jegher: " But now came the big surprise a few weeks ago: The pillars of the monorail, which connects the two banks across the lake. They surpass in beauty and size ( internal, formal as expressed size, not number of meters) everything we have seen in recent years of exhibition architecture, Brussels no exception. "

In contrast to that of 1939, the gondola of the G59 survived the exhibition by seven years. In 1966, the two pylons were removed to again allow an unobstructed view of the city on the Glarus Alps.

Related Publications

• Annemarie Bucher: The G59. Between flowers - Landi and abstract modern garden experiments = L'exposition G59. Entre Flower Landi et expériences paysagères abstraites et modernes. In: anthos. 2, 2009, pp. 4-11
• Judith Rohrer: G59 - a challenging heritage = G59 - un héritage stimulant. In: anthos. 2, 2009, pp. 12-17
• Gabor Oplatka: The gondola of the G59 over the Lake Zurich Le = téléphérique you G59 sur le lac de Zurich. In: anthos. 2, 2009, pp. 18-21
• Stefan ROTZLER: 50 years, " the garden of the poets " by Ernst Cramer = Les 50 ans du « Jardin du poète » de Ernst Cramer. In: anthos. 2, 2009, pp. 22-25
• In floralies aux jardins d'arts: un siècle d' expositions de paysagisme en Suisse = From the flower show for artist's garden: Swiss horticultural exhibitions. Publié sous la direction d' Annemarie Bucher et Martine Jaquet. Presses polytechniques et universitaires romandes, Lausanne 2000, ISBN 2-88074-467-9 (French - German parallel text )
• Udo Weilacher: Visionary gardens. The modern landscapes of Ernst Cramer. Birkhäuser, Basel / Berlin / Boston 2001, ISBN 3-7643-6568-4
• Annemarie Bucher: Between «Flowers - Landi ' and the Manifesto of the Modern: 50 Years of G59, the first Swiss horticultural exhibition and its effect. In: Green time. 29, 2009, pp. 6-7