PROJECT MATRIX
ARCHITECTURAL PRECEDENTS Natalie Taouk PROJECT: The Thermal Vals ARCHITECT: Peter Zumthor LOCATION: Switzerland YEAR: 1996 KEY CONCEPT AND ITS REFLECTION IN THE DESIGN STUDIO The Therme Vals is a hotel and spa, built over the only thermal springs in the Graubunden Canton in Switzerland. The idea was to create a form of cave or quarry like structure. Working with the natural surroundings the bathrooms lay below the grass roof structure half buried into the hillside. Water piped from the area’s mineral springs fill a network of baths in the base of the complex. The Therme Vals is built from layer upon layer of locally quarried Valser Quarzite slabs. This stone became a driving inspiration for the design and is used with great dignity and respect. “Mountain, stone, water – building in the stone, buil...