NEST unit receives architecture award

The "Award for Marketing + Architecture" is awarded to companies, institutions, architects and builders who use architecture as a high-quality and meaningful marketing instrument. This year, 21 projects in a total of six categories competed against each other. In the category "Hotels, Restaurants, Bars, Tourist Facilities, Wellness Facilities, Residences" the top-class jury selected the NEST unit "Solar Fitness & Wellness" as the winner. At the award ceremony in the KKL Lucerne, architect Peter Dransfeld and Empa's deputy director Peter Richner were delighted to receive the award.

Exciting architecture that draws attention to a sustainable idea: This is how the architectural implementation of the "Solar Fitness & Wellness" unit can be seen. Realized with the help of numerous partners from research and industry – above all the Swiss-Liechtensteinian building technology association suissetec – the NEST unit demonstrates how sustainable wellness is possible. The architectural concept developed by Peter Dransfeld from Ermatingen is indeed surprising: Behind an impressive glass façade on NEST's top platform, three ellipsoids float, which contain two saunas and a steam bath. Below is the fitness area. The ellipsoids are close to the ideal shape of a sphere and offer the lowest possible heat loss – and also an unmistakable identity for a pioneering form of energy use. The goal of the "Solar Fitness & Wellness" unit is, therefore, also to massively reduce the energy consumption of wellness facilities so that operation with energy produced directly in and at the unit will be possible. In order to achieve this, a newly developed wellness technology is used, which, compared to conventional systems for heating saunas and steam baths, only requires one sixth of the energy.

Overall winner of the sixth "Award for Marketing + Architecture" is the Juliertheater, a theater tower on the Julier Pass.