Private property is deeply engrained in Swiss Civil Law and Culture. Yet, when it comes to housing in Zurich, only 8% of flats are inhabited by the people who own them. Global Capital and States jointly suffocate the city. On the Allmend Brunau, the land constructed shows an image of true “Swiss” nature. Transgressions of regulatory enforcements in local allotment gardens and the idea of the commons do not just mitigate capitalist property rights. They offer alternatives that lie beyond existing legal frameworks and realities on how to deal with land. Maybe private property does not have to be a given...

In this project the complexities of a system based on private property are investigated in relation to the Allmend Brunau and its surroundings. Separate factors influencing the proposed change in the “Bauzonenordnung” of the City of Zurich points at alternatives beyond the current legal and systemic frame.