For his second collaboration with the Swiss brand, Shigeru Ban delivers an organic 240-metre long office structure by the Suze canal in Biel.

To the Japanese architect, no need to search for an animal metaphor when it comes to the shape of the building. More modestly, he admitted to have followed two elements: the parcel boundaries (the Swatch Group site has been built on both sides of the historic watch campus) and the watch strap. “Although the mechanism is always the same inside, the exterior can change” explained the Shigeru Ban to Neuer Zürcher Zeitung in an interview (dated October 15th, 2019). Note that so far 9,154 models have been produced.

The Swatch Group site has been built on both sides of the historic watch campus: first a new Omega factory on the city side, then Cité du Temps in the North and now the headquarters over 240 metre.

If you like numbers and statistics, here is an impressive.

At 46,778 sqm, the HQ project is Shigeru Ban’s largest and most exuberant hybrid mass timber project to date, on of the largest hybrid mass timber in the world.
The supporting structure of the HQ used almost 2,000 cubic metres of native wood.
Its grid shell roof structure consists of 7,700 unique timber pieces, designed by a specialised computer programme to promote efficiency and minimise errors. All wood pieces were fabricated with a precision of 0.1 mm, allowing each piece to fit perfectly on-site. In contrast, the Omega Factory is a strict, precise, and rigid rectilinear building. Its clean-room construction is unprecedented for a timber building. It was produced in cooperation with Blumer-Lehmann.
400 team members are working in an open landscape under the roof structure
the USM furniture has been reused from the previous office, reducing waste.

Shigeru Ban has composed a wooden honeycomb pattern filled with different elements: windows, photovoltaic elements and ETFE air cushions (a Teflon derivative known from football stadiums). The semi-transparent pillows were because they are so light and reduce the load on the 4,600 beams made of glued laminated timber. No light penetrates through the PV units, so they are increasingly used above the warehouse in the rearmost part.

Inside, there is a wild mix of colourful plastics, cardboard tubes, glass cabins and tubular steel classics. "Yes, it's my most playful project so far," explains Shigeru Ban, "it's the expression of Swatch's character: playful and colourful."

Solar car prototypes from previous years stand in the lobby.

White Swiss crosses are distributed over the entire roof from the inside into the honeycomb, a Swatch tribute to the Swissness of the brand.

Because everything lies in the detail, the white crosses are also perforated, so that they swallow a part of the many sounds in the open-plan office.

Above all, there are fresh air on the nine balconies. Nick Hayek even joked in front of the press suggesting that maybe the balconies are not just for the smokers, but for all employees who wanted to escape from his cigars

If you follow the Suze (Schüss in German) Canal in Biel, you first follow the long and straight facades in the grid of the city, shaped in the 19th century according to the rules of industry and hydroelectric power.

But where the Schleusenweg behind the city park leads out of town and the homes of watch factories are replaced, the 21st century begins.

The huge, upward-pointing chrome steel funnels on the façade of the already inaugurated in 2017 omega manufacture was a hint that something has happened.

The last stage north of the existing clock campus explains unequivocally the end of the industrial grid: This organic form has no counterpart in Biel.

The spirit of Nicolas G Hayek is very present. The adjacent street has been renamed to celebrate his legacy and his children Nayla and Nick Hayek (above) named the Auditorium after him, situated in the head of the HQ. During the press conference, Nick Hayek, CEO, reminded the guests that it is the second cooperation with the Japanese architect, after the Nicolas G. Hayek Centre in Ginza.

To satisfy everyone’s curiosity, a round pavilion is open for watch sales in the Cité du Temps with the colourful Swatch Museum showing 6,234 different watches. There, a wooden bridge connects the cubical museum wing with the open-plan office.