■ Heinz Julen participated in his first international seminar organised by Michel Clivaz, president of the association of alpine heritage, at the Château Mercier in Sierre on 21, 22 and 23 March 2002, and presented his creations with the aim of providing concrete answers to the questions which experts in tourism, architecture and town-planning were asking concerning the sustainable development of winter sports resorts in the mountains. In the presence of many notable guests, Heinz Julen spoke of his experience of the hospitality industry in the mountains, which depends essentially on creating a world in which the tourist can develop his most sublime aesthetic and ethic phantasms. Nothing is left to chance in order that the architectural creation which Heinz Julen has produced matches the emotional reaction which the tourist is sure to experience when he visits Zermatt.
■ Invited to the “CIMES 2002 (International Conference for Mountains), perspectives for a new century of winter sports”, organised by the Foundation for International Cultural Action in the Mountains on 9 and 10 December 2002, Michel Clivaz presented: “The work of Heinz Julen through the perspective of heritage”:
1/ Heritage: the Vernissage and the concept of alpine architecture
2/ Reclaimed heritage: the View House and the anthropology of the project
3/ Re-appropriated heritage: INTO THE HOTEL and the new allegory of heritage
4/ Re-composed heritage: the Loft and the open outlook
■ On 24 March 2003, the head of the department of tourism at the UQÀM (University of Quebec in Montreal), invited people to meet Heinz Julen at a conference entitled “INTO THE HOTEL: a marriage of art and tourism – the work of Heinz Julen, utopian architect” and made the following comment:
Heinz Julen, often called an inspired madman by his peers, inaugurated INTO THE HOTEL in February 2000: a 5-star establishment offering an uninterrupted view of the village of Zermatt, a holiday resort famous throughout the world, situated at the foot of the Matterhorn in Switzerland. Its construction was spread over a period of more that four years, at a cost of on average 600,000 Canadian dollars per room. Acclaimed by Travel & Leisure, INTO THE HOTEL is the most “in”, crazy and trendy place in Switzerland. More than just a hotel, it is a memorable experience, where disconcerting contrasts invite visitors to “look inside themselves”… Contemporary art is at the heart of this stylised world enhanced by original architecture in which simple materials reflect the light and evoke images of snow and ice; daylight penetrates the hotel as through the crevasses of a glacier; the natural assets of the region are emphasised in every room. In addition to becoming an indispensable tourist attraction in Zermatt, Heinz Julen’s work has contributed to rejuvenating the resort.
■ A conference entitled “The Destroyed Project” was held at the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne on 25 September 2003 with the following themes:
1/ The destruction of a completed project 7 weeks after construction work ended
2/ An account of a personal experience, the testimony of the author
3/ His personal method of work and creativity
Within the framework of the exhibition “Mountains, the Land of Inventions” which was held at the Grenoble School of Architecture on 13 November 2003, Michel Clivaz, an architect and lecturer at the IUAG, gave a speech entitled: INTO THE HOTEL, the birth of a myth, of which the following is a brief extract:
“…For the modern contemporary architect, building in alpine surroundings has always been a stimulus favourable to the research and development of technical, functional and flexible solutions. Alpine areas in conjunction with the intentions and anticipations of project-makers have thus been a fertile experimental melting-pot for the development of the architecture of the 20th century. What is the situation today? If the Alps have represented a fantastic land of adventure for modern architects since the 1920s, it is also on this poor land of experimentation that tradition has greater endurance than elsewhere: a paradoxical land of welcoming and rejection, of conservation and innovation. From a very young age, Heinz Julen had felt the potential for experimentation in his studio in the mountains, which was sometimes a temporary tent, sometimes a high-altitude refuge. With his very first experiments with temporary accommodation and his fantastic gift for making things out of wood and metal, this untrained beginner in alpine architecture collected old wooden panelling, dismantled boards, pictures of the Virgin Mary and the Saints, discarded parts of ski lift installations, to re-use them to greater advantage in the Vernissage. The more he invented, the more he collected, the less he designed in the studio, the more he created on the building site… His investigations are explorations, his works are a form of reclamation. In his forge high up in the mountains, the more Heinz Julen perpetuates his ability, the more he intensifies his consciousness…
… As well as being rustic constructions, tourist facilities and buildings with a view, the hotels belong to the category of structures raised to the level of heritage. With INTO THE HOTEL, we learn that heritage can be re-appropriated; It possesses all the ingredients pertaining to the sacrifice of heritage and reminds us of the words of Jean-Pierre Babelon et André Chastel: Maybe it is necessary to remind ourselves that in every society heritage is recognised by the fact that its loss constitutes a sacrifice and that its conservation assumes there will be sacrifices."
Michel Clivaz
An extract from INTO the performance; Heinz Julen and his Hotel in Zermatt – Ed. A journey
■ The High School of Economy and Administartion of Bern suggested a reflexion about politic, economy and society, 13 -17 oktober 2003, in the Sherpa Hotel of Meiringen.
On this occasion, the name of Heinz Julen was several times mentionned by the students, whose wished heard him speak of the theme: “which marketable value for wild/odd projects?”.
■ On 8 august 2004 Heinz Julen was invited at the 14th International Mountain Book Festival, in Passy (France), to talk about his concept: Into the Hotel.
■ On 27 march 2006, Heinz Julen participated at the 17th Tourism Forum Alpineregion, in Ischgl (Austria). This year the forum was entitled Vertical design, and this event which usually approached the mountain tourism with a traditionnal perspective, wanted to widen his horizon, talking about architectural projects which included symbolism like verticality in the alpine arcitecture.
Debates were organised around themes like mountain stations “white gold”, architecture and commercial strategies. Heinz Julen was invited to talk about his project on the Little Cervin.
