Storage Room

The project reimagines the storage room as a form of public ecological infrastructure. Extracted from the domestic sphere, storage is no longer conceived as a space for objects but as a spatial resource capable of supporting forms of life excluded by urbanization.

Located in Zurich’s Escher-Wyss district, the intervention transforms the Hardturm parking garage into a repository of darkness for bats, whose habitats have been threatened by industrial development, light pollution, and the loss of sheltered roosting spaces.

In doing so, the project expands the notion of care beyond the human, proposing architecture as a mediator between urban environments and other species.

Rather than replacing the existing structure, the proposal works through selective subtraction and precise adaptation. The existing tower is largely preserved, while an inhabited facade is created by rotating the metal panels within a timber framework to create cavities that function as bat roosts.

The upper floors are dedicated exclusively to bats, while the emptied elevator shaft translates ultrasonic echolocation into audible frequencies, making their presence perceptible without disturbing their habitat.

Rather than storing objects, the building stores environmental conditions (darkness, shelter, and silence) demonstrating how architectural reuse can foster new forms of multi species coexistence within the contemporary city.

Spring 2026

Project by: Mathilde Genoud, Joëlle Spira, Jash Bhadreshwara, Santiago Madueño

Teaching team: Anna Puigjaner, Dafni Retzepi, Paule Perron,Valentina Noce, Ethel Baraona Pohl, Lisa Maillard, Pol Esteve Castelló, He Shen

Images 1, 2, 3, 4: Luís Úrculo

Images 5, 6, 7: Pierre Marmy