Burckhardt Developments

The early 1990s were marked by an economic recession that hit architecture firms hard, with a noticeable decline in new construction projects. Many firms, including Burckhardt, struggled to secure commissions and often had to settle for smaller jobs or renovations.

By the mid-1990s, the economy began to stabilize. Residential projects started up again, especially in urban areas, typically following the traditional model where a client, acting as both developer and investor, hires an architect to plan the project. Burckhardt however, took a different path, adopting an unconventional acquisition strategy rare among architecture firms. Instead of waiting for commissions, its project development department pinned up zoning plans, studied them closely to pinpoint promising plots and assess their potential. The findings were compiled into dossiers, shared with investors, and pitched through roadshows to gauge interest.

Unlike projects involving laboratories or industrial buildings, where the future user typically initiates the work and sets specific requirements, residential construction offered a prime opportunity for this fresh approach, proving to be an effective job creation model. Under Peter Epting, the project development department steered Burckhardt toward a stronger focus on housing projects in Basel and northwestern Switzerland throughout the 1990s.

The logical next step was for Burckhardt to dive deeper: it founded a new subsidiary for planning and development, AG für Planung und Überbauung, and began investing in projects itself. The venture started primarily with row houses, like the pilot project Reinach Nord. Built on a Coop-owned plot in Reinach (BL) under Donald Wunderlin’s direction, Burckhardt stepped into the investor role and marketed and sold the completed homes through its subsidiary Burckhardt Immobilien AG. This expansion of services added another layer to Burckhardt’s value chain, creating a solid foundation to weather cyclical ups and downs and enter the new millennium with stability, continuity, and control. Burckhardt was a pioneer in Switzerland, where such an approach was still rare, though it wasn’t long before the market caught on, and more firms started securing work through their own developments.

Rising land prices and growing competition years later prompted another bold move. In 2014, Burckhardt purchased a plot at Spitzenrain in Aesch (BL) and developed a residential complex, which Burckhardt Immobilien AG then sold. For the first time, Burckhardt acted as developer, owner, investor, and architect all at once. In 2022, the subsidiary Burckhardt Entwicklungen AG was founded. Under the leadership of Daniel Keller, the company offers development services and also implements its own projects. Its range of expertise includes studies at nearly all scales, zoning and land-use planning, profitability calculations, as well as consulting.