Showing neither trepidation nor any form of banal showmanship the blocky new building by Boltshauser Architekten on the slopes of the hill occupied by the convent gives the existing buildings a modern stamp. The vertical plane draws its strength from the distinctive layering of the building in storeys above the plateau and the basement floors, which are visibly anchored in the slope. Through the privileged position on the plateau two almost complementary visual axes are established to the east the mountains, to the west Lake Lucerne. The design concept for finding the way around the building is based on this complementary pair and uses the semantics of the words “Berg” (mountain) and “See” (lake) to facilitate orientation in the principal directions inside the building.

These terms are subtly reflected by the typography and layout. While the numbers, symbols and lettersthat refer to the lake side are hollowedout, like vessels, those that relate to the side of the building facing the mountain are full and corporeal. On the different storeys the information about which rooms are to be found on the respective floor is mounted in two lines: the word “Berg” is placed above the line with the room numbers, whereas the word “See” is positioned below thenumbers.

A high-quality typeface family with different weights was chosen for the numbers and the lettering – ranging from the classic Antique with bold capitals to sans serif Linear Antiqua – and was used flexibly. The design is intended to reflect the dignity of this order of nuns thatis more than 150years old while also meeting the need for legibility and a contemporary aesthetic. To employ the same language as the architecture the materialisation harmonises with the canon of materials and colours used in the building. The lettering for the outdoor signage on the trass lime facades is made of sanded and galvanised iron, while inside the building the lettering, which is mounted on a variety of materials, is made of colourless matt acrylic glass. The typographical layout is generally axial and conveys a sense of calm and serenity. The plans that help you identify your location and to find your way around the building have a surprisingly unfussy and unornamented character. They resemble tabular typesetting, which, thanks to the use of lines, almost automatically transforms into a cross-section through building, while at the same time providing the overview and orientation required.

Whenever lettering is to be used in a school building in order to identify rooms and help orientation, alongside the demands of the signage, a playful game with letters seems a logical option; it in this building that children first learn to read and write correctly. For the new Altenstadt elementary school Atelier Andrea Gassner literally wove the signage design together with the architecture and the tactile materials that are left in their natural state. We see letters cut out of solid ash with laser, in the form of colourful upholstered furniture or glowing yellow plexiglass with magical colour reflections – between the panes of the glazing. The Atelier developed a special typeface that is based on the method of learning how to write. The beautifully shaped upper-case letters are divided into two elements in accordance with the momentum of this method. In the seating in the large courtyard the game played with the shapes of the letters is especially effective when seen from the upper floor. The cushions for lying or sitting on and for exercising are revealed as words formed from the letters of the two words “PAUSE” (break) and “INSEL” (island). The furniture can be moved around and arranged in different ways, creating anagrams and entirely new words. As well as being recognizable from afar on account of their glowing colours the almost wall-height capital letters on the facades are also effective impact protection. The clouds of words beside the entrances to the classrooms are like ornamental wall graphics. The columns of numbers and words stacked above each other at the classrooms doors are a simple plug-in system that can be used to make different room names. This is all serves orientation and direction in and around the building but is also, quite consciously, a playful educational interaction and perception. With this design Atelier Andreas Gassner operates in both a creative and interdisciplinary way: between space and graphics, between systematics and design, between play and teaching.

In institutions such as hospitals, care facilities, or kindergartens, where cognitive abilities are limited for a variety of reasons, the emotional level is important. Atelier Andrea Gasser, which always searches for new answers to questions about how good design affects us, is currently working on an exciting approach in the area of signage. There haptics – in product design a must – seem to be a poor relation. But for the designer visual directional systems are more than markings, more than pure positioning in space. There is also an intuitive kind of orientation, which functions on an emotional level. In directional systems this is often underestimated or even ignored, says Andrea Gasser. Working in close collaboration with the architects Cukrowicz Nachbaur, a current project that focuses on the role of signage in care facilities for elderly people suffering from dementia or with poor eyesight, addresses the impact and importance of sensual stimuli in orienting oneself in space: what is left when eyesight, hearing and the ability to recognize begin to fail? How can we offer old people greater safety and orientation? The goal is to develop a new guidance system that uses the sense of touch.

The influence of haptics in signage is underestimated. Through our skin we are in permanent contact with the outside world. In a study undertaken with elderly people, including people with dementia and those with visual disability, we looked at how we can help people by introducing the element of touch to signage.

The goal is not just to show the shortest way, our aim is to understand the way. In order to make the world understandable, in our signage we develop a second level, connecting the cognitive with the emotional level. Nothing emotionalizes and convinces us more than that which we can grasp with our own hands and experience with our fingertips.
Together with the old people in the building we examined various kinds of wood, surfaces, and forms. From this study we developed handrails that help people to find their way around on the different floors and in the various parts of the building. The handrails were made and shaped by hand. The craftmanship brings the structures alive and each linear metre is unique.

For both residents and visitors in the entrance area there is an overview and a description of the different handrails. Accompanied by the text:

UNDERSTANDING THE WAY

“At my age my sight and hearing are no longer what they once were. Therefore, I rely on my hands to support me and to help me find my way around. The different structures and profiles of the handrails in this building are an immense help. I can feel with my hands where I am and therefore understand the route.”

The Antoniushaus in Feldkirch has been run by the Kreuzschwestern for more than 120 years. Today it is a house of different generations with a convent for the nuns, kindergarten, old persons home, hostel and nursing home. In 2013 as part of the revitalization and extension of the building, Atelier Andrea Gassner designed the signage and the safety graphics on the glass walls. The Atelier was recently commissioned to design a suitable element to mark the entrance. References for this design were the logo and the mission statement of this international religious order with a Franciscan spirituality. The existing logo is a cross form with narrow openings in a square. The cross is here a symbol of the Kreuzschwestern. The three-dimensional cross form that develops upwards on the plan of the logo conveys a new sculptural expression of the existing symbol. Where the four steel corners meet, openings are made into the vertical interior. At dusk and in the night strips of lighting shine out of these openings, in this way the sculpture extends outwards and on the ground. The founder of the order, P. Theodosius Florentini, once coined the slogan “The needs of the time are God’s will”. This sentence is at eye level in the internal spaces of the cross form. The Antiqua typeface “Swift” with its elongated serifs and emphatic letter forms creates an appropriate contrast to the raw, rusted background of Corten steel.

For many years now “Magazin 4” has been a hotspot in Bregenz that provides impulses and is well known for its cultural events. Magazin 4 functions as an urban facility with a large programmatic open area and, in terms of its profile, has always been able to follow an independent line. Ten years ago, Atelier Andrea Gassner revitalised the Bregenz city trademark, at the same time giving the city’s profile a new direction. Now the outdated brand “Magazin 4” has been operated upon using a sharp knife. These days, evolutionary corrections to existing logos often prove more effective and better equipped for the future than severe cuts and novel solutions, which in the competition for attention have to start from zero and, in order to strike a positive balance, must first of all reach their original level again. The visual interventions: modernisation of the monospaced versal typography as well as the omission of the underlining and the black field for the number 4. Instead, a “pipe” (vertical line) is used. As a result, the brand is more flexible to use and more open. Subtitles and the accompanying typography are borrowed from the design program used for the city’s profile, which awakens the intended secondary association with the corporate identity of Bregenz. The first application of the basic system – the name on the facade and the graphics in the interior – demonstrates functionality and a contemporary habitus.

Rieden School is made up of Rieden Primary School and Rieden Middle School, which are housed in two independent but connected building volumes. While the two school areas are essentially spatially separated, they come together in the rooms that are used jointly such as the gym, library, cafeteria, and administration. The aim, therefore, was to create clear signage and, using just a few accents, to provide easily understandable directions and routes within the school – starting with the school name above each of the three main entrances. The principal design elements are the nomenclature based on easily understandable terms, differentiation by means of colour, and spatial pictograms that employ the plans of the different storeys. Mixing the light blue for the primary school with the red of the middle school produces a rich shade of brown, which is the primary decorative colour in Rieden School. The colour concept borrows from the colour moods and the materials inside the building. Placing the lettering and illustrations directly on the walls obviates the need for additional panels and offers the requisite flexibility in choosing suitable positions for signs and names at important junctions.

As early as 1993 Atelier Gassner designed a guidance system for hiking trails throughout the State of Vorarlberg, working in collaboration with the state regional planning office. A simple system of signs made of natural coloured aluminium was developed, as tests had shown that this material and colour best remained visible in poor weather. In contrast to trails based on specific themes, the focus here was on providing orientation aid. In the intervening period around 20 000 signs have been erected at 6800 different locations. The guidance system on the Schlossberg trail augments the overall route guidance system and provides information on the newly developed “fitness track”. The goal was to provide an unobtrusive guidance system appropriate to a woodland trail – in the form of simple recurring accents in the forest. The design concept of Atelier Andrea Gassner made use of natural colours and materials. Deliberately, only parts of the sanded steel angles and steel tubes were sealed with a clear varnish. The protection against corrosion protection together with the natural oxidation of the untreated areas of steel generated two different colours in a single material. The grey steel takes up the colour of the gravel paths, the rock, and the other shades of grey in nature. The combination of materialisation, formal idiom and the neutral, easily legible lettering provides the information required, while avoiding being a disruptive element in the natural setting. The typography is based on the Corporate typeface used by Atelier Gassner in 2010 for the revitalised public appearance of the City of Bregenz. The graphics at the individual stations that provide orientation and offer illustrations are timeless, designed to appeal playfully to a broad target group (children, families, sports enthusiasts).

Architect Roger Boltshauser positioned his design in the “groove” first made by the architecture of the Maison de Verre which is characterised by “bare” materials and transparency of forms. In the new building the way in which the functions are made legible is entirely in accordance with this early modernism. “Troublemakers” that line the internal world, for example elements for the lighting and building services, are intended to be visible. The same applies to the signage. On this account architect Roger Boltshauser involved Atelier Andrea Gassner at an early planning stage. In designing the directional system in this new, nine-storey building the principalfunctional challenges were the diversity of the spatial structure and functions as well as fluctuations in staff and functional demands that were to be expected. In all zones of the central orientation, sub-orientation (storey areas) and detail orientation (room identification) flexibility and changeability in the messages were called for. Already in the first design study Atelier Andrea Gassner placed the emphasis on digital LED display technology and transmission by means of screens. All the screens, including the wall graphics in the outdoor area, can be centrally controlled. Reflecting the nature of the architectural design, the materialisation envisages an archaic technoid idiom – glass, oiled steel, light concrete. The building blocks of the graphic design include a special dot lettering developed for different grain sizes as well as a symbol program that uses the mould material for the sans serif letters “E T H”. This design concept allows pattern sequences and abstract typographical repeats in a horizontal and vertical direction for floors, walls, and single elements. The square provides the basis for the individual symbols and allows seamless use as partial inlays in the architect-specified mood board with glass blocks or tiling. The general concept for uniform signage in all ETH main and ancillary buildings that was introduced in 2019 prevented this individual proposal from being realised.

Behind the somewhat unwieldy acronym “BSBZ” is the name: “Bäuerliches Schul- und Bildungszentrum für Vorarlberg” (Farming School and Training Centre for Vorarlberg). In the five different wings on the campus various lecture courses for a different user groups are held. The wide range ensures a high frequency of various kinds of visitors. What led to the involvement of Atelier Andreas Gassner was the new “E” building wing and the need for self-explanatory signage and orientation in the constantly growing complex of buildings, approaches, storeys, levels, and rooms. The impact hazard regulations for wall-high glass elements in public buildings presented a further design challenge. A system had to be developed that, while meeting the standards required, would, at the same time, provide a playful graphic element that underlines the new architecture rather than detracting from it. However, the design work began with the start of every form of applied communication, i.e., with the name, the brand. In a moderated process the previous name “Landwirtschaftschule” (agriculture or farming school), which had never fallen entirely out of use, was revitalised and, with the addition of BSBZ, was recreated as a brand and logotype. The inspiration for the graphic elements of the privacy screens and the signage was drawn from the appearance of layers of clay, the textures of arable farming, the architecture of foliage, photosynthesis, the effects of sunlight and wind on the fields, the cycle of growth – the metamorphosis. For this theme and the elements that guide users Atelier Andrea Gassner developed patterns of movement, colour, typography, and plan graphics that are differentiated for each storey. Through the light and the movement of passers-by the patterns begin to oscillate and change constantly, they vanish and reappear, seem translucent and grow, as it were, through the building. The grids of lines and hatching are understood as a graphic echo of the vertically structured wood facade. The signage, the impact prevention patterns on the areas of glazing and the architecture all play together constructively. The very simple and clearly designed elements of the central and sub-orientation use the theme of hatching, too.

In large public buildings graphic symbols, lettering and signs are often used to help people find their way around. In the case of the orientation system for the newly built Schendlingen School in Bregenz the designers of Atelier Gassner, a studio whose reputation has long spread outside the region, have succeeded in a coup. The signage here is made up two words placed prominently on the glass partition walls to important areas and rooms. However, these words do not simply stand beside each other, they run over each other. In addition they are connected by the cross-hatching called for by the building regulations in full-height glass walls to prevent people from walking into them. Out of these normative constraints Atelier Gassner has succeeded in generating a communicative and artistic added value. As you walk by these typographies, depending on the particular location one word or the other appears clearly legible, as if by magic, but in-between the interferences of the overlaid letters and lines create their own delightful, constantly new game. The signage outside the building varies this connection of cross-hatching and letters and interprets the graphical elements in the interior in a way that is appropriate to the materials used outdoors. The relief-like lettering is cast directly into the specially made exposed concrete parapet walls at the approaches to the building. Here the play of light and shadow creates a texture that changes during the course of the day. The focus is on the phenomenon that perception is always related to space and time. The submission by Atelier Gassner, which was chosen by a sizable margin in an ideas competition, convinced the jury above all through this lively game played with perception for a building in which conveying things worth knowing and seeing to around 600 children and young people is a main focus.