Several institutions in one building
The museum, the Kunsthalle, commercial galleries and an art bookshop in one complex.
Juerg.hug — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Sdkb — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Roland zh — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Roland zh — CC BY-SA 3.0
A contemporary art museum in the Löwenbräu complex in west Zurich, a former brewery converted into an art centre. The complex is the context: red-brick industrial buildings reused to hold several art institutions in one place — this museum, the Kunsthalle Zürich, commercial galleries and an art bookshop. You enter one building and see several exhibitions. The museum itself grew from a collection assembled by Migros, Switzerland's largest retailer, under a commitment to give part of its profits to culture — a principle of its founder since the 1940s. The collection concentrates on contemporary art from the 1960s onward, and the programme is temporary exhibitions rotating several times a year, so the value follows what is showing. Zurich West around it is among the city's most transformed areas: former factories and railway land turned into restaurants, shops and cultural spaces, including the railway arches converted into retail units. Check the programme before going.
The museum, the Kunsthalle, commercial galleries and an art bookshop in one complex.
Built on Migros's commitment since the 1940s to give part of its profits to culture.
Former factories and railway land turned into restaurants, shops and cultural spaces.
Löwenbräu complex, west Zurich
Museum für Gestaltung (Museum of Design)One of Europe's most important museums of design and visual communication, with 14 minutes walk4.6
Platzspitz ParkA triangular park at the confluence of the **Limmat and the Sihl**, behind the S19 minutes walk4.6
Swiss National MuseumOpposite the main station stands what looks like a storybook castle of towers — 21 minutes walk4.5
Zürich Main StationSwitzerland's largest railway station and one of Europe's busiest: twenty-six tr21 minutes walk4.6
Urania ObservatoryA round tower rising some fifty metres above the western edge of Zurich's old to25 minutes walk4.4The Kunsthaus is the city's great art museum with a vast permanent collection from the Middle Ages to today, holding Monet, Chagall and Giacometti, and needs half a day. This is a contemporary museum of temporary shows only and needs an hour. With one choice, the Kunsthaus.
The railway arches converted into shops and restaurants, the Prime Tower with its viewing restaurant, the stacked Freitag containers serving as a shop and free viewing platform, and a former freight market turned food hall. The whole district is an example of industrial reuse and is entirely unlike central Zurich.