Herreney Interlaken Building stage I

All around the world, one finds many more people who have heard about Interlaken, but not Bern. And that when you ask a Tokyo travel agent to book a train from Zurich to Interlaken, they say: "Of course, do you want Interlaken East or West? Joking aside, this illustrates how a destination can become internationally known thanks to a jewellery retailer and an innovative mountain railway.

The "Bödeli" land between Lakes Thun and Brienz is actually an old river basin, filled in on one side by the Lombach and on the other by the Lütschine Rivers. Between 1891 and 1895, a canal was built for shipping as far as Interlaken West railway station at the level of Lake Thun (mean water level 557 m.a.s.l.) and Lake Brienz, which is about 6 metres higher. The water was guided into the canal via turbines for power generation and resulted in a massive lowering of the groundwater level on the left side of the Aare. At that time, the Herreney peninsula was also reassigned as a possible building zone and owners were able to sell some of their land. Art Nouveau buildings along the canal promenade were then constructed, and later (around 1978) the semi-detached houses along Tschingeleystrasse.

In 2009, the land was reassigned to the "Herreney" ZPP (Zone with Planning Obligation) with the owners benefitting from the seven-figure additional value. The community of heirs then decided to sell the land, a total of 42,141 m², to the Herreney development company (consisting of Urs Hauenstein's Zulg Immobilien AG and Peter Hauenstein's Hauenstein Immobilien AG). The subsequent architectural competition was won by HMS Architekten AG, the UeO (development regulation) process started at the beginning of 2014, was published in the summer of the same year, and ended with the appeal decision of the JGK on 6 June 2016. Cantonal red tape sometimes moves more slowly than we wish. On 23 August 2016, the municipality of Interlaken approved our building application of 8 September 2014 - and after the rerouting of the "Bödeli" main sewer line (dating back to 1912), we were able to start construction work in spring 2017.