Swiss-style gardener's house

Readers might be interested to find out more about this delightful house built for the gardener at Villa Villette.
It was actually in 1863 that the wealthy Zurich banker and art collector Heinrich Schulthess-von Meiss commissioned Leonhard Zeugheer to design a representative country seat, what became the villa itself, set in extensive English-style gardens, as was the fashion at the time. Then a gatehouse, also designed by Zeugheer was built and this was followed in 1878 by a further building (photograph), the gardener’s house in the northern area of the park, designed this time not by Zeugheer, but by architect Max Peter Heinrich Vogel, who was living in Paris at the time. The gardener himself only lived in an apartment on the upper floor, the rooms below serving as a laundry and wood store.

As mentioned, this gardener’s house was built very much in the Swiss style, such rural buildings very popular with the higher classes in the nineteenth century, bringing with them an alpine-style romanticism to the grounds they stood in.

Vogel paid great attention to detail, as can be seen in all elaborate wood carvings evident on the eaves, balconies and roof, if not on the whole façade. Indeed, some may say it is somewhat exaggerated.

While in keeping with the general Swiss style, there are English and French influences, too, no doubt as a result of Vogel’s travels abroad. What is pleasing is that this building stands there today very much as it was built. It has had various coats of paint in its time, but following the last renovation in 1995, the present shade is reminiscent of how it was when built.

The Villette park and all its buildings were actually acquired by the municipality of Cham in1980, the area where the gardener’s house stands originally being earmarked for an extension to the cemetery. However, this did not happen, and the building became part of the municipal nursery, to which a modern greenhouse was later added.