page_title: Gottfried Semper
section_title: Zürich period (1855–1871)
hierarchical_section_title: Gottfried Semper / Life / Zürich period (1855–1871)
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Gottfried Sempers Stadthaus von Winterthur English: City hall of Winterthur, designed by architect Gottfried Semper. Français&#160;: L'hotel de ville de Winterthour, dessiné par l'architecte Gottfried Semper.
context_page_description: Gottfried Semper was a German architect, art critic, and professor of architecture, who designed and built the Semper Opera House in Dresden between 1838 and 1841. In 1849 he took part in the May Uprising in Dresden and was put on the government's wanted list. Semper fled first to Zürich and later to London. Later he returned to Germany after the 1862 amnesty granted to the revolutionaries.
  Semper wrote extensively about the origins of architecture, especially in his book The Four Elements of Architecture from 1851, and he was one of the major figures in the controversy surrounding the polychrome architectural style of ancient Greece. Semper designed works at all scales, from major urban interventions like the re-design of the Ringstraße in Vienna, to a baton for Richard Wagner. His unrealised design for an opera house in Munich was, without permission, adapted by Wagner for the Bayreuth Festspielhaus.
context_section_description: Concurrently with the onset of the industrial revolution, the Swiss Federation planned to establish a polytechnical school.  As the principal judge for the competition held to select a design for the new building, Semper deemed the submitted entries unsatisfactory and, ultimately, designed the building himself.  Proudly situated (where fortified walls once stood), visible from all sides on a terrace overlooking the core of Zurich, the new school became a symbol of a new epoch. The building (1853–1864), which despite frequent remodeling continues to evoke Semper's concept, was initially required to accommodate not only the new school (known today as the ETH Zurich), but the existing University of Zurich, as well.
  In 1855 Semper became a professor of architecture at the new school and the success of many of his students who attained success and renown served to ensure his legacy.  The Swiss architect Emil Schmid was one such student.  With his income as a professor, Semper was able to reunite his family, bringing them to Zurich from Saxony. The City Hall in Winterthur is among other buildings designed by Semper in Switzerland.
  Semper provided Bavaria's King Ludwig II with a conceptual design for a theatre dedicated to the work of Richard Wagner to be built in Munich.  The project, developed from 1864 to 1866, was never realized, although Wagner 'borrowed' many of its features for his own later theatre at Bayreuth.
caption: Stadthaus (city hall) Winterthur
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