Swiss Architecture Biennial 2026: Handle with Care

The sixth Swiss Architecture Biennial, the biennale svizzera del territorio organised by the Istituto Internazionale di Architettura (i2a), runs from 1 October to 28 November 2026 under the theme Handle with Care. After three opening days in Mendrisio, Bellinzona and Lugano, its exhibition continues at Villa Saroli in Lugano until the finissage on Saturday, 28 November. Admission is free.

The theme

Held since 2016, the biennial looks at architecture in relation to the social and economic changes that shape the territory. This edition calls for a responsible architecture of care, one that repairs, maintains and regenerates by listening to places and to what already exists, and by working with communities. The organisers present it as a more demanding alternative to demolition and new construction, which consume land and resources.

Programme

The opening days from 1 to 3 October brought together 69 contributions and about 1,800 visitors. They included a talk on housing with care at the Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio with Sophie Delhay, Giacomo Guidotti and Marta Peris and José Toral, an urban walk and round tables in Bellinzona, and encounters in Lugano on metabolic thinking and reuse with Sascha Roesler, John Palmesino, Catherine Gay Mentzel and Adrien Meuwly. A conversation with the author and anthropologist Chowra Makaremi, with a screening of her film Hitch, une histoire iranienne, and a reading by Paola Viganò were also part of the programme.

The exhibition now on show gathers the work of the edition’s two open calls. Ten Actions, chosen from 246 proposals from around the world, are installations, performances and interventions built around a single idea: taking care of what already exists. They are set in the park of Villa Saroli or inside its Limonaia, and one of them, Sit For A While by SKNYPL, stands in Piazza Besso and on Piazzale ex Scuole in Viganello. Alongside them are six Pecha Kucha projects, selected from 75 submissions, each told in 20 images.

Visiting

The exhibition at the Limonaia of Villa Saroli, Viale S. Franscini 9, Lugano, is open Tuesday to Friday from 10:00 to 17:30 until 28 November 2026, when a finissage closes the biennial. Entry is free, and the full programme and news are on the biennial website.