Modern Projects and Projections

It Takes a Village to Make a Nation: The ‘Village Suisse’ at the Exposition Nationale de Genève (1896)

The village has always been a utopian locus of national-romantic imaginaries. This is where the heart of the nation supposedly beats louder, and where one should return to find its longlost unity. Throughout the long nineteenth century, many nation-building projects have followed this narrative. But how can such ideological mechanisms work in Switzerland, a country famous for its pluralism of languages, religious denominations and regional architectural traditions? In 1896, for the Swiss National Exhibition in Geneva, a ‘Village Suisse’ was built, a composite exhibition village with an almost impossible task: it had to represent all the different Swiss cantons in all their cultural diversity, and at the same time unite them in something that symbolised national unity.