Gustav Ammann (9 July 1885 – 23 March 1955) was a Swiss landscape architect who worked in the modernist style and influenced garden architecture in Switzerland. He has worked on over 1,700 projects, notable amongst which is the namesake Gustav-Ammann-Park in Zürich.

Biography

Ammann, who grew up in a middle-class environment, was the son of the president of the Bürgli District Court in Zurich-Enge. He attended the Cantonal Commercial School, Zurich, but left his federal diploma in favor of an apprenticeship with the notable landscaping company run by Leopold Frobel, from 1903 to 1905. He was then employed at the Zurich Botanical Garden and attended lectures by its director, Hans Schinz, who also served as a professor of botany at the University of Zurich. In 1907, he left for Germany where he worked with Reinhold Hoemann, a proponent of the reformist architectural style. He studied at the Magdeburg School of Arts and Crafts between 1905 and 1911. From 1909 to 1911, he worked at the offices of notable landscaping architects including with Franz Paetz (Düsseldorf), Ludwig Lesser - known for the namesake park (Berlin), and Jacob Ochs (Hamburg) where German landscape artist Leberecht Migge later became the artistic director. From 1911 until the company was dissolved in 1933, Ammann was chief garden architect at the company of Otto Froebel and Heirs, where he trained the Austrian-American architect Richard Neutra as a gardener's apprentice, and later the landscape architect Ernst Cramer. In those years, he was also associated with the Schweizerischer Werkbund (translated as Swiss Werkbund). In 1934, Ammann set up his studio in Zurich. He frequently collaborated with notable Swiss architects of the time, including Max Frisch, Max Ernst Haefeli, Werner Max Moser, Rudolf Steiger, and members of the Congrès Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne (CIAM). Ammann was President of the Swiss Federation of Garden Designers (BSG) and the Secretary General of the International Federation of Landscape Architects (IFLA).

Notable projects

Ammann was affiliated with many projects across Switzerland, designing their gardens and landscapes.

Publications

Ammann's gardening and landscaping ideologies have been the subject of multiple publications.