Last weekend was Open House Basel, an event where buildings around Basel open their doors to the public for two days. Sites included private homes, churches, museums, schools, apartments, and other architecturally interesting buildings around the city. Visitors can take guided tours of places like the Basel town hall or the Blue and White House (Blaues und Weisses Haus), two mansions that housed a silk ribbon factory in the late 1700s and now serve as offices for Basel’s Department for Economy, Social Welfare, and the Environment.
Those tours were booked, but one Open House spot had no lines on Sunday: the Allschwil water tower.
I see this water tower every day. Our apartment windows face it. It looms over the tree line like a UFO, and it has as long as I’ve been alive. Its construction began in 1970, and the water tower was first filled in 1973. In the early ‘80s, the water tower got an elevator and a rooftop terrace that opened to the public in 1983.
And in 1988, my uncle had his wedding reception on that terrace. My cousin and I were flower girls, and I have the vaguest memories of walking into the tower entrance and of a table full of open-faced sandwiches at the top. Or maybe I just remember the pictures.
I think I’ve only been up the water tower once besides that August day, so it was a delight to find it open last Sunday afternoon. We’d had lunch at a nearby restaurant and wandered over – otherwise it’s a 30-minute walk, largely uphill. The walk is beautiful, either through the forest or along fields with a view over Basel, a view I start dreaming about if I don’t see it for a few weeks. The Open House Basel website said all the tours of the water tower were also booked, but since we were in the area, we stopped by to see if we could get in anyway.
There were no tours, just a volunteer at the entrance and another on the viewing deck, ready to answer questions and take group pictures. We walked up the 196 stairs, pausing to look out the tiny windows and through a porthole at the 990 cubic meters of water. While waiting for other visitors to pass, I learned that there’s a diving school in Basel that practices in an old water tower. Since the Allschwil tower holds drinking water, there’s no divers or fish swimming around. One hopes.
The viewing deck gives a 360 degree panorama of Basel, the Black Forest, Allschwil, and parts of France. You can also see the Bruderholz water tower, built in 1926. It definitely has more of an art deco Rapunzel tower look to it than the 1970s style of the Allschwil water tower. It, however, was not specifically open for Open House Basel, because it’s open daily from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and unlike the Allschwil tower, appears to be free. Allschwil typically charges 2 francs to walk 196 stairs or ride the water tower elevator between 2 and 5 p.m. on Sundays and holidays.
Two francs is super cheap entertainment in Switzerland, and you get an overhead view of these mini donkeys.
Next year I’ll look out for the Open House weekend to try to get a spot on some of the popular sites. In the meantime, Open House Worldwide exists, and if you live in or are visiting places like London, Chicago, San Diego, New York, or Miami1, maybe you can visit some architecturally-interesting buildings, too.
This is just a list of places I know I have readers and US cities.
Beautiful! Love the wedding story.
Open house London sounds similar. Definitely worth looking into (advance) if you are in London during the first two weeks of September.