Apartment house at Muristrasse 5/7

About the building

Walking up the Grosser Muristalden from the Bear Pit, you see Muristrasse 5/7 where the road curves. Its position in the bend of the slope makes the stately building visible from afar. It was built in 1905; the city inventory names G. Rohrer-Badertscher as architect and F. Giroldi as client. The house has two street numbers but forms a single block.

In the years around 1900 the area of the Obstberg and Muristrasse filled quickly with large rows of rental houses for the upper middle class. Muristrasse 5/7 is one of them. The street side is built of exposed brick; window surrounds, the sill cornice of the upper floor and the corner quoins are picked out in contrasting colour and structure the building in a calm, balanced way. The rear is rendered and plainly treated.

The main motif of the street front is the central staircase: a two-bay projection, taller than the rest, more richly decorated and crowned by a round-arched false gable. Balconies on brackets sit in front of the outer axes, and a further projection stands out on each end. The steep mansard roof carries dormers with triangular pediments placed exactly above the axes of the tall windows. The inventory classes the house as historicist architecture with a baroque flavour.

Little has changed: number 5 received new roof windows in 1927, and later windows without glazing bars were fitted. The building is rated as worthy of protection; number 5 has been covered by a protection contract since 2006. The city also rates the open space around the house as being of heritage interest.

Researched and summarised by Bärn Kit. Sources: Bauinventar der Stadt Bern: Muristrasse 5, 7 · Bauinventar der Stadt Bern: Quartiergeschichte Allmend-Murifeld · Wikidata: Q128138248