Oppenheim Architecture + Design

Beat Huesler is the European partner of Chad Oppenheim who together in 2009 founded Oppenheim Architecture + Design Europe based in Basel / Muttenz, Switzerland. Huesler’s relationship with Oppenheim extends back to their joint studies at Cornell University, New York, where Huesler received his Bachelors and Masters of Architecture in 1993.

Huesler is a licensed Architect with over 26 years of professional experience. He developed his professional training at firms in New York, and Basel, Switzerland before founding in 1996 Huesler Architekten in Muttenz, Switzerland. His extensive experience in the modern and sensitive intervention of historic structures won him the Gutes Bauen in Kanton Baselstadt and Baselland Award 2002.

As Director of Oppenheim Architecture + Design Europe, Huesler has coordinated Oppenheim projects Lavender Bay (Greece), Bricks Masterplan (Allschwil, Switzerland), and the Enea Headquarters (Schmerikon, Switzerland) which received the 2009 American Architects Award.

Broadening his architectural realm, Huesler’s involvement in civic activities include consulting Architect for the Historic Town Center Commission Switzerland, President of the Chamber of Commerce Muttenz, and founding President of the Economics Affair Council, Muttenz, Switzerland.

Chad Oppenheim is a Miami-based international architect whose work encompasses all realms of design, ranging from large-scale urban architecture, hotels and resorts, residential and office towers, luxury homes to interiors and furnishings. Founded in 1999, his firm Oppenheim Architecture + Design has garnered global recognition for socially and environmentally conscious architecture, as well as setting trends in the sustainable and humanitarian sectors. Oppenheim transforms the prosaic into the poetic – eliciting a site’s inherent power through passion and sensitivity towards man and nature.

The environment continues as the main inspiration behind the firm’s work. In Miami, Oppenheim thoughtfully made an impact on the local community with the donation of an enchanting new entrance to Simpson Park, one of South Florida’s last natural hardwood hammock ecosystems. Having expanded to Europe with an office in Basel, Switzerland; Oppenheim’s completion of the Enea Headquarters in Rapperswil-Jona, set the stage for the world’s first tree museum. Design is underway for a stunning new benchmark of ecological sensitivity along Surfers Paradise Beach on Australia’s Gold Coast. A result of winning an international design competition, the 1.5 million square foot mixed-use development will push the boundaries of nature and experience. The Wadi Rum Resort – located in Jordan’s Wadi Rum desert – will execute unprecedented innovation with the design of an eco-resort carved into the stone of the desert.

Oppenheim’s built large-scale works range from the elegant 50-story Ten Museum Park tower along the downtown Miami waterfront, to the 1.6 million square foot Net Metropolis, a multi-tower commercial complex in Manila which has the distinction of being the pilot project for the Filipino government’s first ever national sustainable design program. His recent renovation and restoration projects include the Bass Museum of Art, the FIU-Wolfsonian Museum, South Beach’s Clinton Hotel and the Estate of Carl Fisher, the co-founder of Miami Beach.Oppenheim designed the upcoming 800-room resort for Disney in Shanghai. Today Oppenheim is working in New York City, designing hotel and residential towers in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

A graduate of Cornell University, his uncompromising commitment to green architecture has made Oppenheim a highly sought-after global lecturer and the recipient of over 50 academic and career distinctions, including 33 AIA Awards. Having worked on projects in 23 countries on 6 continents, Oppenheim’s award-winning work has been published internationally in over 1,000 publications including multiple times in The New York Times and Architectural Record.