LECTURES
The ECAL Media & Interaction Design department is pleased to welcome Vera van de Seyp for a talk about her practice as a computational designer, artist, and educator.
EXHIBITIONS
ECAL presents a selection of projects developed in collaboration with Cristallina Design, focusing on a rare material: the only marble quarried in Switzerland.
AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS
Congratulations to Simone C. Niquille, ECAL resident at La Becque in 2020, for winning the Swiss Design Grand Prize 2026.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Nicole Udry
Genius Loci, or the spirit of the place, refers to the unique identity or essence of a location. In architecture, this principle suggests that the specific characteristics of a place should be reflected and extended in a design. In the case of the second-year graphic design students, they have applied this principle to communication projects focused on promoting or extending the identity of a particular place through design. Their work likely explores how to visually capture and communicate the essence of a space, using graphic design elements that resonate with the architectural features or history of the place.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Aurèle Sack
Second-year students were required to manually develop the lowercase letters of two typefaces.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Adeline Mollard
As part of the visual identity course led by Adeline Mollard, students developed a visual identity starting from a randomly selected business card. By appropriating one of its graphic elements and its title, each project offers a unique interpretation. The identity is then expanded across a range of formats, from business cards to F4 posters, including posters, flyers, business cards, and an animated poster.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Diego Bontognali
As part of this editorial design course, students developed a research-based project focused on the selection and design of texts around a shared theme. Based on a curated set of sources, each project presents two editions with identical content, produced in both a large and a small format.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
by Leandra Adler, Cansu Celen, Layana Comte, Anaïs Dermont, Camille Genoud, Eve Gremaud, Eloïse Guillod, Mathis Harmant, Marie Hintzy, Matteo Lucca, Maxime Manera, Gaëtan Mauclair, Mathys Mauron, Emma Morisseau, Sara Pedersoli, Lucie Pittet, Hélène Prongué, Leonardo Mariucci, Alice Refachinho, Justine Renevey, Gaspard Schlatter, Laura Simons, Vu Toni Thien Duc, Maïa Yassin, Jonas Zesiger
In November 2025, 27 ECAL students took part in Work and Turn, a workshop led by Geoff Han exploring the theme of labor and the often overlooked work that sustains the school. Located in a former IRIL knitwear factory in the industrial area of Renens, ECAL occupies a vast building whose daily functioning depends on many visible and invisible forms of labor. Over five days, students worked in small teams to produce a collective 96-page pocket-sized publication. Each pair created an 8-page photographic visual essay focusing on a specific aspect of labor at ECAL. Rather than relying on traditional portraits, the projects explored more poetic and indirect ways of documenting traces of work through spaces, gestures, materials, and infrastructures. The entire publication was manually printed on an offset press by the students themselves, in either black or red and black. The printing process was a central part of the workshop: participants prepared the plates, set up the press, and ran the prints. This hands-on production process echoed the theme of labor explored throughout the publication.
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
with Mario Von Rickenbach
This project brings together a series of experiments created by students exploring the intersection between physical reality and immaterial imaginary worlds. Using a mixed reality headset, they transform their environment into experimental spaces where real elements become supports for digital creations.
EXHIBITIONS
ECAL welcomes the 8th edition of the Dior Photography and Visual Arts Award for Young Talents exhibition.
LECTURES
Public meetings with Wes Anderson & Richard Ayoade, Joe Dante, Verena Paravel, Kelly Reichardt, Marie-Elsa Sgualdo and Fabrice Aragno.
ONLINE
Event on registration intended for prospective Master’s candidates who wish to receive feedback on their portfolio by a faculty member or an assistant from their chosen program.
with Stéphane Halmaï-Voisard, Younès Klouche, Frederik Mahler-Andersen Pietro Alberti, Maxwell Ashford, Alain Bellet, Laurent Soldini
Arboricrop is a research project conducted by a multidisciplinary consortium bringing together Vivent Biosignals, Changins – University of Viticulture and Oenology, and ECAL/Ecole cantonale d’art de Lausanne (HES-SO), with the support of Innosuisse. Its objective is to develop a miniaturized plant electrophysiology sensor designed for use in real agricultural conditions: the VITA Mini Sensor.
LECTURES
A three-day symposium to examine the repercussions and resistance to New Typography in the French-speaking world.
EXHIBITIONS
Curated by Master Type Design and Bachelor Graphic Design programmes, this project presents a wide selection of 300 typefaces created by ECAL students from around the world.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Guy Meldem
First-year students were invited to design a 16-page publication. By experimenting with duotone through various printing techniques, they structured a dual reading experience dependent on the printed colors.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Harry Bloch
During the editorial design course with Harry Bloch, the first-year students each laid out a chapter of Charles Dickens' Great Expectations. A final edition compiling all the chapters was produced for the occasion.
GRAPHIC DESIGN
with Adeline Mollard
During the visual identity course, the 1st year of the Graphic Design bachelor had to carry out a poster project from a random event. They had to define their own visual system and explored a search for hand-made typographic posters. The visual identity of the event was developed through a poster and a flyer, accompanied by a research notebook grouping their entire creative process.
EXHIBITIONS
On the occasion of Art Genève’s 2026 edition, 2016 takes the form of an installation conceived by students of the ECAL Master in Visual Arts during a workshop led by artist Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster.
ANNOUNCEMENT
Curated by ECAL, this project brings together over 300 typefaces created by ECAL students from around the world, developed within the Master Type Design and Bachelor Graphic Design programmes.
EXHIBITIONS
From January 23 to 25, four Bachelor Media & Interaction Design diploma projects will be featured in the immersive section of the 2026 Solothurn Film Festival.
ANNOUNCEMENT
Milo Keller, photographer, teacher and researcher, a leading figure in contemporary photography in Switzerland and a recognised player on the international art scene, has passed away. His death deeply affects ECAL, where he played an essential role for nearly two decades, as well as all those with whom he shared his vision, his thoughts and his commitment.
ANNOUNCEMENT
Artist Louisa Gagliardi presents the 2025 greetings for ECAL with Aphrodisiacs (for 2026), a work that blends digital imagery and tactile materials.
ELAC GALLERY
From December 17, 2025, to January 15, 2026, come and see the 100 most beautiful posters of 2024 from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland at ECAL. This exhibition, organized by 100 Beste Plakate, showcases the award-winning designs from the 2024 competition. Opening, Wednesday December 17 at 6 pm.
AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS
The Jan Michalski Foundation and ECAL highlight the most outstanding Bachelor final-year thesis projects.
ANNOUNCEMENT
Bringing together craft, experimentation, and contemporary design, ECAL designers and alumni contribute to NOUVEL’s Glass Reflections showcased at Design Miami 2025.
AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS
Congratulations to BIG-GAME – Augustin Scott de Martinville, Elric Petit and Grégoire Jeanmonod – who have been awarded the 2025 Grand Prix by the Fondation vaudoise pour la culture.
AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS
Congratulations to Nicolas Le Moigne, head of the MAS in Design for Luxury & Craftsmanship at ECAL, for winning the Design Preis Schweiz 2025 in the In Between category.
AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS
Congratulations to Marvin Merkel, graduate of ECAL's Bachelor Photography, and Noa Epars, winners of the 2025 Best Swiss Film Award presented by SUISSIMAGE and SSA (Société Suisse des Auteurs) at Internationale Kurzfilmtage Winterthur.
AWARDS & DISTINCTIONS
Congratulations to ECAL Bachelor Industrial Design graduates Lena Bernasconi, winner of the FIT Impact Grant 2025, which rewards innovative projects at the intersection of design, sustainability, and social relevance.
Learn more about projects and activities
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