Alfred Senn (1930–2022) owes his career as an interior designer to the interior architect and VSI member Oskar Kunz in Lenzburg. His professional life, however, begins with an apprenticeship as a cabinetmaker at Thut AG in Möriken, which would later become a renowned furniture manufacturer.

Through the intervention of his former primary school teacher – Oskar Kunz’s wife – Alfred Senn subsequently completes a three-year internship with Kunz. He gains further professional experience at the Zurich office of architect and VSI member Otto Glaus.

Fascinated by the metropolis of Milan, Senn then applies to work with architect and designer Cesare Pea, who at the time is particularly known for his exhibition and trade fair pavilions. Back in Switzerland, Alfred Senn finds a position with the Basel architect Otto Senn. He then begins taking on independent projects in collaboration with his wife Ines Senn, a master textile designer. During the 1970s, he also collaborates with Doris Dietschy (1973–1978).

Thanks to the extensive network Alfred Senn builds during these various positions, the design themes he works with are largely shaped by the architects with whom he collaborates. His main interest lies in designing spaces that are not intended to last forever: numerous exhibitions form a defining part of his work. In his private life, he is an avid art collector. Personal relationships with artists remain important to him throughout his life and also shape his professional perspective.

Alfred and Ines Senn spend more than 26 years of their life together in their sensitively renovated home in La Chapelle-Thècle, a traditional farmhouse in the Bresse region of France.

One of Alfred Senn’s major works is the Schatulle shop in Basel, opened in 1968 by his sister-in-law Heidi Stoll after gaining experience as a sales assistant at Klingele and Wohnbedarf. The shop is distinguished by its unusual selection of textiles, including fabrics by Marimekko. Another particularly challenging project is his design of the open-plan offices for Ciba-Geigy in Basel’s Schoren district. Completed in 1971, it is one of the first open-plan offices in Switzerland.

For Alfred Senn, interior design is justified as a profession in its own right by the scale at which it operates, demanding a far more subtle approach to design than architecture. “Architects often think on too large a scale and pay less attention to detail,” as Senn puts it.