Ursula Hiestand
Designing life
Ursula Hiestand (b. 1936 in Zurich, lives in Zollikon ZH) has, throughout her career, coupled design with social responsibility and practical living. From 1960 onwards, she and her husband Ernst Hiestand ran the E+U Hiestand studio in Zurich, which was renowned for its clarity, objectivity and systematic economy of means.
Their best-known projects include the corporate design for the department store chain ABM, the information systems for Zurich’s public transport company and the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, and the design of Swiss banknote series from 1976 to 2000. All of these have made a lasting impact on Switzerland’s collective visual memory.
Ursula Hiestand was a pioneer, becoming one of the first women to join the Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI) in Switzerland. The Federal Design Commission commends her trailblazing contribution to modern Swiss graphic design: her creations are enduring features of the public space to this day, and have encouraged the international dissemination of central principles of “Swiss style”. As president of the school board at Zurich’s design school from 2002 to 2009, Ursula Hiestand was instrumental in ensuring the quality of training and maintaining the foundation course in design.
The studio, which she ran by herself from 1980 onwards, has been involved in many other projects, notably the complete range of advertising for ABM until 1994. Her life’s work blends design quality with social awareness, and remains to this day a guiding light for up-and-coming generations.