"After being cancelled last year, Art Basel is back in a new hybrid form, with digital and IRL editions welcoming 272 galleries from around the world. The Messeplatz will have site-specific interventions by Argentina-born Cecilia Bengolea, who is staging a video and performance work in its fountain, as well as Britain’s Monster Chetwynd, whose Salvador Dalí-inspired work involves dancers in giant balloons."

"The Renzo Piano-designed Fondation Beyeler—which will soon add an extension by starchitect Peter Zumthor—is now showing “Close-Up” (September 19, 2021–January 2, 2022), which includes portraits and self-portraits by nine renowned female Modernists, from Berthe Morisot to Frida Kahlo to Elizabeth Peyton."

"Don’t miss “Kara Walker: A Black Hole is Everything a Star Longs to Be” (until September 26) at the Kunstmuseum Basel. While Walker is known for her wall-sized silhouettes, drawing on paper is the foundation of her practice. This exhibition displays, for the first time in public, more than 600 sketches, collages, and large-format works from the artist’s personal archive, in which she explores her identity as a Black woman in America."

"It’s worth hopping over the border to the German town of Weil am Rhein, if only to visit the architecture and design Mecca that is the Vitra Campus, whose Frank Gehry–designed museum is showing “Here We Are! Women in Design 1900 to Today” (September 23, 2021–March 6, 2022). In addition to its flagship store (designed by Herzog & de Meuron), conference pavilion (Tadao Ando), fire station (Zaha Hadid), and viewing tower and slide (Carsten Höller), the Swiss furniture-maker just unveiled a 43,000-square-foot perennial garden from the Dutch landscape designer Piet Oudolf."

"At the Restaurant Kunsthalle, situated inside the eponymous institution for emerging artists, you can dine—say, on French duck liver with apple slices, blueberry juice, and Calvados—under an expansive ceiling lamp created by the late Danish designer and former Basel resident Verner Panton, who frequented the restaurant."

"Less formal, the Herzog & de Meuron–designed brasserie inside Volkshaus—Basel’s ca.-1925 concert hall—complements its menu of French and Swiss comfort foods with an impressive collection of contemporary art, including all of the original works from the book “Artists’ Recipes” (by Marina Abramović, Roger Ballen, and Anish Kapoor, to name a few)."

"Since 1681, when it was founded as an “inn for gentlemen,” the Grand Hotel Les Trois Rois has welcomed everyone from Napoléon Bonaparte to Ella Fitzgerald. With frescoed walls and views of the Rhine in many of its 101 suites—not to mention the three Michelin–starred Cheval Blanc, the cigar bar, or the new Pedrazzini boat (the only one on the Rhine, handcrafted in Switzerland)—it’s still the most luxurious address in the Old Town."

"In 2019, the Polish entrepreneur and art collector Grażyna Kulczyk unveiled her non-profit Muzeum Susch on the site of a medieval monastery and brewery in the Engadin valley. It is a space for experimental, site-specific works alongside temporary exhibits from conceptual and female artists."

"The Engadin is also where the multidisciplinary artist Not Vital has his foundation, including the 17th-century Planta house in Ardez, with its library of historic Rumantsch writings, as well as a painting studio and sculpture park in the mountain village of Sent, his birthplace. Meanwhile, he calls a ca.-1040 castle in Tarasp home (when he’s not in Beijing or Rio de Janeiro, that is); it also houses and sometimes exhibits his collection of antique, Modern, and contemporary art, along with works from artists near and far. They are all worth visiting (note: you’ll need to book tours of the castle and the Planta house)."

"There is a thriving gallery scene, too. Joining Vito Schnabel—which is displaying abstract, large-scale paintings on raw jute canvas by the Los Angeles–based artist Spencer Lewis through September 26, 2021—Hauser & Wirth returned to its Swiss roots a few years ago by opening a three-level, Luis Laplace–designed space in the center of St. Moritz."

"While the Grand Resort Bad Ragaz is widely known for its health spa, based around the healing waters of the town’s Tamina Gorge, it is also becoming increasingly renowned for its food. Even if you’re not staying at the property, we’d suggest booking a table at one of its Michelin-starred restaurants."

"Originally built ca. 1913 as an alpine sanatorium in Zuoz, the 68-room Hotel Castell offers a full-on immersion in art. Its owner—the Swiss artist and collector Ruedi Bechtler—has invited a number of big-name artists to develop projects on site, from Pipilotti Rist (who designed the Red Bar with Zurich architect Gabrielle Hächlero) to Tadashi Kawamata (see sun terrace and pool) to James Turrell (you’ll want to spend some time sky-gazing in his open-air installation, Skyspace Piz Utèr)."

"With its thermal baths crafted from 60,000 slabs of local quartzite by none other than Peter Zumthor, 7132 Hotel Vals—named after the area’s postcode—is a destination for both wellness and design. For its House of Architects sister hotel, 7132 tapped Tadao Ando, Kengo Kuma, Thom Mayne, and Zumthor to create a series of Zen-like suites overlooking the Grison mountains."