Since starting out with a humanistic, theosophical and sensualist vision, architect Laura P. Spinadel has moved towards a holistic and ecological position, that seeks to put maximum emphasis on the health of open and closed spaces, as well as on the requirements and principles of bio-construction. Holistic thinking implies profoundly replacing rational and analytical thought with a more inclusive thinking, in which all factors are taken into account, even those that seem trivial or invisible, such as perception, health or freedom.
Laura P. Spinadel and her team from BUSarchitektur set one of the most important examples for urban planning in Vienna during the past decades. Based on the master plan from Laura P. Spinadel the campus of the Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU) stands out due to its extraordinary urban and architectural quality. It can be seen as a new landmark, a lighthouse-project for Vienna. Reacting to such highly diverse demands of users in a holistic way by using creativity as well as highly analytic conceptual thinking has seldom been succeeded in such an outstanding way. Laura P. Spinadel managed to develop a new district within one of the most heterogeneous urban areas of Vienna – located at the transition between the densely populated Gründerzeit buildings, the Vienna Fair Area and the green space of the Vienna Prater – that has been accepted by the students and teachers as well as by the Viennese population with great pleasure. The Campus WU radiates far into the adjacent districts with its vitality. The new University of Economics and Business based on Laura P. Spinadel’s master plan must be seen as THE essential impulse to upgrade an urban area close to the Danube river that laid in a deep sleep until then. With the Campus WU, new scales in architectural and urban planning have undoubtedly been set in Vienna but also internationally.