Kyrgyzstan: Saikal Zhunush
Born in 1982 in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Saikal Zhunush is founder and principal architect of Oekofacta GmbH, an architectural bureau in Lausanne, Switzerland. She studied architecture and interior design at the Kyrgyz State University of Construction, Transportation, and Architecture in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, and holds a master’s of architecture from Zürich University of Applied Sciences in Winterthur, Switzerland.
Zhunush was a guest lecturer at the University of Liechtenstein in Vaduz (2023), and contributed to teaching and design support at ETH Zurich (2023). The following year she received the Berlin Junge Akademie Fellowship in Architecture from the Akademie der Künste, where she researched the artistic and ecological dimensions of traditional Kyrgyz yurts (2024). As part of this fellowship, she took part in the ProtoResidency at ProtoPotsdam project by Bauhaus Earth research institution, where she and her team transported Kyrgyz yurt and curated a pop-up exhibition exploring nomadic architecture (2025). She was also selected to participate in WIA 2025 Berlin Women in Architecture.
Zhunush serves as deputy project lead of Yurt 2.0 research: New Cycles for Sheep’s Wool as Insulation Material and Felt Facade in Kyrgyzstan. She has also led workshops on ecological construction and sustainable uses of wool with a focus on felting techniques. She has managed Baubüro InSitu in Switzerland since May 2025. Saikal Zhunush earned third place at the Foundation Award for Young Swiss Architects competition (2021), and her restoration work on a historic property located in Zürich was named “Building of the Year” by readers of Swiss Architects (2021).
References
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