Industriequartier

This guide to Zurich's Industriequartier follows the invisible machine that powered the neighborhood before electricity ever arrived: a waterworks built near the Letten weir in the 1870s that spun a steel wire rope across the Limmat to run mills on the far bank. You'll hear about city engineer Bürkli and the firm Escher, Wyss and Company, the six towers that carried the cable over a kilometer, and the silk, dye and cotton factories it once fed. Stand at the riverbank and try to picture the rattle of chains and belts where glass and steel buildings now stand.