Institut Le Rosey - Plans To Leave Gstaad

Plans To Leave Gstaad

In January 2008, Swiss economics magazine Bilanz, a subsidiary of Groupe Edipresse, published an interview with Le Rosey Director-General Philippe Gudin that revealed the school is currently seeking the sale of its Gstaad winter campus and the construction of a new campus in another location. Gudin is currently in negotiations with the local authorities in Schönried, a ski resort village adjacent to Gstaad, to construct a new main campus on an undeveloped piece of land, but has run into difficulties due to zoning restrictions. Reasons for moving to a new campus, according to the Director-General, include the fact that the school's personnel, who typically live on campus, are at maximum capacity, and that the student body can no longer increase in size due to the lack of space. Gudin stated that for the moment the new winter campus location will be in Switzerland, but he has not ruled out the French Alps. The 100,000m² (approximately 25 acres) of prime real estate that the school occupies on Ried Hill in the centre of Gstaad is estimated to be worth several hundreds of millions of USD, considering the International Herald Tribune reports that the price per square meter in Gstaad starts at 20,000 CHF (19,000 US$) and can rise to 45,000 CHF (43,000 US$). Gudin asserts that the high value of the Gstaad winter campus has nothing to do with its planned sale.