Palais de Beaulieu is the historical and emblematic building of the Lausanne convention and exhibition center, located in Lausanne, in the Vaud Canton, Switzerland. The Palais is a convention centre that welcomes mainly conventions and events.
The center includes the Théâtre de Beaulieu concert, dance and theatre hall. With 1,844 seats, the Théâtre de Beaulieu is the biggest theatre in Switzerland. The Prix de Lausanne, an international ballet competition, is also hosted at the Palais de Beaulieu. La Télé, a regional TV-channel, has its studio and its offices at Beaulieu, as well as the Béjart Ballet Lausanne company. Conference Halls 6 + 7 of the Palais hosted the 1989 Eurovision Song Contest
Located in the Beaulieu area in Lausanne, the Convention and Exhibition Center lies in more than 6 hectares of ground. It boasts of 11,000 sq.m. of floor and 12,000 sq.m. of public gardens.[1] The Convention Center uses around 20 modular rooms and halls. Beaulieu Lausanne, part of the MCH Group, also hosts some of Switzerland's major fairs and exhibitions. It is, with Lausanne railway station, one of the two buildings displaying the sign "Lausanne capitale olympique" ("Lausanne Olympic Capital"). The two statues of Casimir Raymond installed in 1954 represent crafts and agriculture.
History
Palais de Beaulieu (top left) in 1951
The first "Comptoir Vaudois d'échantillons"[2] was inaugurated in Lausanne in 1916, thanks to the Société industrielle et commerciale de Lausanne, the Chambre vaudoise du commerce et de l'industrie, with support from the Lausanne Municipality. This kind of event was a novelty in Switzerland but was to be generalized afterwards. The first Comptoir suisse took place in September, 1920. Since then, only one edition never happened: the one of 1939, because of the war.[3] Note that the first official event of the NASA in Europe took place during the 1962 Comptoir suisse.[4]
The great hall – later to be known as Beaulieu's main building – was built in 1921. It is called the Palais de Beaulieu since 1957. During the Second World War, it hosted prisoners of war.[5] Talks about creating a new theater began in 1949, and involved the Lausanne Municipality and the Société Coopérative du Comptoir Suisse.[2] In 1954, the Théâtre de Beaulieu was inaugurated.[6] Nowadays, the Theater is used, among others, by well-known local institutions such as the Béjart Ballet Lausanne, the Orchestre de la Suisse romande and the Paternelle.
On the western side of Beaulieu, buildings were added between 1920 and 1940. Then, between 1950 and 1954, development moved to the South and East of the site. The North Halls were built in 1960 and many renovations followed.[7] Thus, as well as the Comptoir suisse, Beaulieu gradually hosted conventions, artistic activities and economic events.
Since 2000, the buildings belong to a public law foundation named the Beaulieu Foundation, created by the Vaud Canton, the City of Lausanne and Vaud district councils (Lausanne Region and Association of Vaud municipalities). The Foundation is in charge of maintenance, renovations and logistics, as well as the strategic and economic development of the site. It manages the Convention Center and, along with Opus One SA, the Beaulieu Theater. As a tenant, MCH Beaulieu Lausanne SA, that took over from the Société Coopérative du Comptoir Suisse,[8] organizes fairs and exhibitions, mostly in the South Halls. Since 2006, Eldora Traiteur SA, a branch of the Eldora SA Group (previously DSR), is in charge of the catering.
The Beaulieu Foundation launched a renovation program named Beaulieu 2020, that encompasses years 2000 to 2020. Under the Beaulieu 2020 flag, the Palais de Beaulieu has undergone various renovations since 2001, and work is still going on. The old South Halls were destroyed and new South Halls were built in 2011.[9][10] In 2014, a vote of the population of Lausanne rejected by 52% the project of building a tower of 90 meters next to the Palais de Beaulieu.[11] As a result, MCH Beaulieu Lausanne decided to reduce the conference activities (except general assemblies) and to concentrate on trade fairs (such as the Comptoir suisse). This triggered a reorganization of the Beaulieu 2020 project and of its partners.[12] As from 2014, spaces in the Palais de Beaulieu are being reallocated.[13] The Haute Ecole de la Santé La Source (La Source Healthcare High School) has decided to take premises at Beaulieu. The Court of Arbitration for Sport is planning to move from the Château de Béthusy (already in Lausanne) to the south part of the Palais de Beaulieu.[14]
Lausanne is the capital and largest city of the Swiss French-speaking canton of Vaud. It is a hilly city situated on the shores of Lake Geneva, about halfway between the Jura Mountains and the Alps, and facing the French town of Évian-les-Bains across the lake. Lausanne is located 62 kilometres northeast of Geneva, the nearest major city.
The University of Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland was founded in 1537 as a school of Protestant theology, before being made a university in 1890. The university is the second oldest in Switzerland, and one of the oldest universities in the world to be in continuous operation. As of fall 2017, about 15,000 students and 3,300 employees studied and worked at the university. Approximately 1,500 international students attend the university, which has a wide curriculum including exchange programs with other universities.
The Eurovision Young Dancers 1995 was the sixth edition of the Eurovision Young Dancers, held at the Palais de Beaulieu in Lausanne, Switzerland on 6 June 1995. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster Swiss Broadcasting Corporation, dancers from nine countries participated in the televised final. A total of fifteen countries took part in the competition. Hungary and Russia made their début while Denmark and Estonia decided not to participate. However, the Danish broadcaster DR broadcast the event as did Bulgaria and Romania.
Vaud more formally the canton of Vaud, is one of the 26 cantons forming the Swiss Confederation. It is composed of ten districts, and its capital city is Lausanne. Its coat of arms bears the motto "Liberté et patrie" on a white-green bicolour.
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Solange Ghernaouti is a professor at the University of Lausanne (UNIL) and an international expert on cybersecurity and cyberdefence. She regularly collaborates with various United Nations, European and government institutions as well as with private corporations.
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Scriptorium is the digital library of the Bibliothèque cantonale et universitaire (BCU), part of the University of Lausanne in the Swiss canton of Vaud. It was launched on 7 December 2012 and initially included more than a million pages of digitized newspapers published in Vaud canton. All of the content is freely available to the public on the Scriptorium website. In their annual report, BCU reported 2,973,638 visits to Scriptorium Digital Library for its first full year of availability (2013). By the end of 2013, the collection had grown to 2,153,176 pages.
René Morax was a Swiss writer, playwright, stage director and theatre manager. He founded the Théâtre du Jorat in Morges in 1908, and promoted historical and rural theatre in French in Switzerland. He is known for the play Le Roi David, with music by Arthur Honegger.
Lucienne Peiry, born in Lausanne on 4 September 1961, holds a doctorate (PhD) in the history of art; she is a specialist in Outsider Art, an exhibition curator, a lecturer and the author of several publications. She gives lectures in both Switzerland and elsewhere in Europe, and has been teaching Outsider Art at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne since 2010. Since 2016, she has also been teaching at the University of Lausanne
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Jacqueline Denise de Quattro is a Swiss-Italian politician, lawyer, and former judoka. As a member of the FDP.The Liberals, she was elected to the Council of State of Vaud in 2007. In 2019, she was elected to a seat in the National Council of Switzerland.
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