“Austria West”, the successful traveling exhibition on the contemporary architecture of Vorarlberg and Tyrol, curated by architecture critic Liesbeth Wächter-Böhm, also made a stopover in New York in 2004. There, - most Americans live in single-family houses - an additional show was intended to introduce the numerous appealing single-family house designs of the participating architects to the interested laymen. Thus, the exhibition “New Alpine Residences” was shown for three months on the first floor of the Austrian Cultural Forum.

A box made of planed silver fir boards from Vorarlberg with a width of ten centimeters was set up as an original item of display and example of contemporary interiors from the region. The ceiling height of 2.05 meters corresponds to the height of the parlors in the Wälderhäuser (houses in the woods), but the minimalist bench in front of the slideshow is fixed to the floor and underneath the stairs was enough space for a supposed fireplace. The projection screen is located right in front of the covered window. Thus, the otherwise autonomous installation adapts to the architecture of the Austrian Cultural Forum by Raimund Abraham.

Placed at eye-level were approx. three-dozen wooden models of single-family houses at a scale of 1:333. Informative maps including photographs, plans and brief descriptions could be taken from the boxes just below the models. The photographs were then shown as large projections one after another. The temporary installation was set up in New York by two carpenters from Bregenzerwald, namely Wolfgang Schmidinger and Wolfgang Meusburger. They are members of the craftsmen association “Werkraum Bregenzerwald” (work room Bregenzerwald) that develops, manufactures and distributes modern furniture designs ready for production. This example illustrates the close collaboration between architects and craftsmen in the region of Bregenzerwald. The delicate odor of freshly cut silver fir wood, which notably differs from the resin smell of spruce trees, gave the visitors a sense of what it means to live in wooden houses.