The opening of the exhibition on the history and renovation of Dizengoff Square welcomes around 50 guests: architecture  freaks  and  students,  holidaymakers, and locals who had spent their lives with and in the Bauhaus. There are a few speeches, salted almonds and local Chardonnay are served. In the middle of it all is Micha Gross, the founder and director of the Bauhaus Center Tel Aviv. He seems to know every second visitor, greets people sometimes in Heb­rew, sometimes in English or in Swiss German.“
After  a  long  struggle,  Dizengoff  Circle  was  freed from later architectural sins and restored to its original form,” he explains. “This was import­ant because the square is the centre of the White City and an icon of Bauhaus architecture.” He should know – after all, Micha is regarded world­wide as an expert on this style of architecture.

Between Zurich and Israel
The 60­-year­-old Swiss initially started out in a completely different direction. Gross studied psychology in Zurich and graduated with a doctorate in his speciality, sleep and dream research, at the Technion in Haifa. “At the time, this discipline was only taught in a few places. Haifa was one of them,” he explains. There he meets his future wife Shlomit. The couple marries and moves to Zurich. Micha becomes a research assistant at the university and opens a private sleep laboratory. But Shlomit is unable to settle into the new city, finding it too cold, too orderly, too lacking in spontaneity. “I always wanted to go back to Israel,” she says. Thanks to his contacts from his days at the university, Micha finds an opportunity to work in his field in Tel Aviv. Though 25 years ago, the city was not what it is today, namely attractive, up­-and­-com­ing, sophisticated, and expensive. “There was hardly any coffee, private bakeries were unknown, people ate the so-­called standard bread throughout the country. There were two yoghurts and three cheeses to choose from. I always came back from Switzerland with suitcases full of food.”

Passion becomes profession
However, even back then Tel Aviv was architecturally interesting: “There are still around 4,000 Bauhaus houses here,” says Gross. “It is the world’s largest collection of buildings in this style. I have always been interested in ar­chitecture and found this fascinating.” When his daughter was born in 1998 and his wife, who was working as a tour guide, wanted to stay close to the baby, he invented the Bauhaus walks. “We started out very small and gradually expanded our offering.” In Israel at the time, no one cared about architecture; people knew little about it. “When we founded the Bauhaus Center Tel Aviv in the year 2000, everyone thought we were crazy,” Gross remembers. Nevertheless, his tours were a success – for a full three months, then came the Intifada and the tourists stayed away. The first major crisis lasted nearly three years and was followed by others: “There were wars again and again, the last one four years ago – that was another significant setback.” 

The Bauhaus is alive
Today, the company is doing well, the Bauhaus Center employs seven people,  and Micha Gross is a sought­after speaker worldwide. He regularly travels to Zurich, but enjoys living in Israel. “I feel more free here than in Switzerland,” he says. “In this very young country, you have more oppor­tunities, life is more open – I like that.” Although he sometimes misses the reliability and consistency of the Swiss, all things considered, the balance is positive overall – Micha has arrived in Israel. “His Hebrew is  perfect,”  confirms  Shlomit.  “Nowadays my husband only speaks Swiss German with the children.”