Living in Gundeldingen — Basel neighbourhood

Officially, the "Gundeli" has been called "Cundoltingin" since 1194 and remained a sleepy farming village of barely 30 houses until 1870 — until a Mainz-based property company bought up 72 hectares of land in 1872 and had the quarter built out in an American grid pattern within just a few decades. Out of fear of "German encroachment", the planned street names were scrapped at the last minute: the main axis has been called Dornacherstrasse ever since, after the Battle of Dornach in 1499, and the squares Tellplatz and Winkelriedplatz after Swiss folk heroes. Today Gundeldingen is Basel's most densely populated quarter — a "city within the city", as the Tageswoche newspaper calls it: conservative at its core, dynamic at its edges. The area is defined by the Gundeldinger Feld, the former Burckhardt/Sulzer machine factory, converted since 2000 into a cultural site with a climbing hall, Theater Süd, its own brewery and the pitch-dark restaurant blindekuh, staffed by blind and visually impaired people. Margarethenpark is within walking distance, as are numerous restaurants, cafés and an organic market along Güterstrasse. Roche is a 15-minute walk away, and the SBB railway station is 5 minutes by tram.