Designer botte-culs at the House of Switzerland

At the Wanderlust, fans are having fun with mini two-legged Swiss milking stools. Dotted about the terrace are about twenty of these stools, from which hang a cast iron bell that makes a sound that you would normally only hear in the mountains. The stools known in French as botte-culs – which translates literally as a 'kick in the backside' – are a type of one-legged milking stool that Swiss farmers traditionally strapped to their backside to be able to sit down while keeping their hands free as they went about their work. With increased automation, the botte-culs is no longer such a must-have in the milk shed, although it is still used by many farmers.

The stools are emblematic of our roots and combine our country's traditions with humour and good design. Devised and created by Gregory Oswald, a former student of Lausanne's renowned school of art and design, ECAL, the Swiss botte-culs make reference both to tradition and to the know-how of a contemporary Switzerland with its eye on the future.