Vinzel Tile Factory With Hoffmann Kiln

BursinsSwitzerland 46° N · 6° E Verified Aug 2026

One of only two Swiss tile works with a Hoffmann kiln hides as a vine-choked, barely visible ruin near Bursins—abandoned since 1956 and still privately owned.

View map
Time needed
15–30 minutes (exterior view)
Entry
Free (exterior view only)
Access
Not wheelchair accessible

Exactly two Hoffmann ring kilns survive in Switzerland. One of them is the Vinzel tile factory in Bursins, Switzerland—a nationally listed industrial monument so overgrown you can walk past without noticing it. Visit not for a polished attraction, but for the uneasy truth of Swiss heritage: the highest protection rating can coexist with near-total collapse.

The factory sits on Chemin de la Tuilière, a road whose name still means "Tile-maker's Path". Built in 1816 or 1817—sources split on the year—it fired clay roof tiles for the villages and wine cellars between Lausanne and Geneva for roughly 140 years.

Around 1903 the factory was modified to house a Hoffmann ring kiln, the continuous-fire invention that changed European brickmaking. That detail moves the ruin from forgotten outbuilding to one of only two surviving Hoffmann kilns in the country. The other stands in Cossonay, also in the canton of Vaud.

Today the site carries Class A status as a Swiss cultural property of national significance. Yet the owner lives in New Zealand, invasive vegetation covers the walls, and the entire visual record on Wikimedia Commons amounts to two photographs. It is less a monument than a question mark.

Researched by the Audiala editorial team from historical records, architectural archives, and local expertise.

What to see

  1. The Hoffmann Kiln

    Friedrich Hoffmann patented a kiln in 1858 that never stops burning. The fire travels — around a ring, through a dozen chambers, chasing the fuel that workers feed it. Vinzel's kiln, installed around 1903, may have been the first Hoffmann model with absolutely continuous operation; only one other Swiss factory, at Cossonay, ever ran the same design.

    The tile factory itself dates to around 1816, and it's been dissolving back into the vineyard soil ever since the fires went out in 1956. You won't find a ticket office — the kiln sits on private land off Chemin de la Tuilière, half-swallowed by brambles, and the owner lives in New Zealand. Bring a torch, watch your footing, and treat the site with the respect a ruin deserves.

    What you'll find instead is a long brick tunnel curving around a central chimney — darker than you expect, with water dripping somewhere in the dark. The brickwork wears mineral streaks: white lime, green copper, red iron. The Swiss federal inventory lists this ruin as an A-object of national significance, the same category as cathedrals.

  2. The Furnace Mouths

    Step into one of the arched openings along the corridor and you're inside a firing chamber. The walls are glazed — vitrified by heat until the brick turned glassy, black and slick. Fifty years of fire does that to clay. The kiln ran from around 1903 to 1956, and every tile that roofed a farmhouse in La Côte probably passed through one of these chambers.

    But look down before you look up. The thresholds at the base of each furnace mouth are worn smooth — rounded, polished by decades of boots and barrow wheels. Workers carried tiles and fuel through these openings thousands of times. The groove in the brick is their signature. No plaque commemorates them. The floor does.

  3. The Vineyard Walk: Luins to Bursins

    The kiln is a ruin you visit on your own terms, but the vineyards around it offer a gentler way in. The Balade Oenotouristique runs 5.5 km through Luins, Vinzel, and Bursins — the largest vineyard in the canton of Vaud. Download the free Vaud: Guide app and the trail turns into a game: GPS-triggered quizzes, wine trivia, and a route that winds between vines heavy with Chasselas.

    Pair it with the kiln. The contrast is the point — one structure devoted to fire and clay, the other to sun and soil. And if you want something more polished afterward, the Château du Rosay, Bursins sits nearby, proof that Bursins has always known how to build things that last.

Plan your visit

Getting There
From Gland or Rolle station, take CarPostal line 835 or Greenbus line 841; buses run about every 30 minutes between the two towns and stop in Bursins or Vinzel village. Walk the last stretch to Chemin de la Tuilière using a map app—the site is unsigned. By car, there is no dedicated parking, so use village streets.
Opening Hours
As of 2026, there are no opening hours: the Tuilerie de Vinzel is an abandoned, privately owned ruin, not an operated monument or museum. Exterior viewing from the public road is possible at any time, but there is no official access, signage, or visitor facilities. Do not enter the grounds.
Time Needed
An exterior photo stop takes 10–15 minutes. A walk from Bursins or Vinzel village and back runs 30–45 minutes; combining it with the Caveau des Vignerons or a village stroll makes 1–2 hours. During Le Bourru (7–8 November 2026), allow a half to full day for the wine route and shuttles.
Accessibility
Not wheelchair accessible. There are no maintained paths, lifts, or level visitor routes; the site is a ruin surrounded by invasive vegetation on uneven ground. Visitors with limited mobility can view it only from the road, and even that vantage may be blocked by greenery.
Cost & Tickets
There is no ticket, no booking, and no free-entry day because the factory has no official entry system. Exterior views from public space are free. If you visit during Le Bourru, a CHF 20 tasting glass gives access to roughly 20 wine cellars in Begnins, Luins, Vinzel, and Bursins, plus free shuttle buses from Gland.

History

The Kiln That Refused to Cool

From the early 1800s to 1956, this building supplied roof tiles to a wine-growing region that needed barns, cellars, and houses. The Hoffmann kiln arrived halfway through that lifespan and changed the pace of production from intermittent firings to a continuous ring of heat.

The timeline below runs on dates that sources still disagree about—1816 or 1817, 1903 or 1905. That uncertainty is part of the site's strangeness: a national monument with the thin paper trail of a minor roadside chapel.

The turning point

The Master Bricklayer Who Took the Fire Out of Waiting

Friedrich Hoffmann worked as a master bricklayer and engineer in Prussia, and by 1858 he held a patent for a radical idea: a ring-shaped kiln that burned continuously, with the fire zone moving around the ring instead of stopping for cooling. If it worked, bricks and tiles could be fired without losing heat between batches. If it failed, he was just another inventor with a circular oven.

Records show the first operational Hoffmann kiln went into service at Scholwin near Stettin—now Skolwin in Poland—in November 1859, though secondary sources split between November 3 and November 22. What mattered was that it held. The design spread fast across Europe, and half a century later, a Swiss tile factory near Bursins was modified to house one.

At Vinzel, that same continuous fire likely cut fuel costs and kept the kiln hot for days. According to current research, the installation is dated to 1903, though a 1905 date also circulates. Hoffmann never set foot in Bursins—his kiln did, and it still stands in skeletal form.

Artisan Beginnings (1816/1817–1903)

The factory opened in 1816 or 1817, thirteen years after Vaud became a sovereign canton. It used traditional intermittent kilns, each firing a batch of clay roof tiles before cooling and starting again. For nearly ninety years, that stop-start rhythm likely supplied the local construction trade around the La Côte wine villages.

Industrial Modernization (1903–1956)

A major modification in 1903 installed the Hoffmann ring kiln, bringing continuous-firing technology to the tile works. The upgrade put Bursins on the industrial map: only two examples of this kiln type survive in Switzerland, here and at Cossonay. The factory kept running until 1956, when activity ceased, according to a single source that still needs archival confirmation.

Ruin and Recognition (1956–Present)

Since closure, the building has sunk into overgrown ruin. Federal records list it as a Class A cultural property of national significance, and the village of Bursins itself earned national-interest recognition. But the owner lives in New Zealand, preservation efforts have stalled, and the place remains barely visible behind vegetation.

Tips for visitors

  • Don't enter the ruin

    The walls are unstable, and dense vegetation hides holes, broken glass, and rusty metal. Stay on the public road and treat it as private property—there's no legal interior access anyway.

  • Shoot from the road

    Photograph only from public paths or the road; crossing fences for a better angle means trespassing. Swiss drone rules still apply, and no interior photography is possible without permission.

  • Malakoffs at l'Union

    Hôtel/Restaurant de l'Union in Bursins is the mid-range local address for light malakoffs and fondue. For a more polished meal, Auberge du Soleil averages around CHF 35; both sit minutes from the ruin.

  • Drink at the Caveau

    Caveau des Vignerons de Luins-Vinzel is the budget-friendly stop, open Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from mid-February to mid-December. It pours local La Côte wines with small plates of lard, tomme, and saucisson, and is the nearest reliable spot after seeing the ruin.

  • Come for Le Bourru

    Plan around 7–8 November 2026, when Le Bourru opens about 20 wine caves across Begnins, Luins, Vinzel, and Bursins. The CHF 20 glass includes free shuttles from Gland; Sunday closing time is listed as 17:00 by Vaud tourism and 16:00 by the Caveau, so verify before you go.

  • It's really Bursins

    Despite the name, the factory sits on Bursins territory, not Vinzel. Pair the ruin with Bursins' Prieuré Saint-Martin and Château du Rosay for a fuller sense of the village.

  • Use the vineyard paths

    The local footpath Le Fosseau links Luins, Vinzel, and Bursins through the vines; use a map app because the factory is unsigned and often swallowed by vegetation. Sturdy shoes and long trousers help if you're poking along the edges.

Frequently asked

Is the Vinzel tile factory worth visiting?

Only if you're already in Bursins for the wine. The factory is a barely visible ruin behind invasive vegetation—not a maintained site, not a museum, nothing to walk through. But it's one of only two Hoffmann kilns in all of Switzerland. Standing on Chemin de la Tuilière looking at those crumbling brick walls, you're seeing 140 years of industrial history slowly disappearing. Industrial heritage enthusiasts will find that worth 15 minutes. Everyone else should head for the vineyards and Bursins village instead.

Can you visit the Vinzel tile factory?

No, not really. The site is private property, abandoned since 1956, and structurally unstable. You can view the ruin from Chemin de la Tuilière—the street name literally means 'Tile-maker's Path'—but there's no public access, no signage, and no visitor facilities. The owner reportedly lives in New Zealand, which has left the site in a legal deadlock that 24 heures newspaper described as an impasse.

What is a Hoffmann kiln?

A ring-shaped continuous-firing kiln patented by German master bricklayer and engineer Friedrich Hoffmann in 1858. Traditional kilns fired one batch at a time—load, fire, cool, unload. Hoffmann's design arranged chambers in a ring so the fire could travel continuously: while one chamber fired, workers loaded another, cooled another, and unloaded another. The Vinzel kiln was installed around 1903, and it's one of only two surviving examples in Switzerland.

Why is the Vinzel tile factory abandoned?

Production stopped in 1956, and the building has decayed ever since. The current owner lives in New Zealand, which makes any preservation effort legally paralyzed—a nationally listed heritage site effectively held hostage by geographic distance. Despite being classified as a Swiss cultural property of national importance, no restoration plan exists. 24 heures reported the situation as a deadlock with no easy solution.

Where is the Vinzel tile factory located?

In Bursins, not Vinzel—the name is misleading. The address is Chemin de la Tuilière, Bursins, in the Canton of Vaud, about halfway between Lausanne and Geneva. The street name itself preserves the factory's memory: 'tuilière' means 'tile-maker.' The site sits at 443 meters above sea level, on the slopes above Lake Geneva in the heart of the La Côte wine region.

When was the Vinzel tile factory built?

Sources conflict between 1816 and 1817—the archives haven't settled it. The Hoffmann kiln was added around 1903, and production ceased in 1956. That's roughly 140 years of making roof tiles for the villages, farmhouses, and wine cellars of the La Côte region, from the post-Napoleonic period through Switzerland's industrial modernization.

How do I get to the Vinzel tile factory?

Take bus 835 or 841 from Gland or Rolle railway station—both run roughly every 30 minutes through the area. Get off in Bursins or Vinzel village and walk to Chemin de la Tuilière. No dedicated parking exists at the site, and no official walking route is signposted. If you visit during the Le Bourru wine weekend in November, free shuttle buses run from Gland station.

Sources & attribution 9

Researched and written by the Audiala editorial team from historical records, architectural archives, and local expertise. Last reviewed August 2026.

Built from cited sources · see the method · How we make our guides →

Photo credits (2)
  1. Bursins - Tuilerie 01 — Pymouss — CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) — Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bursins_-_Tuilerie_01.jpg
  2. Bursins - Tuilerie 02 — Pymouss — CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) — Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bursins_-_Tuilerie_02.jpg

Photos may have been resized or cropped.