EPFL Archives Document Management and Archiving (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

History and Founding

The EPFL Archives were formally established by decision of the EPFL Presidency in February 2024, tasked with preserving and promoting all documents of archival value from the university's contributing units. EPFL (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) itself traces its origins to 1853 as the École Spéciale de Lausanne and became a federal Swiss institute of technology in 1969. The university is based on a campus at Écublens, near Lausanne, which was developed from 1978 onward. EPFL is required by Swiss law (the Archiving Ordinance, OLAr) to archive documents of legal, political, economic, historical, social, and cultural value. Before the creation of the dedicated Archives in 2024, archiving functions were distributed across the EPFL Library and various units; the Library has archived EPFL doctoral theses dating from the first one in 1920. EPFL also hosts the Archives de la Construction Moderne (ACM), a specialist architecture archive under the ENAC school, which holds significant collections including the Alberto Sartoris fonds.

Collections and Holdings

The EPFL Archives collect, organise, and make accessible documents transferred from all contributing units across the university, supporting operational continuity, oversight, and historical research. Holdings document the management and activities of EPFL across its missions of teaching, research, and innovation. The EPFL Library at the Rolex Learning Centre maintains 500,000 printed works and gives access to 10,000 online journals and 17,000 e-books. The complete series of EPFL doctoral theses since 1920 is archived and accessible through the Infoscience institutional repository. EPFL also hosts archives from the Montreux Jazz Festival, a significant cultural collection at the EPFL campus. The Archives de la Construction Moderne holds architectural archives from across the twentieth century.

Notable Materials Related to Journalism and Media

EPFL research archives and the Library's collections document major scientific and technological developments including projects such as Solar Impulse (the first solar-powered circumnavigation), SwissCube-1, and the Human Brain Project, all of which generated substantial media coverage. The Infoscience repository provides open access to EPFL's research output including publications in applied sciences, life sciences, engineering, and humanities.

Access and Usage

The EPFL Library at the Rolex Learning Centre is open seven days a week, from 7 am to midnight, and is freely accessible to the public. EPFL theses and much of the research output are available through the Infoscience platform. The EPFL Archives support university units with pre-archiving assistance, processing, and transfer of records. Access to archived documents is governed by legal provisions under the Archiving Ordinance.