Over the past few months you’ve perhaps read the odd mention of my new side project along the lake from Zürich, a classic Swiss Gasthof in the heart of the neat, well-mannered village of Küsnacht. Given that this is indeed a project, there has been a considerable amount of thinking about how you revive a building that has been around for five centuries and how you make it function for a community that’s both established and one of the most international in Switzerland, if not Europe.

The good news is that when the Gemeinde (the community) is your landlord, you inherit a building in excellent shape; everything is fully functioning – almost immaculate in some cases – and all aspects are ready to roll. This being Switzerland, however, function often trumps warmth and intimacy, so the past few months have been devoted to softening the edges, dimming the lights (indeed installing dimmers), adding metres of felt and putting up artwork. What started as a fondue pop-up back in November is now nearing the point of becoming a fully functioning restaurant, bar, garden and low-scale hotel operation.

We officially threw open the doors to the Oxen (formerly Ochsen) on Friday and it has been full tilt for the kitchen from the get-go. With about 50 seats indoors and more than 60 in the garden, as well as room for another 50 in the Oxensaal, (birthdays, wedding, local choir crazy nights), we’re building slowly. The “we” in all of this is me, along with my business partners Marc, Markus and Thomas. While it’s a distinct operation from Monocle, there are some Monocle components in the mix. More on this in a moment. In the tradition of a hearty Gasthof, the Oxen also features seven rooms on the top floor and an apartment suite on the second floor. As we’re a bit more than a B&B but not quite a full hotel, we’re dubbing our overnight offer the “Oxen Sleeper” as every room features a comfy bed and washbasin, with two full bathrooms along the corridor. Think more mid-century Swiss train than five-star lakeside hotel. One floor down, we’re almost finished with the two bedroom Monocle Suite. It’s available to all but there are preferential perks for Monocle subscribers. Indeed, Monocle Patrons will get their first glimpse on Monday evening, when a group of 30 will join us from far and wide.

As we thought about how to offer more for the community and add to village life, the laundry facility out the back caught my eye. Could it be an extra conference room? A wine-tasting venue? A newsstand and coffee shop? No surprise that we went for the latter. We’ve dubbed it the “Oxbox”. At the time of writing this column, it has been open for exactly five hours and we’ve already welcomed neighbours from across the courtyard and down the lake. For anyone familiar with our operations in Merano or on Dufourstrasse in Zürich, the Oxbox is currently sailing under the Monocle flag. We’ll see how it goes over the coming months. It’s a seasonal spring offer for now but, like many such ventures, it just might turn out to be permanent. As you plot out summer and where you might fly in and out of, we look forward to helping you. There’ll be more on monocle.com over the coming weeks and a dedicated send-out as soon as we hang the final pictures in the apartment. The temperature is due to hit 27C today, so the lake is, of course, calling. If you have any questions, please send them to Izumi in my office at id@monocle.com. You can also find more at oxen.ch.