🇨🇭 Part of the Swiss Public Data MCP Portfolio

🏛️ swiss-culture-mcp

MCP server for Swiss cultural heritage data from the Federal Office of Culture (BAK) — ISOS townscapes, Living Traditions, cultural prizes, press releases. No API key required.

🌐 English | Deutsch

Demo: Claude queries ISOS townscapes via MCP tool call

Overview

swiss-culture-mcp makes Swiss cultural data accessible to AI assistants. The server connects LLMs like Claude with Switzerland's national cultural heritage: from protected townscapes (ISOS) to living traditions of intangible cultural heritage and current cultural awards.

Sources: geo.admin.ch REST API · news.admin.ch RSS · opendata.swiss CKAN · lebendige-traditionen.ch

No API key required. All data sources are publicly available (Open Government Data).

Anchor demo query: "Which protected townscapes are there in the school districts of the city of Zurich, and what living traditions are practised there?"

Features

🏘️ ISOS search – Federal Inventory of Swiss Townscapes Worth Protecting by name, canton or settlement type
📜 Living Traditions – 228 entries of Swiss intangible cultural heritage
🏆 Cultural prizes – Swiss Film Prize, Grand Prix Literature, Music Prize and more
📰 BAK press releases – current news from the Federal Office of Culture
📦 Open data catalogue – BAK datasets on opendata.swiss
☁️ Dual transport – stdio for Claude Desktop, Streamable HTTP for cloud deployment

#	Tool	Description
1	`bak_search_isos`	Search ISOS townscapes by place name
2	`bak_isos_by_kanton`	List all ISOS objects in a canton
3	`bak_get_isos_detail`	Get full details of an ISOS object
4	`bak_isos_by_kategorie`	Filter ISOS by settlement type (Stadt, Dorf, etc.)
5	`bak_isos_statistics`	ISOS inventory statistics (sampled by canton)
6	`bak_get_news`	Current BAK press releases
7	`bak_get_kulturpreise`	Swiss cultural prizes (Film Prize, Grand Prix Literature, etc.)
8	`bak_get_opendata`	BAK datasets on opendata.swiss
9	`bak_list_traditions`	List Switzerland's Living Traditions
10	`bak_get_tradition_detail`	Get detailed description of a tradition

3 Resources: bak://isos/kantone · bak://isos/kategorien · bak://kulturpreise/uebersicht

Data Sources

Source	API Type	Content
geo.admin.ch	REST MapServer	ISOS (Federal Inventory of Swiss Townscapes)
news.admin.ch	RSS Feed	BAK press releases, cultural prizes
opendata.swiss	CKAN REST API	BAK open data datasets
lebendige-traditionen.ch	HTML Fetch	228 entries of intangible cultural heritage

Prerequisites

Python 3.11+
uv or pip
No API keys required

Installation

# Recommended: uvx (no install step needed)
uvx swiss-culture-mcp

# Alternative: pip
pip install swiss-culture-mcp

Quickstart

# Start the server (stdio mode for Claude Desktop)
uvx swiss-culture-mcp

Try it immediately in Claude Desktop:

"Show me all protected townscapes in the canton of Graubünden" "Which living traditions are practised in canton Appenzell?" "Which Swiss cultural prizes were awarded in 2026?"

Configuration

Environment Variables

Variable	Default	Description
`MCP_TRANSPORT`	`stdio`	Transport: `stdio` or `streamable_http`
`MCP_HOST`	`127.0.0.1`	Bind host for HTTP transport (loopback by default)
`MCP_PORT`	`8000`	Port for HTTP transport
`MCP_ALLOW_PUBLIC_BIND`	`false`	If `true`, permits binding `0.0.0.0` without auth. Set this only behind an authenticating reverse proxy (e.g. Cloudflare Access, oauth2-proxy).
`LOG_LEVEL`	`INFO`	`DEBUG`, `INFO`, `WARNING`, `ERROR` — structured JSON logs to stderr

Claude Desktop Configuration

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "swiss-culture": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["swiss-culture-mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Config file locations:

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

After restarting Claude Desktop, all tools are available. Example queries:

"Show me all protected townscapes in the canton of Graubünden"
"What is the Alphorn and Büchelspiel tradition?"
"Which Swiss cultural prizes were awarded in 2026?"
"Is the old town of Stein am Rhein in the ISOS inventory?"
"Which living traditions are practised in canton Appenzell?"

Cloud Deployment (Streamable HTTP)

For use via claude.ai in the browser (e.g. on managed workstations without local software):

Render.com (recommended):

Push/fork the repository to GitHub
On render.com: New Web Service → connect GitHub repo
Set environment variables in the Render dashboard
In claude.ai under Settings → MCP Servers, add: https://your-app.onrender.com/mcp

# Docker / local HTTP mode (loopback only — safe default)
MCP_TRANSPORT=streamable_http MCP_PORT=8000 python -m swiss_culture_mcp.server

# Public bind (DANGEROUS — only behind an authenticating reverse proxy)
MCP_TRANSPORT=streamable_http MCP_HOST=0.0.0.0 MCP_ALLOW_PUBLIC_BIND=true \
    python -m swiss_culture_mcp.server

⚠️ Security: The server itself has no authentication. Binding to a public interface without an upstream auth layer turns it into an open proxy for the federal data sources. Always run an authenticating reverse proxy (Cloudflare Access, oauth2-proxy, nginx + auth_request) in front of 0.0.0.0 deployments.

Architecture

┌─────────────────┐     ┌──────────────────────────┐     ┌──────────────────────────┐
│   Claude / AI   │────▶│   Swiss Culture MCP      │────▶│  geo.admin.ch REST       │
│   (MCP Host)    │◀────│   (MCP Server)           │◀────│  news.admin.ch RSS       │
└─────────────────┘     │                          │     │  opendata.swiss CKAN     │
                        │  10 Tools · 3 Resources  │     │  lebendige-traditionen   │
                        │  Stdio | Streamable HTTP  │     └──────────────────────────┘
                        └──────────────────────────┘

Project Structure

swiss-culture-mcp/
├── src/
│   └── swiss_culture_mcp/
│       ├── __init__.py
│       └── server.py          # All 10 tools, 3 resources
├── tests/
│   ├── conftest.py            # pytest configuration
│   └── test_server.py         # 36 tests (unit + live)
├── pyproject.toml
├── CHANGELOG.md
├── CONTRIBUTING.md            # Contribution guide (English)
├── CONTRIBUTING.de.md         # Contribution guide (German)
├── SECURITY.md               # Security policy & posture (English)
├── SECURITY.de.md            # Security policy & posture (German)
├── LICENSE
├── README.md                  # This file (English)
└── README.de.md               # German version

Testing

# Unit tests (no API key required)
PYTHONPATH=src pytest tests/ -m "not live"

# Integration tests (live API calls)
PYTHONPATH=src pytest tests/ -m "live"

Example Use Cases

Schools / Education

"Which protected townscapes are there in the school districts of the city of Zurich?"
→ bak_isos_by_kanton(kanton="ZH") + bak_get_isos_detail(...)

"Find living traditions for a project week on the theme of cultural heritage"
→ bak_list_traditions() + bak_get_tradition_detail(slug="...")

"Which UNESCO World Heritage Sites are also in ISOS?"
→ bak_search_isos(query="...") + bak_get_opendata(query="UNESCO")

City Administration / Spatial Planning

"Is the building at address X within an ISOS perimeter?"
→ bak_search_isos(query="community/place name")

"Which BAK datasets are available for GIS integration?"
→ bak_get_opendata() → WMS/WFS URLs for GIS software

AI Working Group / Demos

"Show current cultural policy of the federal government"
→ bak_get_news() + bak_get_kulturpreise()
→ More use cases by audience →

Safety & Limits

Aspect	Details
Access	Read-only — the server cannot modify or delete any data
Personal data	No personal data — all sources are aggregated, public cultural heritage data
Rate limits	Built-in per-query caps (e.g. max 100 ISOS results, 50 news items, 200 category entries)
Timeout	20 seconds per API call
Authentication	No API keys required — all 4 data sources are publicly accessible
Licenses	All data under open licenses (Open Government Data): geo.admin.ch, opendata.swiss, news.admin.ch
Terms of Service	Subject to ToS of the respective data sources: geo.admin.ch, opendata.swiss, news.admin.ch, lebendige-traditionen.ch

Known Limitations

ISOS statistics: Sample-based per canton (not exhaustive for all cantons)
Living Traditions: HTML scraping – may break if lebendige-traditionen.ch changes its structure
BAK news/prizes: RSS feed limited to the most recent entries
opendata.swiss CKAN: Full-text search may return results from other publishers

Synergies with Other MCP Servers

swiss-culture-mcp can be combined with other servers in the portfolio:

Combination	Use Case
`+ swiss-transport-mcp`	Cultural tourism: day trips to traditions by public transport
`+ zurich-opendata-mcp`	Local cultural atlas: ISOS + Zurich city events
`+ global-education-mcp`	Cultural education in international comparison
`+ fedlex-mcp`	Cultural property transfer act + BAK enforcement practice
`+ swiss-statistics-mcp`	Cultural expenditure by canton (BFS data)

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md

Contributing

Contributions are welcome — see CONTRIBUTING.md.

Security

Security posture, hardening details and the responsible-disclosure process are documented in SECURITY.md.

License

MIT License — see LICENSE

Author

Hayal Oezkan · malkreide

Credits & Related Projects

Data: Bundesamt für Kultur (BAK) – Federal Office of Culture
ISOS: geo.admin.ch – Federal Office of Topography swisstopo
Traditions: lebendige-traditionen.ch – BAK living traditions registry
Protocol: Model Context Protocol – Anthropic / Linux Foundation
Related: zurich-opendata-mcp – MCP server for Zurich city open data
Portfolio: Swiss Public Data MCP Portfolio

Installation

Run via uv's uvx — no clone or manual install needed. Add to your MCP client config (mcpServers for Claude Desktop, Cursor and Windsurf; use a top-level servers key for VS Code in .vscode/mcp.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "swiss-culture-mcp": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": [
        "swiss-culture-mcp"
      ]
    }
  }
}