The cloth merchant Joseph Wyler from rural Aargau and the lawyer Martin Bloch from St. Gallen achieve a social ascent in bourgeois Zurich in the late 19th century that would have been denied to their parents. In the booming economic center, they take the long-denied integration into their own hands: they become citizens while remaining Jews. However, their political ambitions in the liberal movement are met with rejection. In 1925, Hugo Wyler, the son of the cloth merchant, marries Gertrud "Trudy" Bloch, the daughter of the lawyer. But by then, everything has become unstable. Against her family's opposition, Trudy Wyler-Bloch becomes a Zionist. Her husband joins Martin Bloch's law firm and soon becomes the honorary consul of Monaco. Political turmoil surrounding Martin Bloch, however, puts the law firm in serious jeopardy, and World War II also severely impacts the cloth trade.