Japanese architect Riken Yamamoto, known for bringing together public and private spaces, is this year’s winner of The Pritzker Architecture Prize, the industry’s highest international honor.
Yamamoto is being recognized for designs including residential complexes in Japan, China and South Korea; public buildings such as museums, schools, libraries and fire stations; and a mixed-use complex within a Swiss airport.
Yamamoto’s work “establishes kinship between public and private realms,” according to a statement Tuesday announcing the winner.
“For me, to recognize space, is to recognize an entire community,” Yamamoto said in the statement. “The current architectural approach emphasizes privacy, negating the necessity of societal relationships. However, we can still honor the freedom of each individual while living together in architectural space as a republic, fostering harmony across cultures and phases of life.”
The China-born, Japan-trained architect joins past winners, including the likes of Frank Gehry, I.M. Pei and Zaha Hadid. Last year’s winner was London-based David Chipperfield, who also is known for museums and other civic projects.
The award is sponsored by the Chicago-based Hyatt Foundation. The award was founded in 1979 by the late Jay Pritzker, founder of Hyatt Hotels, and his wife, Cindy.
The first award winner was Philip Johnson. The latest is a 78-year-old known for transparent designs, starting in 1977 with an open-air summer house called Yamakawa Villa in the woods around Nagano, Japan. There, humans often interact with wildlife.
Yamamoto was born in China but moved to Japan as a child, shortly after the end of World War II. He now lives in Yokohama, Japan.
His firm, Riken Yamamoto & Field Shop, has envisioned residential communities such as the nine-block, low-rise Pangyo Housing complex in South Korea; the 110-home Hotakubo Housing social housing project in Kumamoto, Japan; and Jian Wai Soho in Beijing, a development including nine residential towers and four office buildings near Tiananmen Square.
Public spaces include the Hiroshima Nishi Fire Station, the transparent, nine-building Saitama Prefectural University campus and the Yokosuka Museum of Art in his home country, as well as the transparent, 6 million book Tianjin Library in Tianjin, China.
The Circle at Zurich Airport created a complex of hotels, restaurants and shops within the airport in Switzerland.
Of 53 Pritzker Prize winners, Yamamoto is the ninth from Japan.
He will be formally honored in a May 16 ceremony at Chicago’s Illinois Institute of Technology, in partnership with the Chicago Architecture Center.
“Yamamoto develops a new architectural language that doesn’t merely create spaces for families to live, but creates communities for families to live together,” Tom Pritzker, chair of the Hyatt Foundation, said in the statement. “His works are always connected to society, cultivating a generosity in spirit and honoring the human moment.”