Norman Foster is a British architect whose company maintains an international design practice. He is Britain’s most prolific builder of landmark office buildings. He was born in Manchester in 1935. After graduating from Manchester University School of Architecture and City Planning in 1961 he won a Henry Fellowship to Yale University, where he gained a Master’s Degree in Architecture.
He is the founder and chairman of Foster + Partners. Founded in London in 1967, it is now a worldwide practice, with project offices in more than twenty countries. Over the past four decades the company has been responsible for a strikingly wide range of work, from urban masterplans, public infrastructure, airports, civic and cultural buildings, offices and workplaces to private houses and product design. Since its inception, the practice has received 470 awards and citations for excellence and has won more than 86 international and national competitions.
Current and recent work includes the largest single building on the planet, Beijing Airport, the redevelopment of Dresden Railway Station, Millau Viaduct in France, the Swiss Re tower and the Great Court at the British Museum in London, an entire University Campus for Petronas in Malaysia, the Hearst Headquarters tower in New York, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and research centres at Stanford University, California. In 1990 he was granted a Knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours, and in 1999 was honoured with a Life Peerage, becoming Lord Foster of Thames Bank.
Here is some of their British developments:
London’s first ecological tall building and an instantly recognisable addition to the city’s skyline, 30 St Mary Axe is rooted in a radical approach – technically, architecturally, socially and spatially. Generated by a radial plan, its energy-conscious enclosure resolves walls and roof into a continuous triangulated skin, allowing column-free floor space, light and views.
At almost four times the height of the original, covering twice the area, and with 90,000 seats, the new Wembley Stadium is the largest covered football stadium in the world. The key feature of the new stadium is its partly retractable roof, supported structurally by a spectacular 133-metre-high arch. Dramatically illuminated at night, the arch is visible from across London.
The Millennium Bridge springs from a dynamic collaboration between engineering, art and architecture to provide the first new Thames crossing since Tower Bridge. A shallow suspension structure, it is designed to allow pedestrians unimpeded views up and down river. A thin ribbon of steel by day, it is illuminated to form a blade of light at night.
The transformation of Trafalgar Square represents the completion of the first phase of the World Squares for All Masterplan. The north side of the square has been closed to traffic, creating a broad terrace in front of the National Gallery and establishing a direct connection between the gallery and the heart of the square.
Located on the south bank of the Thames, alongside the new More London development, City Hall is one of the capital’s most symbolically important new projects. Advancing themes explored earlier in the Reichstag, it expresses the transparency and accessibility of the democratic process and demonstrates the potential for a sustainable, virtually non-polluting public building.
His companies latest project is a collaboration with Aston Martin for the new London buses competition. They came joint first, with a vehicle that is environmentally sensitive, accessible and reinvents a much-loved symbol of London for the modern era. The design includes a glazed roof with solar cells to generate energy and control the internal temperature by filtering daylight.
