Born Álvaro Joaquim de Melo Siza Vieira
25 June 1933 (age 87);
Place of birth: Matosinhos, Portugal;
Nationality Portuguese;
Alma mater: University of Porto
Occupation: Architect and architectural educator.
Awards Pritzker Prize (1992),
Royal Gold Medal (2009),
UIA Gold Medal (2011),
Golden Lion for lifetime achievement (2012),
National Architecture Award of Spain (2019).
Most of his best known works are located in his hometown Porto: the Boa Nova Tea House (1963), the Faculty of
Architecture (1987–93), and the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art (1997). Since the mid-1970s, Siza has been involved
in numerous designs for public housing, public pools, and universities. Between 1995 and 2009, Siza has been working
on an architecture museum on Hombroich island, completed in collaboration with Rudolf Finsterwalder. Most recently,
he started coordinating the rehabilitation of the monuments and architectonic heritage of Cidade Velha (Old Village) in
Santiago, an island of Cape Verde.
Commissioned after winning an international competition in 2010, Siza and Granada-based Juan Domingo Santos unveiled
designs for a new entrance and visitors center at the Alhambra in 2014.
By 2012, Siza warned that he might close his Portuguese office because of a lack of contracts.
In 2014, Álvaro Siza designed, with Carlos Castanheira the Building on the Water in Huai'An City, Jiangsu, China that
was awarded the building of the year 2015 by ArchDaily.
In 2019, Alvaro Siza was commissioned with his first project in the United States, a 450-foot-tall, 37-story apartment
building at 611 West 56th Street in Manhattan.
In 2020, Álvaro Siza designed four buildings respectively Siza House, YuChia House, Tea House and Gate House at the
Taifong Golf Club, in Changhua, Taiwan.
Siza taught at FAUP from 1966 to 1969, returning in 1976. In addition to his teaching there, he has been a visiting
professor at the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University; the University of Pennsylvania; Los Andes University of
Bogota; and the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
Learn more on Wikipedia
Page was made by
Iryna Sheptukha
