ROLEX LEARNING CENTER

Description

Barely five weeks after the opening of the Rolex Learning Center, the verdict was announced – the building’s architects, Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa (SAANA) were the winners of the 2010 Pritzker Prize, the most prestigious prize in architecture. The jury celebrated an “…architecture that is simultaneously delicate and powerful, precise and fluid, ingenious but not overly or overtly clever; for the creation of buildings that successfully interact with their contexts and purposes, creating a sense of fullness and experiential richness”. At the Ecole Polytechnique Fιdιrale de Lausanne (EPFL), the Japanese architects’ unique procedure allowed for a dream to become a reality by creating what one might call the first “enhanced library”. A building that became a new focal point for the campus gathering together all the different forms of access and exchange of knowledge in one open space. It is also a space for living where a new rapport between the exterior and the interior was established. The list of technical challenges inherent in the construction of this gently sleeping giant, undulating over 160 meters, is almost infinite. Its construction unceasingly forced engineers and builders to imagine new solutions. This book tells the story of the genesis of the Rolex Learning Center – it opens the door to a revolution in knowledge access.

224 pages, color ills / 18 x 24 cm / English