This year's winner of the Pritzker Prize, architecture's highest award, is also the designer behind the new downtown Aspen Art Museum. Shigeru Ban may have offices in Tokyo, Paris, and New York, but the modernist architect is better known for his experimental use of materials (like cardboard!) and his humanitarian work building structures in the wake of disasters. Ban's design in Aspen is a massive, 47-foot-tall, 30,000 square-foot building with glass walls and a wood-lattice facade that in architect-speak is supposed to "invite those outside to engage with the building's interior." Construction at the corner of Spring Street and Hyman Avenue has been going on for awhile now, and the project is still on time for a summer 2014 completion. An exhibition of Ban's humanitarian work will be on display when the museum opens and we're expecting Aspen to roll out the ultimate red carpet party. With Ban as the 2014 Pritzker Prize laureate, this project just keeps getting hotter.
-All drawings via Shigeru Ban Architects
· Shigeru Ban Architects [Official Site]
· The Aspen Art Museum [Official Site]
· All Aspen Art Museum Coverage [Curbed Ski Archives]
· All Aspen Coverage [Curbed Ski Archives]