Friday Inspiration - Alvaro Siza

Came across this beautiful building on Dezeen yesterday by Alvaro Siza, a Portuguese architect. It's an auditorium for the Universidad de Pais Vasco in Bilbao, Spain. Siza takes minimalism to an extreme while not making the building seem too institutional. This building has several things that make my mouth drop. Take for instance in the photo above the way the tile wall meets the large marble panels. It's not fussy. There's no transition strip of note. It's just sheer beauty. (Click this link for more pictures: http://is.gd/i9bqN.) There is also a corner of the building that seems to have three upper stories whose only structural support is a thin wall of glass. And then there's the lobby ceiling. It's flat and white and devoid of any penetrations you would normally see, like sprinklers, exit signs, smoke alarms, etc. You will never see that in America. Ever. But we try on every project. It's our goal at archimana to make that happen on a project one day.