Richard Rogers

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Richard Rogers
Personal information
Name Richard Rogers
Nationality Flag of the United Kingdom United Kingdom
Birth date July 23, 1933 (1933-07-23) (age 74)
Birth place Florence
Work
Practice name Richard Rogers Partnership
Significant buildings Centre Georges Pompidou
Lloyd's Building
Millennium Dome
National Assembly for Wales
European Court of Human Rights
Significant projects Towards an Urban Renaissance
Awards and prizes Pritzker Prize (2007)
Stirling Prize (2006)
Aerial view of the Millennium Dome.
Aerial view of the Millennium Dome.

Richard George Rogers, Baron Rogers of Riverside FRIBA (born 23 July 1933) is a British architect noted for his modernist and functionalist designs. He was born in Florence in 1933 and attended the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London, before graduating from Yale School of Architecture in 1962.[1]

Contents

[edit] Early career

At Yale he met fellow student Norman Foster and on returning to England he set up architectural practice as Team 4 with Foster and their respective wives Su Rogers and Wendy Cheesman. They quickly earned a reputation for high-tech industrial design. In 1967 the practice split up, and Rogers joined Renzo Piano. An early commission was a house and studio for Humphrey Spender near Maldon, Essex, a glass cube framed with I-beams. His career leapt forward when he won the design competition for the Pompidou Centre on 13 July 1971 with Renzo Piano and Peter Rice. This building established Rogers's trademark of exposing most of the building's services (water, heating ducts, and stairs) on the exterior, leaving the internal spaces uncluttered. The building is now a much admired Paris landmark, but at the time critics were mixed, dubbing the "inside-out" style "Bowellism".

[edit] Projects

[edit] Honours

Rogers was knighted in 1991 by Queen Elizabeth II. He was awarded the RIBA Royal Gold Medal in 1985. He received a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 10th Mostra di Architettura di Venezia.[3] In 2006, he was awarded the Stirling Prize for Terminal 4 of Barajas Airport.[4]

He was created Baron Rogers of Riverside, of Chelsea in 1996. He sits as a Labour Peer in the House of Lords [5].

Rogers has been awarded honorary degrees from Oxford Brookes University and theUniversity of Kent, and was awarded the 2007 Pritzker Prize, architecture's highest honour.[6]

[edit] Later career

Rogers was one of the most vocal advocates of the Millennium Dome project and his reputation has suffered as a result. Though still regarded as one of the major international practices it is notable that since the Dome he has secured fewer landmark projects.

After several years of development, the ambitious Rogers Masterplan for the regeneration of Newcastle-upon-Tyne was rejected. Rogers has been active politically as a Labour life peer with the title Baron Rogers of Riverside in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. In 2000 he wrote the UK government's white paper, Towards an Urban Renaissance. Rogers is currently chair of the Greater London Authority panel for Architecture and Urbanism.

Rogers was appointed to design the replacement to the Central Library in the Eastside of Birmingham; however, his plan was rejected on grounds of cost. City Park Gate, the area adjacent to the land the library would have stood on, is now being designed by Ken Shuttleworth's MAKE Architects.

Rogers has been chosen as the architect of Tower 3 of the new World Trade Center in New York City, replacing the old World Trade Center, which had been destroyed in the September 11 attacks. His old classmate, contemporary and former practice partner Norman Foster is also designing a new WTC tower.

After working with Piano, Rogers established the Richard Rogers Partnership in 1976. This became Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners in 2007. The firm maintains offices in London, Barcelona, Madrid, and Tokyo.

[edit] Controversy

In February 2006, Lord Rogers hosted the inaugural meeting of the campaigning organisation Architects and Planners for Justice in Palestine(APJP) in his London offices. At that time Lord Rogers had secured a commission for a $1.7 billion expansion of the Jacob K. Javits Convention Centre in Manhattan, the late Senator Javits had been an ardent supporter of Israel. However within weeks he had publicly dissociated himself from the group, "I unequivocally renounce Architects and Planners for Justice in Palestine and have withdrawn my relationship with them."[7]. This statement followed pressure from strong pro-Israeli interests in New York[8], who threatened him with the loss of this prestige commission. Rogers at first said he was dissociating himself from APJP because of its published aims and "in view of the suggested boycott by some members," although APJP denied it was promoting a boycott. Rogers subsequently hardened his line, coming out with statements defending Israel's right to build its separation wall. He described the Israel-Palestine conflict as being between a "terrorist" state and a "democratic" one and said that he was "all for the democratic state".

[edit] Family

He is married to Ruth Rogers, founder of the influential River Cafe.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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