Sou Fujimoto

Architect / Japan / Sou Fujimoto Architects

Sou Fujimoto was born in Hokkaido, Japan in 1971 and studied architecture at Tokyo University. He established Sou Fujimoto Architects in Tokyo in 2000. The firm has designed many private residences in Japan and Europe, including the Primitive Future House in Basel, Switzerland (2008). In 2010, Fujimoto completed in Tokyo the Musashino Art University Museum and Library, based on the concept of a single spiral bookshelf, and the “132 5” store for Issey Miyake. Also in 2010 he designed the exhibition space for the acclaimed exhibition of Japanese fashion “Future Beauty,” at the Barbican Gallery in London.

The firm has garnered many awards, including the 2010 Rice Design Alliance Prize; the 2009 Wallpaper* magazine Design Awards for the Best New Private House (for Final Wooden House, Kamakura, Japan); and the winning award in the 2008 World Architectural Festival, Private House Category (also for Final Wooden House). The work of the firm was represented at the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2010.

Fujimoto is currently Professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology. His 2008 book Primitive Future was the year’s best-selling architecture book.

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