David Adjaye

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David Adjaye
David Adjaye, Dhaka.jpg
David Adjaye at CAA Conference, Dhaka, 2013
Born 1966
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Nationality British
Occupation Architect
Awards RIBA Bronze Medal for Part 1 Students
Buildings Skolkovo Moscow School of Management Rivington Place

David Adjaye OBE (born September 1966) is a British architect.[1]

Early life

David Adjaye was born in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The son of a Ghanaian diplomat, David Adjaye lived in Tanzania, Egypt, Yemen and Lebanon[2] before moving to Britain at the age of nine.[1] He earned a BA at London South Bank University, before graduating with an MA in 1993 from the Royal College of Art.

Career

Early projects

In 1993, the same year of graduation, Adjaye won the RIBA Bronze Medal, a prize offered for RIBA Part 1 projects, normally won by students who have only completed a bachelor's degree. Previously a unit tutor at the Architectural Association, he was also a lecturer at the Royal College of Art. After very short terms of work with the architectural studios of David Chipperfield (London) and Eduardo Souto de Moura (Porto), Adjaye established a practice with William Russell in 1994 called Adjaye & Russell, based in North London. This office was disbanded in 2000 and Adjaye established his own eponymous studio at this point.

The studio's first solo exhibition, David Adjaye: Making Public Buildings, was shown at the Whitechapel Gallery in London in January 2006, with Thames and Hudson publishing the catalogue of the same name. This followed their 2005 publication of Adjaye's first book, David Adjaye Houses.[3]

File:Idea store 4.jpg
Whitechapel Idea Store

Firm operations

In February 2009, the cancellation or postponement of four projects in Europe and Asia forced the firm to enter into a Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA), a deal to stave off insolvency proceedings which prevents financial collapse by rescheduling debts – estimated at about £1m – to creditors.[4]

National Museum of African American History

On 15 April 2009, he was selected as a team of architects, which includes the Freelon Group, Davis Brody Bond and SmithGroup, to design the $500 million new Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.[5] [6] His design features a crown motif from Yoruba sculpture.[7][6]

Other comissions

Alongside his international commissions, Adjaye's work spans exhibitions, private homes and artist collaborations. He built homes for the designer Alexander McQueen, artist Jake Chapman, photographer Juergen Teller, actor Ewan McGregor, and artists Tim Noble and Sue Webster. For artist Chris Ofili, he designed a new studio and a beach house in Port of Spain.[8] He worked with Ofili to create an environment for The Upper Room, which was later acquired by Tate Britain and caused a nationwide media debate. He also collaborated with artist Olafur Eliasson to create a light installation, Your black horizon, at the 2005 Venice Biennale. He has also worked on the art project Sankalpa with director Shekhar Kapur.[4] Adjaye coauthored two seasons of BBC's Dreamspaces television series and hosts a BBC radio programme. In June 2005, he presented the documentary Building Africa: Architecture of a Continent.[9] In 2008, he participated in Manifesta 7[10] and the Gwangju Biennale.

Recent work

Recent works include the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver,[1] the Nobel Peace Centre in Oslo[11] and the Skolkovo Moscow School of Management, completed in 2010.[12][dead link]

Adjaye currently holds a Visiting Professor post at Princeton University School of Architecture. He was the first Louis Kahn visiting professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and was the Kenzo Tange Professor in Architecture at Harvard Graduate School of Design. In addition, he is a RIBA Chartered Member, an AIA Honorary Fellow, a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and a Senior Fellow of the Design Futures Council.[13] He is a member of the Advisory Council of the Barcelona Institute of Architecture and also serves as member of the Advisory Boards of the Barcelona Institute of Architecture and the London School of Economics Cities programme.[14]

Making Place: The Architecture of David Adjaye is on display at the Art Institute of Chicago from September 2015 to January 2016.[15]

Personal life

In 2014, Adjaye married business consultant Ashley Shaw-Scott.[16]

Adjaye was featured in an advertising campaign for British luxury brand Dunhill in 2012.[17] Adjaye has also worked on numerous collaborative projects with his brother Peter Adjaye, a musician.[18][19]

Awards

In 2006, Adjaye was shortlisted for the Stirling Prize for the Whitechapel Idea Store, built on the remains of a 1960s mall. He received the title of OBE from the Queen in 2007 for services to British architecture.

  • RIBA – Bronze Medal for Part 1 Students – 1993
  • Design Futures Council Senior Fellow
  • Design Miami/ Designer of the Year Award – 2011[20]
  • Powerlist: Britain's Most Influential Black Person – 2012[21]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ William Shaw (2 April 2006), "Man With a Plan", New York Times.
  3. ↑ David Adjaye, Harvard Design School.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Cahal Milmo, David Adjaye: Downfall of the showman The Independent, 24 july 2009..
  5. ↑ Jordana, Sebastian. "David Adjaye wins competition for the National Museum of African American History and Culture", 17 April 2009. ArchDaily. Retrieved 16 July 2013.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Kate Taylor, "The Thorny Path to a National Black Museum", New York Times, 22 January 2011.
  8. ↑ Diane Solway, "Where In The World Is David Adjaye?" W Magazine, March 2011.
  9. ↑ David Adjaye
  10. ↑ David Adjaye manifesta7.
  11. ↑ Alexander Topping, Architect to Hollywood stars attempts to save firm from financial collapse, The Guardian, 24 July 2009.
  12. ↑ SKOLKOVO Campus, Moscow.[dead link]
  13. ↑ Design Futures Council Senior Fellows.
  14. ↑ David Adjaye, LSE Cities.
  15. ↑ artic.edu Making Place: The Architecture of David Adjaye
  16. ↑ "Ghanaian-British Architect David Adjaye weds Ashley Shaw-Scott", BellaNaija, 18 January 2014.
  17. ↑ "David Adjaye by Alfred Dunhill". YouTube.
  18. ↑ "Musicity", The Architecture Foundation, 19 April 2011.
  19. ↑ "MEETING ARCHITECTURE Part 5: David Adjaye and Peter Adjaye – MAXXI", Nero.
  20. ↑ Designer of the Year Award, Design Miami. Retrieved 16 July 2013.
  21. ↑ David Adjaye tops PowerList 2013, Guardian, 25 October 2012

External links

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