Peter Zumthor Wins Pritzker Prize
Swiss architect Peter Zumthor has been named the 2009 winner of the Pritzker Architecture Prize, the premiere international distinction for an architect. Zumthor is best known for his design for the Therme Vals spa complex in the Swiss Alps. Inspired by the spa's majestic surroundings, Zumthor built the structure on the sharp grade of an Alpine mountain slope with grass-topped roofs to mimic Swiss meadows.
The Pritzker jury praised both Zumthor's detailed approach to each of his projects as well as his use of materials, commenting: "In Zumthor's skillful hands, like those of the consummate craftsman, materials from cedar shingles to sandblasted glass are used in a way that celebrates their own unique qualities, all in the service of an architecture of permanence.… In paring down architecture to its barest yet most sumptuous essentials, he has reaffirmed architecture's indispensable place in a fragile world."
Two recent books by Verlag Scheidegger and Spiess offer wonderful insight into Zumthor's work alongside gorgeous images that present his striking designs. Peter Zumthor Therme Vals is the only book-length study of this unique building, and it includes the his original sketches and plans for its design. Seeing Zumthor is a unique collaboration between distinguished Swiss photographer Hans Danuser and Zumthor. Danuser's images of the buildings created by Zumthor are photographs that comment equally on the art of photography and the art of architecture.