The Praemium Imperiale, one of the world’s two highest honors for design, is awarded this year to architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, who maintain a distinguished international practice in New York. Sponsored by the Japan Art Association, the prize was bestowed in Tokyo on October 16.
Unlike the comparable Pritzker Prize for architecture, which went this year to Arata Isozaki of Japan (officeinsight, March 18), the Praemium Imperiale is bestowed annually on creative figures in five areas of the arts: painting, sculpture, architecture, music and theater/film. It was established in 1988 to be an arts equivalent to the Nobel prizes in the sciences and literature.

Williams and Tsien are one of the many married couples who have long figured prominently in the world of design. (Think 20th-century designers Charles.and Ray Eames, architect-planners Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, and currently prominent architects Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio.) This year’s winners have worked together in the field since 1977, establishing their firm Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects in 1986.
Their core beliefs, cited in the Praemium Imperiale press release on their honor, is that architecture is an act of “profound optimism,” and that it can reflect the values of institutions that share this view. They also speak admirably of prioritizing the experience of those who occupy and visit their works – asserting that experience takes precedence over external image, although they clearly care about that as well. And their work adheres closely to the foundation belief of Modernism: that the components and craftsmanship of construction must be apparent, overlaid with no allusions to earlier styles.
The citation speaks as well of their determination to blend their works into their surroundings, but they achieve this without facile replication of the built context. Correctly, they have viewed the relationship to surroundings as a much more complex concern.
A selection of their most notable works illustrates these principles in practice.
American Folk Art Museum, New York, 2001-2014

This museum’s design dealt with its challenging situation as a townhouse-scaled structure among much larger institutions and office towers, displaying a boldly sculptured hand-crafted bronze façade to proclaim its presence. The façade also dealt creatively with the fact that a museum demands a largely windowless enclosure. Its interior was spatially rich for its size, with views across light wells and from level to level.
Despite protests from the design community, their Folk Art Museum was demolished in 2014 to make room for the Museum of Modern Art’s expansion, which has just now reached completion.
Neurosciences Institute, La Jolla, CA, 1995
Designed to accommodate advanced research on the brain, this complex responds to its coastal terrain by cutting into its sloping site, creating a wind-sheltered central plaza, flanked by its “theory center” and laboratories and centered on an auditorium designed to double as a concert hall for the wider community. The boldly sculptural forms of its buildings are articulated by a variety of exposed concrete and stone cladding. A landscaped roof terrace provides views of the distant San Diego skyline. In 2014, the Neurosciences Center moved to smaller quarters, and this complex became an extension of the adjoining Scripps Research Institute.


Cranbrook Natatorium, Bloomfield Hills, MI, 1999
Inserted into the Cranbrook campus, which includes one of the nation’s most distinguished schools of design and architecture, this swimming pool structure takes its place among National Historic Landmark buildings designed in the early 20th century by the renowned Eliel Saarinen. Enclosed in walls of meticulously crafted brick, with few carefully composed window areas, the structure presents a muted exterior, integrated into its evergreen-shaded surroundings.
It is on the interior, with its competition-sized pool, that the building displays dramatic individuality. The vast rich blue ceiling plane is punctured by constellations of downlights and by two 30-foot-diameter oculi admitting daylight. The facility is designed to be comfortable without air conditioning. The tops of the oculi can be opened to ventilate the space, even in the winter, when snow sometimes enters.
The Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, PA, 2012
The design of a new home for the legendary art collection of Albert C. Barnes, who established his foundation in 1925, was an exceptional challenge. Having been open to the public in 1961 on the condition that it remain in his suburban mansion exactly as he installed it, the museum suffered under a limitation on visits imposed by its “Main Line” community. Years of litigation resulted in a 2004 ruling that it could relocate to Philadelphia on the condition that the house’s interior and installations be faithfully reproduced.


On its prominent center-city site, the new institution was set well back from streets in an ample public garden designed by landscape architect Laurie Olin, recalling the sequestered quality of the suburban property. For the building, Williams and Tsien developed a scheme composed of three linear volumes: one for visitor amenities, temporary exhibitions, art education, and conservation; a spacious court and adjoining terrace where visitors can gather for tours or just relax and where evening events can be held; and the structure that contains the replicated interiors.
The exterior was lent appropriate dignity with a cladding largely of fossilized limestone. Hovering above the central court and terrace, a monumental translucent lightbox admits diffuse daylight by day and becomes a beacon of the foundation after dark. While the replicated galleries maintain the original configuration, they offer far superior lighting and air quality.
Lefrak Center at Lakeside, Brooklyn, NY, 2013
This year-round skating and recreation center is a key element in a 26-acre improvement and restoration project for historic Prospect Park. The center includes two ice-skating rinks: a covered rectangle meeting hockey standards and an adjoining uncovered oval. In warmer weather, the covered area converts to roller skating, while the uncovered one becomes a water play area, with spray fountains.

Service structures are notched into the terrain, appearing largely as backdrops. Dark rough-hewn granite, like that seen throughout the park, clads those structures and is used for low walls. The rink’s roof is made as inconspicuous as possible, given its size, and is supported on slim, irregularly spaced steel columns. The underside of this canopy is midnight blue, incised with silver-painted curvilinear lines inspired by skating footwork.
Construction of the center allowed for removal of an old, poorly sited open rink and restoration of a lakeside esplanade conceived by park designers Olmsted & Vaux in the 1860s.

The Asia Society Hong Kong Center, Hong Kong, 2013
Established by Hong Kong business leaders as an outpost of the Asia Society based in New York, this complex accommodates a variety of lectures, conferences, exhibitions, performances and films. Sited on a precipitous, forested slope, surrounded by high-rises, the development incorporates a number of previously derelict buildings originally constructed by the British military – in two clusters, separated by a steep cascade.
The upper cluster of structures, once used to produce and store ammunition, has been adapted for offices, theater and a gallery. Covered walkways inspired by those of traditional Chinese courtyards link them. Lower on the site, a 1930s building has been restored, and a new low building faced in dark green Chinese stone serves as the main entrance and public face of the complex.
The two portions of the development are linked by structurally dramatic bridges. Other memorable exterior elements of the complex are extensive roof terraces, offering dramatic views and constituting the principal image of the development as seen from surrounding towers.

The Obama Presidential Center, Chicago, IL, In Design
Currently “on the boards” at the firm is perhaps its most prestigious project, the Obama Presidential Center, planned for construction in Jackson Park on Chicago’s South Side. Obama and his family have lived in this area, and he held his first public-service job there. The former president has expressed the hope that the complex will draw attention and lend economic support to the area. But the project has been held up in the courts for years as opponents object to the use of public park land planned in the 1890s by Olmsted & Vaux for private foundation purposes, as well as the specter of accelerated gentrification for the neighborhood.
The designs drawn up – in collaboration with Interactive Design Architects of Chicago and landscape architects Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates – show a midrise tower of distinctive silhouette housing exhibitions about the Obamas and the context of African-American, local, and national history. Low-rise wings surrounding a public plaza would include an event space, restaurant, library and athletic center. Planted roofs on these structures would transition into the landscape of the park.

Other Williams & Tsien Accomplishments
Among the dozens of other works by the firm, some of the most notable have been:
- >Phoenix Art Museum expansion, AZ, two phases, 1996 and 2006: Context-sensitive extensions of a low-rise, Southwest-inspired complex, its galleries interspersed with planted courtyards
- >Mattin Center, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, 2001: a focus for the visual and performing arts on a campus known mainly for the study of science and technology, cut into a slope, with sunken courtyards and terraces offering broad views.
- >The Robin Hood Library Initiative, 2004: four interior renovations to create effective and appealing libraries in New York City public schools, carried out under a philanthropic program.
- >C.V.Starr East Asian Library, Berkeley, CA, 2008: a four-story building cut into a steep hillside, adopting the symmetry, pale stone walls, and red tile roofs of the campus’s signature buildings.
- >The David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center, New York, 2009: a kind of indoor garden for rest, refreshment and small-scaled performances in a confined passage-like ground-floor space on Manhattan’s densely built Upper West Side.
- >The Center for the Advancement of Public Action, Bennington College, VT, 2011: on the school’s bucolic campus, the center is divided into three modest buildings around a central plaza, housing teaching areas, quarters for resident fellows, and a multipurpose gathering place, all clad in slabs of Vermont marble.
- >Logan Center for the Arts, University of Chicago, 2012: housing departments of visual arts, film, theater and music, in a low-rise wing with north-facing skylights and a slim ten-story tower, alluding abstractly to the campus’s Gothic Revival landmarks, topped with a lofty performance space.
- >Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, Princeton University, NJ, 2016: academic and research facilities in a dense complex of low and mid-rise structures, with green rooftops and planted courtyards.
- >The firm has also completed numerous houses and designs for exhibitions.
This Year’s Honorees in the Other Arts
>Painting: William Kentridge of South Africa, whose art is said to be “rooted in the social injustice of apartheid” and of colonialism worldwide. He is noted for “monochromatic drawing” in an expressionist manner, sometimes superimposed on existing texts. He also makes animated films and has directed opera.
>Sculpture: Mona Hatoum, Palestinian-British, who pursues “a diverse and unconventional range of media,” including sculpture, video, photography, installation, and works on paper. In her work, everyday objects are sometimes transformed into threatening things.
>Music: Anne-Sophie Mutter, German-born violinist, who made her concert debut at the age of 13 with the Berlin Philharmonic, has worked with many of the world’s greatest conductors in the decades since. So far, she has premiered 27 works for violin and orchestra. Foundations she founded have supported young musicians, aided children in war-torn Yemen, and contributed to other causes.
>Theater/film: Bando Tamasaburo is a legendary actor in traditional Japanese kabuki theater, playing female roles in its all-male casts. He has also performed outside his time-honored roles, appearing in Chinese opera and collaborating with prominent figures in the worlds of concert music, dance and film.
Established to honor the late Prince Takamatsu, the Art Association’s patron for almost six decades, the prize has been bestowed on at total of 154 international artists, including artists Cindy Sherman and David Hockey, composer Philip Glass, pianist and composer Mitsuko Uchida, dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov, playwright Arthur Miller, film directors Federico Fellini, and Akira Kurosawa, and Martin Scorsese, and film actresses Sophia Loren and Judi Dench.
Previous winners for architecture include I.M. Pei (first honoree), James Stirling, Frank Gehry, Kenzo Tange, Renzo Piano, Tadao Ando, Jean Nouvel, Norman Foster, Oscar Niemeyer, Zaha Hadid, Ricardo Legorreta, Steven Holl, and Dominique Perrault.
The Association chooses winners based on the recommendations of international advisors from England, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, and the United States, each of them guided by a nominating committee of cultural leaders in his or her country. Now leading the U.S. nominating committee is Caroline Kennedy, daughter of the late president and former ambassador to Japan – the first woman international advisor for the prize.