Nicolas G. Hayek Center

With so much new, high-profile construction going on in Tokyo, it takes a special building to stand out as truly exceptional.
The Nicolas G. Hayek Center, the new headquarters for Swatch Group Japan (designed by Shigeru Ban) is just such a building. Located in the posh Ginza district and named after the company's founder, the building focuses on Swatch's luxury labels — Breguet, Blancpain, Glashütte Original, Jaquet Droz, Léon Hatot, Omega (plus a Swatch presence for the masses) — each with its own retail space.
Each shop has a hydraulic glass elevator that lifts you directly to the shop's entrance and doubles as a showroom, offering a glimpse of what to expect when it stops and you step out.
Add to that a wide-open exterior lobby and beautiful wall-mounted garden — environmentalism is a signature of Ban's work — and you end up with a shopping center that's truly ahead of the times.

via Times

Matteo Thun

Matteo Thun was born in 1952 in bolzano/alto adige, he studied under oskar kokoschka at the salzburg academy. in 1975 he was awarded his ph.d. in architecture at the university of florence, italy. in collaboration with ettore sottsass he grounded the sottsass associati and the memphis design group in 1981. between 1983 and 1996 he was professor of design at the university of applied arts in vienna. in 1984 he inaugurated his own design studio in milan.
This environmentally friendly, sustainable, modular private house, call Heidis, makes you live in close contact with nature and it´s ready in a matter of weeks.

Matteo Thun Portrait (2006)

Interview for Euromaxx on DW-TV.

Peter Zumthor - The Thermae of Stone

One of Peter Zumthor´s architecture master pieces.