Site 4 - Multi Storey Apartment - Sydney Rd Brunswick, Melbourne

Site Visit 3 - Multi Storey Apartment

Site Visit 2 - 2-Storey Multi Apartment

Site Visit 1 - Safeway - Brunswick, Melbourne

Major Project - Warehouse and Office Complex

Renzo Piano

Renzo Piano was born in Genoa on September 14,1937. In Genoa he still maintains a home and office (Building Workshop). He runs his firm from three offices in Genoa, Paris and Berlin.

Its name, Renzo Piano Building Workshop, indicates the concentration tradition that he inherited from his family, which led him to be faithful to his materials, by pushing them to their limits, improving their performances and enhancing their characteristics.

Renzo Piano's work is based on a search for the human face of technology, on an attempt to demonstrate that modern building processes do not inevitably lead to cold, mechanized industrial buildings, but can give rise to warm, luminous spaces catering to the needs of human beings.

Technology is used in all his projects to tone down light, evaluate the context and find a means to integrate them into nature. After designing buildings where technology represented an end in itself, Piano moved towards projects in which innovative building techniques are merely a tool used to obtain comfortable, sustainable and ecological spaces.

The most common materials used in his buildings are: glass, timber, stone & steel.

Renzo Piano concentrates on the relationship between the interior and the exterior as one of his main aspects.

Buildings I'm focusing on for the major project:

1. Beyeler Foundation, Riehen (Basel), Switzerland (1992-1997)

2. Jean Marie Tjibaou Cultural Centre, Noumea, New Caledonia (1991-1998)

3. Niccolo Paganini Auditorium, Parma, Italy (1997-2001)

4. Padre Pio Church, San Giovanni Rotondo (Foggia), Italy (1991-2003)

5. Kansai International Airport Terminal, Osaka, Japan (1988-1994)

6. Zentrum Paul Klee, Bern, Switzerland (1999-2005)