Alvar Aalto + Brick

    As a designer, sculptor and painter, Alvar Aalto’s portfolio transcends that of the typical architect. Designing the furnishings inside his buildings down to the glassware and lamps, Aalto’s legacy is built around a holistic understanding of design, from the smallest detail to the largest component. Among his numerous projects, brick features heavily. From an experimental house in Muuratsalo to the monolithic façades at Jyvaskyla University, he both angled bricks and curved them, always treating his material with his characteristic attention to detail.

Zaha Hadid + Composite Fibres

    Zaha Hadid’s practice is at the forefront of using new materials to express the complex geometries they create through parametric design. Although they are famed for making concrete appear weightless, many of their building’s skins are clad in different types of composite fibres. The Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku, for example, uses Glass Fibre Reinforced Polyester (GFRP) to create an almost seamless flowing exterior. Their recent extension to the Serpentine Sackler Gallery in London uses much the same technique, with their experimental materiality even extending into the design of superyachts.

SANAA + Glass

    SANAA, also based in Japan, are known for expertly crafting glass around translucent volumetric spaces. All sense of weight and gravity falls away from their design for the Louvre Lens, which uses mirrors and hidden detailing to turn glass into the only visible material. In a similar vein, the New Art Museum in New York City employs a clever combination of glass, anodised aluminium mesh and white painted walls to make the building shimmer in a semi-transparent way.