TROPOLISM

Álvaro Siza, one of the best architects in the world and Tropolism favorite, is the first Portuguese architect to receive the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture. It's the award given by Britain's Royal Institute of British Architects. The Guardian interviews Siza for the occasion:

From the moment he began building, in the early 1950s, Portugal's most celebrated architect sought to frame views, to reveal landscapes, cityscapes, interiors and the ways through them. His aim was to delight the eye, and to make each creation a place of subtle revelation. Siza, now 75, has never been an architect of big statements and bigger pictures. He is, however, a designer and craftsman of some of the most considered of all modern buildings.