Architect I.M. Pei Turns 99
This news just came across my desk. For those of you who are infatuated with design... One of the masters of filling space in an extraordinary manner I.M. Pei has a birthday!
Famed modernist and master architect I.M. Pei is celebrating his 99th birthday today. One of the world’s most celebrated living architects, Pei is best known for designing the Pyramid at Le Grand Louvre in Paris and the East Building of the National Art Gallery in Washington, D.C. Some of his most recent projects include the Suzhou Museum in Suzhou, China, in 2006 and the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha in 2008.
Pei came to the United States to study architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology when he was 17. Continually decorated for his iconic creations throughout his longstanding career, Pei was the recipient of the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1983, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Smithsonian Institution’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in 2003, the Royal Gold Medal of the Royal Institute of British Architects in 2010, and the Gold Medal of the International Union of Architects in 2014.