Foreign Office Architects

FOA is a London-based international practice founded led by Farshid Moussavi and Alejandro Zaera-Polo to provide full masterplanning, architecture and interior design services to for both the public and the private sectors. Founded in 1995, FOA has emerged as one of the most significant architecture and urban design practices working today, known for combining technical innovation with design excellence. FOA has produced critically acclaimed and award winning projects for the public and private sector on an international scale. In their approach to architecture, FOA are new pragmatists, bringing to bear great technical rigor in their focus on organic growth and the evolution of design ‘species’ hybridizing uses relating to both local and global conditions. The work unfolds rigorously through a broad variety of locations and typologies. In 2002 they realised the groundbreaking project which put the practice on the map, the Yokohama Port Terminal in Japan, an imaginative hybrid of non-Cartesian industrial infrastructure and versatile social functionality completed in 2002.

Work

The work of the practice has branched into a very broad range of typologies and geographical locations and client types, rigorously developed to suit the particular conditions and programatic requirements. FOA has already completed numerous projects: in the UK, a John Lewis department store and Cineplex at the Shires West Development, Leicester (2000-8). In Spain, where FOA has a local branch, completed projects include the La Rioja Technology Transfer Center, Logrono (2003-7), a social housing in Carabanchel, Madrid (2004-7), a 50,000m2 coastal park with outdoor auditoria in Barcelona (2000-4), a police headquarters in La Villajoyosa (2000-3) and the Municipal Theatre in Torrevieja (2000-6). Completed projects in other European locations include the Bluemoon Hotel in Groningen, the Netherlands (1999-2000), the Umraniye Retail Complex and Multiplex, in Istanbul, Turkey (2007), and a Villa in Pedralbes, Barcelona (2008). Projects completed in Asia include the Spanish Pavilion at the 2005 Aichi International Expo in Japan (2004-5) and a headquarters building for Dulnyouk Publishers, Paju, South Korea (2000-5). In Spain, projects under way include the Institute of Legal Medicine in Madrid (2006-), the D-38 Office Complex in Barcelona (2004-), the Hotel Masaveu in Gijón (2006-), and a Residential Tower in Durango (2004). In the UK, projects under way include the Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication, in the Greenwich Peninsula (2005-), Trinity EC3, an office complex in the City of London (2003-), the mixed use extension of the West Quay retail centre in Southampton (2002-), Sevenstone Quarter, a mixed-use complex in Sheffield (2007-), Hadspen Gardens, Somerset (2005-), the redevelopment of Euston Station in London, and a Maggie’s Centre for cancer patients in Newcastle upon Tyne (2007-). Other European projects include the Mahler 4 office building in Amsterdam (2000-), and the future Aerospace Campus in Toulouse, France (2006-). In the USA, FOA is developing the Museum of Contemporary Art in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, (2006-). In Asia, FOA is currently building two 180m high housing towers at the World Business Centre in Busan, South Korea (2006-), and the KL Sentral Plot D Residential Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (2006-)

FOA has won several prestigious competitions and commissions, including the BBC Music Box for the firm’s White City complex in 2003, which was widely exhibited but the client has yet to commit to build it. The practice played a central creative role in the Masterplanning team for the London 2012 Olympics Park, site-wide infrastructure and accompanying long-term regeneration of the Lower Lea Valley (2002-2007) and was selected as part of the United Architects team to submit a design for the World Trade Center in New York in 2002, in the aftermath of 9/11.

Awards

Awards to the firm include the Enric Miralles Prize for Architecture (2003); the Kanagawa Prize for Architecture in Japan (2003); three RIBA Worldwide Awards (2004, 2005 and 2006); the Special Award for Topography at the 9th Venice Architecture Biennale (2004); the 2005 Charles Jencks Award for Architecture and, most recently FOA was honoured with the title of Architect of the Year Award by Architectural Digest Magazine in Madrid. FOA is one of very few practices to have represented Britain with a solo exhibition at the 8th Venice Architecture Biennale in 2002. The work of the firm has been widely exhibited at venues including the Museum of Modern Art in New York. and at the Max Protetch Gallery. The practice has been published in numerous monographs and catalogues globally.

Further reading

*foa’s ark evolving container for the proliferating singularities, Korean Architecture and Culture Magazine, December 2004
*Phylogenesis: foa’s ark, Foreign Office, A monograph by Actar, Barcelona, Spain, 2003
*Complexity and consistency, A monograph, issue 115/116, El Croquis, Madrid, Spain, 2003
*The Yokohama Project, a monograph, Actar, Barcelona, Spain, 2002
*FOA Recent Projects, Text by Jeffrey Kipnis, Ciro Najle & Alejandro Zaera Polo, published as 2G no.16, Barcelona, Spain, 2001

External links

* [http://www.f-o-a.net Foreign Office Architects] .