Danish architect Bjarke Ingels rockets through photo/video-mingled stories of his eco-flashy designs. His buildings not only look like nature — they act like nature: blocking the wind, collecting solar energy — and creating stunning views.
Why you should listen
As Bjarke Ingels writes: “Hoping to become a cartoonist, I enrolled into architecture school at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts to improve my drawing skills. I immediately developed an interest in architecture and later studied at the Escola Tècnica Superior d’Arquitectura de Barcelona, where I won my first competition with a few friends.
“I cofounded PLOT Architects with Julien De Smedt in 2001. I founded BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group in 2005. We are a team of architects, designers, urbanists, landscape professionals, interior and product designers, and inventors” who utilize information — “local culture and climate, changing patterns of contemporary life, the ebbs and flows of the global economy”– to drive the design process.
Ingels grew up in Copenhagen, Denmark. He is the author of HOT TO COLD: An Odyssey of Architectural Adaptation and Yes Is More: An Archicomic on Architectural Evolution.