Archinect - News

Phyllis Lambert and Kazuyo Sejima win 2023 Jane Drew and Ada Louise Huxtable Prizes

2023-01-30T13:40:00-05:00

Influential Canadian architect Phyllis Lambert and SANAA co-founder Kazuyo Sejima have been named as this year's respective winners of the Jane Drew and Ada Louise Huxtable prizes by the UK-based publications Architects’ Journal and The Architectural Review as part of the annual W Awards program, now in its 11th year.

Lambert was awarded the Ada Louise Huxtable Prize for her influence on the culture of architecture. Her early work with Mies van der Rohe on New York’s Seagram Building has been well documented, along with the influence spread throughout her native country after founding the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) in Montreal in 1979. Her influence is still widely felt today in both countries. As AR’s Deputy Editor Eleanor Beaumont said, Lambert encourages us to “always be curious.”

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Phyllis Lambert with the model for the Seagram Building New York, 1955. Photo © Fonds Phyllis Lambert.

Sejima, the 2010 winner of the Pritzker Prize along with S...

Documentary explores the lives of 4 innovative women in architecture

2020-08-10T12:16:00-04:00

City Dreamers is a Canadian documentary directed by Joseph Hillel that looks at the lives of Phyllis Lambert, Denise Scott Brown, Cornelia Oberlander, and Blanche Lemco van Ginkel, all notable powerhouses in architecture and design who were among some of the first women to rise to prominence within the male dominated industry of the time.

Founding and creating the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal is probably one of Phyllis Lambert's greatest feats. Apart from working with the likes of Mies van der Rohe and receiving honorary degrees from roughly 26 universities, Lambert has also built a commendable career as a philanthropist.

Denise Scott Brown's work along with her husband, Robert Venturi is often regarded as some of the most influential amongst twentieth century architectural discourse. Learning from Las Vegas is a favorite. But, perhaps even more notably, Scott Brown grew to become a powerful advocate for Women in Architecture and continues to be a symbol for equality...

At age 90, Phyllis Lambert looks back on her career in CCA exhibition

2017-02-01T18:30:00-05:00

Phyllis Lambert is 90 years strong, and the impact she has made in architecture in the last six decades still resonates to this day. While her influence in architecture is well known, what is Lambert's perspective on her own career? In celebration of her 90th birthday that was on January 24, the CCA in Montreal is currently exhibiting “Phyllis Lambert: 75 Years at Work”.

Curated by the CCA Founding Director Emeritus herself, the exhibition highlights milestones like the early days in her career, her iconic role as Director of Planning of the Seagram Building, to her conservation and restoration projects in her native Montreal and abroad.

Find out more on Bustler.

The Seagram Building after the Four Seasons: maintaining a costly landmark

2016-07-19T14:09:00-04:00

Mr. Rosen would not mind getting a little credit for maintaining the 59-year-old building, a landmark inside and outside, designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson. With its rich materials and exquisite detailing, the building demands scrupulous attention. And money. RFR executives estimated that it cost about 20 percent more to maintain the seemingly spartan Seagram Building than it would a typical office tower of roughly the same size and age. Less is more.

Phyllis Lambert receives 2016 Wolf Prize in Israel

2016-06-03T18:47:00-04:00

The one and only Phyllis Lambert continues to rake in architecture honors from around the globe. She received the American Academy's Brunner Memorial Prize this past April and was bestowed the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement during the 2014 Venice Biennale. Most recently, the former Canadian Centre for Architecture Director has been honored with the 2016 Wolf Prize in Israel. Past laureates include Eduardo Souto de Moura, David Chipperfield, and Peter Eisenman.

Phyllis Lambert recognized with 2016 Arnold W. Brunner Memorial Prize

2016-04-06T14:48:00-04:00

The American Academy of Arts and Letters announced architect Phyllis Lambert as the 2016 recipient of the Arnold W. Brunner Memorial Prize [...]. Dubbed as the "Joan of Architecture", Lambert is widely recognized for founding the Canadian Centre for Architecture and her role as Director of Planning for the iconic Seagram Building (which she commissioned Mies van der Rohe to design), among her other initiatives that advocate for architecture's cultural value.

More of Phyllis Lambert in the Archinect news:

2015 Phyllis Lambert grantees Pelletier de Fontenay to expand on winning Insectarium Montreal proposal

2015-12-15T18:34:00-05:00

The annual Phyllis Lambert Grant puts the Montreal design scene in the spotlight. Established in 2007 by the City and named in tribute to Montreal native architect Phyllis Lambert, the grant recognizes a locally based designer or firm — who has no more than 10 years of practice — for producing outstanding designs and research that show potential for longterm benefits for the city. For 2015, Pelletier de Fontenay won the $10,000 grant for their project "Architectures de la nature captive". Hubert Pelletier and Yves de Fontenay received the prize during a recent ceremony at City Hall, with Phyllis Lambert in attendance.

"Architectures de la nature captive" is a spin-off from their winning proposal with Kuehn Malvezzi for the upcoming Insectarium Montreal, and reflects the practice's ongoing investigation of the relationship between the built and natural environments. They'll use the grant for a trip to Germany to study topics related to the architecture of nature museums.

Pelletier de ...

Landmarked Four Seasons restaurant must not be changed, NYC landmarks commission rules

2015-05-21T15:25:00-04:00

The interior of the Four Seasons restaurant, a vision of Modernist elegance with its French walnut paneling and white marble pool of bubbling water, should not be changed, New York City’s Landmarks Preservation Commission decided [...]. The decision was a setback to Aby J. Rosen, the owner of the Seagram Building, which is home to the restaurant. Mr. Rosen had proposed what he characterized as minor changes to the interior that was designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson in 1958.

Phyllis Lambert — part of the group of architects passionately opposing Rosen's revamp plans and personally interwoven with the history of the Seagram Building like no one else — penned this Op-Ed in the New York Times last week: Save New York's Four Seasons.

Phyllis Lambert named as 2014 Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement recipient

2014-05-20T15:31:00-04:00

Phyllis Lambert, Founding Director Emeritus of the Canadian Centre for Architecture, has been announced as the 2014 recipient of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement. The award comes from the upcoming Venice Biennale -- the 14th International Architecture Exhibition Fundamentals opening June 7 through Nov. 23, 2014. Aside from founding the CCA, Lambert is also widely known for commissioning the historic Seagram Building in New York to Mies van der Rohe.

Lambert was selected by the Board of la Biennale di Venezia, chaired by Paolo Baratta, under Director Rem Koolhaas. She will formally accept the Golden Lion award on June 7 at 11 a.m. in the Giardini of la Biennale, during the 14th International Architecture Exhibition opening and award ceremony.

More details on Bustler.

Audiotopie awarded the Phyllis Lambert Design Montréal Grant 2013

2013-12-11T19:11:00-05:00

Audiotopie was awarded $10,000 from the 2013 Phyllis Lambert Design Montreal Grant in Montreal, Canada earlier this week. Established in 2007, the annual grant distinguishes young, emerging Montreal designers who have shown excellence in their work and research study that can contribute to the city of Montreal.

"The $10,000 grant will enable the Audiotopie team, which designs immersive sound works closely connected to physical spaces through creation of sensory experiences, to go on a study trip during which its members will compare sound environments in the underground spaces of three Asian cities."

Phyllis Lambert steps down from Canadian Centre for Architecture

2013-12-05T14:01:00-05:00

Phyllis Lambert, 86, announced Wednesday she is retiring as chair of the board of trustees of the museum and research centre she founded in 1979. A tireless defender of Montreal’s built heritage, Lambert has taken an active role in every major urban planning debate in the city in the last four decades, from redeveloping the Old Port to protecting Mount Royal.

Phyllis Lambert, founder of the Canadian Centre for Architecture, is stepping down as chairperson. She had also served as Director of the CCA until 1999. Toronto architect Bruce Kuwabara will succeed her as chair of the world-renowned museum and research center.

Before becoming an architect in the 1960s, Lambert established herself as Director of Planning for the Seagram Building, where she was responsible for hiring Ludwig Mies van der Rohe as the designer. She recently published a book, Building Seagram, chronicling the experience.

Fred Bernstein reviews "Phyllis Lambert’s Building Seagram"

2013-05-13T18:37:00-04:00

As Seagram’s director of planning, Lambert visited the site daily. “I had intended to go back to Paris, but I stayed in New York, convinced that if the one person who really cared about the building was not there, Mies would not build Seagram,” she says. With Lambert as his protector and Johnson as his assistant, Mies went on to create in 1958 the Seagram building, a landmark of 20th-century architecture.

The Story Behind the Seagram Building

2013-04-08T13:43:00-04:00

Reading this was for me an epiphany. I could see, almost in a flash, the unity of building and landscape developing throughout Mies’s building art, ultimately morphing into the podium that binds the Seagram tower to the urban landscape — plaza, platform, an oasis amid the chaos of New York. This led me to reevaluate the importance of surrounding context, in Mies’s architecture throughout his career and to understand in a new light some of his statements, drawings, and photomontages.

"What led Mies to create the union of skyscraper and plaza on Park Avenue, a binding together so profoundly important in his oeuvre?" On Places, in an excerpt from the new book Building Seagram, Phyllis Lambert recounts the evolution of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's architectural philosophy, from his early years in Berlin to the postwar American projects; in particular she explores his deep concern for the interrelationship between architecture and landscape, which culminated in his design for the Seagram Building.