-432 Athens, Greece Classical Greek
Parthenon
A Doric temple on the Acropolis whose proportions and entasis became a reference point for the classical tradition.
Chronicle
Buildings 78
One decade at a time, one plate after another.
-432 
126 Rome, Italy Roman
Pantheon
Rome’s concrete-domed temple, rebuilt under Hadrian, is famous for its circular hall and the beam of light from its oculus.
537 Istanbul, Türkiye Byzantine
Hagia Sophia
Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus
A Byzantine monument with a vast central dome on pendentives, whose uses have changed between cathedral, mosque, museum, and mosque.
1220 Chartres, France Gothic
Chartres Cathedral
A canonical French Gothic cathedral known for its lofty nave and stained glass.
1345 Paris, France Gothic
Notre-Dame de Paris
The Gothic cathedral on Paris’s Île de la Cité is renowned for flying buttresses and rose windows.
1851 London, United Kingdom Iron and glass
The Crystal Palace
The 1851 exhibition hall assembled at enormous scale from prefabricated iron and glass, later destroyed by fire.
1882 Barcelona, Spain Catalan Modernisme
Sagrada Família
Barcelona’s basilica has remained under construction since 1882. Gaudí devoted his later life to it, while later teams continue the work.
1889 Paris, France Steel frame
Eiffel Tower
An iron tower built for the 1889 Exposition, later becoming the emblem of structural beauty in the industrial age.
1906 Barcelona, Spain Art Nouveau
Casa Batlló
Gaudí’s remodeling of a Barcelona house, mainly from 1904 to 1906, is renowned for a facade evoking bone and skin.
1908 Oak Park, United States Prairie
Unity Temple
A reinforced-concrete Unitarian meeting house in Oak Park, completed in 1908, and an early landmark of modern American religious architecture.
1914 Barcelona, Spain Catalan Modernisme
Park Güell
Begun as a housing development and opened as a park, its principal works date roughly from 1900 to 1914.
1924 Utrecht, Netherlands De Stijl
Rietveld Schröder House
Rietveld’s De Stijl house assembles space from planes, lines, and primary colors.
1926 Dessau, Germany Modernism
Bauhaus Dessau Building
Gropius’s Bauhaus school and workshop complex, clearly separating functions behind a glass curtain wall.
1929 Barcelona, Spain International Style
Barcelona Pavilion
The German Pavilion for the 1929 exposition, reconstructed in the 1980s, is defined by a free plan and flowing material planes.
1931 Poissy, France Modernism
Villa Savoye
Le Corbusier’s iconic 1931 white house at Poissy condenses the Five Points of Modern Architecture into one design.
1933 Paimio, Finland Nordic modernism
Paimio Sanatorium
A 1933 Finnish tuberculosis sanatorium where beds, windows, and rail heights shaped a humane modernist design.
1937 Mill Run, United States Organic architecture
Fallingwater
A 1937 house with horizontal terraces cantilevered over a waterfall in Mill Run, Pennsylvania, and Wright’s defining work of organic architecture.
1949 New Canaan, United States International Style
Glass House
Philip Johnson’s glass-and-steel residence explores the transparent box under the influence of Mies.
1951 Plano, United States Minimal
Farnsworth House
A 1951 single-story glass-and-steel house beside the Fox River, conceived as an experiment in transparency and minimal structure.
1952 New York, United States International Style
Lever House
An early glass curtain-wall tower on Park Avenue designed by Gordon Bunshaft at SOM.
1952 Marseille, France Early Brutalism
Unité d'Habitation
A 1952 vertical-village housing block in Marseille combining dwellings, shops, shared facilities, and a communal roof.
1955 Ronchamp, France Expressive modernism
Notre-Dame du Haut
A 1955 pilgrimage chapel at Ronchamp where a sculptural roof and light openings in thick walls create a sacred atmosphere.
1955 Hiroshima, Japan Modernism
Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum
The 1955 museum in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park uses a raised mass and a strong axis to shape a place of memory.
1958 New York, United States International Style
Seagram Building
The 1958 bronze curtain-wall tower and its setback plaza established a model for Midtown office architecture.
1959 New York, United States Organic architecture
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
Wright’s 1959 museum on Fifth Avenue replaced a sequence of galleries with one continuous spiral ramp.
1962 New York, United States Expressionist modern
TWA Flight Center
Eero Saarinen’s wing-like terminal at JFK, a landmark of flowing concrete form.
1963 New Haven, United States Modernism
Beinecke Rare Book Library
Yale’s rare-book library filters daylight through marble panels and displays its collection in a glass tower.
1964 Philadelphia, United States Postmodern
Vanna Venturi House
A house for Venturi’s mother that helped announce Postmodernism and the claim that less is a bore.
1964 Tokyo, Japan Modernism
Yoyogi National Gymnasium
A 1964 Tokyo Olympic arena whose suspended roof, cables, and sweeping eaves form one silhouette.
1965 St. Louis, United States Modernism
Gateway Arch
A stainless-steel catenary arch beside the Mississippi River, conceived as a monumental symbol of St. Louis.
1965 La Jolla, United States Modernism
Salk Institute
A 1965 research campus on the La Jolla cliffs, famous for its austere central court and axis toward the Pacific.
1968 São Paulo, Brazil Brazilian modernism
São Paulo Museum of Art
A museum whose glass gallery is suspended from red beams, leaving an urban plaza open below.
1970 Brasília, Brazil Brazilian modernism
Cathedral of Brasília
A 1970 cathedral in Brasília whose hyperbolic concrete columns surround a circular plan.
1971 Helsinki, Finland Nordic modernism
Finlandia Hall
A 1971 concert and conference hall in Helsinki where white marble masses and curves meet the lakeside setting.
1972 Fort Worth, United States Modernism
Kimbell Art Museum
A 1972 museum in Fort Worth whose cycloid vaults and daylight slots softly illuminate the galleries.
1973 Sydney, Australia Expressionist modern
Sydney Opera House
Jørn Utzon’s harbor performance complex, whose shell roofs became a late twentieth-century landmark.
1973 Verona, Italy Modernism
Castelvecchio Museum
Carlo Scarpa’s museum conversion of a medieval fortress, celebrated as a lesson in material joints and intervention.
1974 Chicago, United States Skyscraper
Willis Tower
A Chicago skyscraper using a bundled-tube structure, formerly known as the Sears Tower.
1976 Osaka, Japan Minimal
Row House in Sumiyoshi
Ando’s seminal 1976 house on a narrow Osaka site brings daylight and rain into daily life through a central court.
1977 Paris, France High-tech
Centre Pompidou
The 1977 Beaubourg cultural center by Piano and Rogers turns structure and services outward to free the interior.
1978 Washington, D.C., United States Modernism
East Building, NGA
The 1978 East Building of the National Gallery of Art uses triangular geometry and an atrium of daylight to guide circulation.
1982 Dhaka, Bangladesh Monumentality
Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban
Kahn’s monumental parliamentary complex in Dhaka, completed in 1982, is framed by geometric openings and water courts.
1985 Central, Hong Kong High-tech
HSBC Building Hong Kong
A 1985 High-Tech headquarters in Central, Hong Kong, exposing its external trusses and service towers.
1986 London, United Kingdom High-tech
Lloyd's Building
An inside-out office building with services placed outside, extending the High-Tech lineage of the Pompidou.
1987 Paris, France High-tech
Institut du Monde Arabe
A Paris cultural institution whose diaphragm-like south facade modulates daylight.
1989 Paris, France Modernism
Louvre Pyramid
The 1989 glass-pyramid entrance to the Louvre contrasts modern geometry with a historic palace court.
1989 Ibaraki, Japan Exposed concrete
Church of the Light
A small 1989 chapel in Ibaraki, Osaka Prefecture, where a cross-shaped opening cuts through exposed concrete.
1990 Central, Hong Kong Modernism
Bank of China Tower
A 1990 Hong Kong skyscraper whose triangular geometry and diagonal bracing are expressed on the facade.
1993 Weil am Rhein, Germany Deconstructivism
Vitra Fire Station
Hadid’s early built work, composed of sharply angled concrete planes in collision.
1994 Osaka, Japan High-tech
Kansai International Airport
A long, curving 1994 terminal on an artificial island in Osaka Bay, notable for its roof span and immense check-in hall.
1996 Niterói, Brazil Brazilian modernism
Niterói Contemporary Art Museum
A 1996 saucer-shaped museum overlooking Guanabara Bay, approached by a long curving ramp.
1996 Vals, Switzerland Minimal
Therme Vals
A stone thermal bath in an Alpine village, renowned for silent chambers and narrow passages.
1997 Los Angeles, United States Modernism
Getty Center
A hilltop campus of museum and research institutions characterized by white planes, stone, and strong axes.
1997 Bilbao, Spain Deconstructivism
Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
A museum of curving titanium surfaces and a symbol of urban regeneration known as the Bilbao effect.
1997 Seattle, United States Contemporary
Chapel of St. Ignatius
A university chapel based on the concept of seven bottles of light, known for its colored luminous interior.
1999 Berlin, Germany High-tech
Reichstag Dome
The 1999 glass dome added to Berlin’s parliament, with spiral ramps and a mirrored cone directing light below.
2001 Sendai, Japan Contemporary
Sendai Mediatheque
A transparent public media library whose lattice tubes pierce a stack of open floor plates.
2001 Berlin, Germany Deconstructivism
Jewish Museum Berlin
A museum of zigzag plans and voids that gives spatial form to memory and absence.
2003 Los Angeles, United States Deconstructivism
Walt Disney Concert Hall
A Los Angeles concert hall wrapped in stainless-steel curves, and Gehry’s major American performance building.
2004 London, United Kingdom High-tech
30 St Mary Axe
The 2004 diagrid office tower at 30 St Mary Axe, widely known as the Gherkin.
2004 Kanazawa, Japan Minimal
21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art
A 2004 circular museum in Kanazawa where glass and white planes loosen the boundary between park and institution.
2004 Millau, France High-tech
Millau Viaduct
A cable-stayed bridge crossing the Tarn Valley, and a landmark collaboration between Foster and structural engineers.
2004 Seattle, United States Contemporary
Seattle Central Library
A 2004 public library stacking functional platforms inside a faceted glass envelope.
2005 Porto, Portugal Contemporary
Casa da Música
A 2005 polyhedral concert hall in Porto, sculptural outside and densely organized with performance and public spaces within.
2006 New York, United States High-tech
Hearst Tower
A diagrid office tower rising above a historic masonry base in Manhattan.
2007 Cologne, Germany Minimal
Kolumba Museum
A museum built over wartime ruins and archaeological layers, distinguished by a perforated brick filter wall.
2009 Tokyo, Japan Contemporary
Nezu Museum
A museum where bamboo, deep eaves, and garden paths express Kengo Kuma’s material sensibility.
2010 Lausanne, Switzerland Minimal
Rolex Learning Center
The 2010 EPFL learning center in Lausanne uses an undulating floor and roof to define zones without conventional stories.
2010 Dubai, United Arab Emirates Skyscraper
Burj Khalifa
A supertall tower whose buttressed Y-shaped plan and stepped setbacks respond to wind.
2010 Rome, Italy Contemporary
MAXXI
Rome’s 2010 national museum of twenty-first-century arts, organized as a network of crossing gallery ribbons.
2011 London, United Kingdom Parametric
London Aquatics Centre
A 2011 Olympic swimming complex in London beneath a broad wave-like roof.
2012 London, United Kingdom High-tech
The Shard
A 2012 glass spire at London Bridge stacking offices, hotel space, and viewing levels in a mixed-use skyscraper.
2012 Baku, Azerbaijan Parametric
Heydar Aliyev Center
A 2012 cultural center in Baku whose continuous surfaces make ground, wall, and roof flow together.
2012 Beijing, China Contemporary
CCTV Headquarters
A looped Beijing skyscraper in which OMA twists program and structure into a new urban icon.
2013 Wonju, South Korea Exposed concrete
Museum SAN
A 2013 museum in the mountains of Wonju by Tadao Ando, organized through paths, courts, and terrain.
2016 Jeju, South Korea Exposed concrete
Healing Stay Kosmos
A 2016 lodging and architectural project at Seongsan, Jeju, publicly documented in connection with Tadao Ando.
2017 Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates Contemporary
Louvre Abu Dhabi
A museum city beneath a vast sea-borne dome that produces a patterned rain of light.
2017 Cupertino, United States High-tech
Apple Park
A circular corporate campus combining landscape, large glass panels, and energy infrastructure.