DAVID ADJAYE: Works

David Adjaye, OBE

Lead Advisory Judge, Founder and Principal Architect, Adjaye Associates

David Adjaye OBE was born in Tanzania to Ghanian parents and his influences range from contemporary art, music and science to African art forms and the civic life of cities. He founded Adjaye Associates in 2000 and immediately won several prestigious commissions. In Oslo, he designed the Nobel Peace Centre in the shell of a disused railway station (completed in 2005). In London, his design for the Whitechapel Idea Store pioneered a new approach to the provision of information services (2005). Later projects in London included the Stephen Lawrence Center with teaching and community spaces (200&), Rivington Place, an exhibition venue and resource centre (2007), and the Bernie Grant Centre for the performing arts (2007).

Adjaye Associates now has offices in London, Berlin, New York, Accra and Shanghai, and is working throughout the world. In the United States, Adjaye is the designer of a new home for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver (2007), two public libraries in Washington DC (2012), the Sugar Hill low income housing development in Harlem (2014) and the redesigned Ethelbert Cooper Gallery of African & African American Art at Harvard’s Hutchins Center (2014). Adjaye Associates’ larges completed project to date is the 160 million Moscow School of Management Skolkovo (2010). Current projects include the $360 million Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall in Washington DC, the Alara concept store in Lagos, the Aishti Foundation arts and retail centre in Beirut and a new headquarters building for the International Finance Corporation in Dakar.