Renzo Piano (born September 14, 1937) is a famous architect.

He was born in Genoa, Italy and still maintains a home and office (Building Workshop) there. He was educated and subsequently taught at the Milan Politecnico. From 1965 to 1970 he worked with Louis Kahn and with Makowsky. He worked together with Richard Rogers from 1971 to 1977, their most famous project is the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris (1977).

He designed the Menil Collection Museum in Houston (1986), one of the most extraordinary 20th-century engineering feats in Kansai Airport, Osaka (1988), and the rebuilding of the Daimler-Benz part of the Potsdamer Platz in Berlin, Germany. 2003 will mark the completion of his basilica of San Giovanni Rotondo , a pilgrimage shrine to Padre Pio. Piano has also designed football stadia, bridges, liners and automobiles.

One of his most recent designs is the proposed London Bridge Tower skyscraper (also known as the Shard of glass) in London.

He won the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1998 and is a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador.

External links

• Renzo Piano, official site
• Pritzker Architecture Prize bio
• "Renzo Piano - A celebrity architect without all the glitz" Slate article