Artist of the day: Artist of the day, May 14, 2020: Moshe Safdie, an Israeli-Canadian architect, urban designer, educator, theorist, and author (#994)

Thursday, May 14, 2020

Artist of the day, May 14, 2020: Moshe Safdie, an Israeli-Canadian architect, urban designer, educator, theorist, and author (#994)

Moshe Safdie CC FAIA FRAIC (1938) is an Israeli-Canadian architect, urban designer, educator, theorist, and author. He is most identified with designing Marina Bay Sands and Jewel Changi Airport, as well as his debut project Habitat 67, which was originally conceived as his Master's thesis while studying at McGill University and paved the way for his international career.

Safdie was born in Haifa in Israel, to Sephardic Jewish family of Syrian-Jewish and Lebanese-Jewish descent. In 1954, his family moved to Montreal, Canada and in 1959, Safdie married Nina Nusynowicz, whom he has two children. His son Oren Safdie is a playwright who has written several plays about architecture. and his daughter Taal is an architect in San Diego.

In 1961, Safdie received his master's degree in Architecture from the McGill University School of Architecture. After apprenticing with Louis Kahn in Philadelphia, Safdie returned to Montreal to oversee the master plan for Expo 67. In 1964, he established his own firm to undertake Habitat 67, an adaptation of his McGill thesis. Habitat 67, which pioneered the design and implementation of three-dimensional, prefabricated units for living, was a central feature of Expo 67 and an important development in architectural history. He was awarded the 1967 Construction Man of the Year Award from the Engineering News-Record and the Massey Medal for Architecture in Canada for Habitat 67.

In 1970, Safdie opened a branch office in Jerusalem. Among the projects he has designed in Jerusalem are Yad Vashem and the Alrov Mamilla Quarter, which includes the Mamilla Mall, David's Village luxury condominiums, and the 5-star Mamilla Hotel. In 1978, after teaching at McGill, Ben Gurion, and Yale universities, Safdie moved his main office to Boston and became director of the Urban Design Program at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design, until 1984. From 1984 to 1989, he was the Ian Woodner Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at Harvard. Since the early 1990s, Safdie, a citizen of Canada, Israel, and the United States, has focused on his architectural practice.

Safdie has designed six of Canada's principal public institutions—including the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, and Vancouver Library Square—as well as many other notable projects around the world, including the Salt Lake City Main Public Library; the Khalsa Heritage Centre in Punjab, India; the Marina Bay Sands, integrated resort in Singapore; the United States Institute of Peace Headquarters in Washington, DC; the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts in Kansas City, Missouri; and the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas.

He is a self-described modernist.

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