Form isn't Facile

Alejandro Zaera-Polo is an architect and cofounder of London and Barcelona-based Alejandro Zaera-Polo Architecture (AZPA). He graduated from the Escuela Tecnica Superior de Arquitectura de Madrid with Honors and obtained an MARCH2 degree from Harvard GSD with Distinction. He worked at OMA in Rotterdam prior to establishing first FOA in 1993, and AZPA in 2011, the vehicles where he has developed a successful international professional practice since.

In parallel to his professional activities, Alejandro Zaera-Polo has developed a substantial role within academia. He was the dean of the Berlage Institute in Rotterdam from 2002–2006, holding the Berlage Chair at the Delft University of Technology. He is a Visiting Professor at Princeton University and the first recipient of the Norman R. Foster Visiting Professorship at Yale. He has published extensively as a theorist in El Croquis, Quaderns, A+U, Arch+, Volume, Log and many other international magazines and is a member of the London School of Economics Urban Age project.

His current projects in the UK include Birmingham New Street Station in Birmingham and Trinity EC3 office complex in the City of London. In Spain, he is involved in a new Hospital in Lleida, a Biotechnology centre in Barcelona, the redevelopment of the Santander Waterfront, including the design of a new ferry terminal and a yacht club. AZPA is also involved in the development of two-high-rise residential towers in Busan, Korea.