Richard Leplastrier receives Dreyer Foundation Award Denmark

Richard Leplastrier teaching on the annual Glenn Murcutt Master Class in Australia

Richard Leplastrier, great architect, great teacher, has been awarded the prestigious Dreyer Foundation Prize of Honour in Denmark – the first non-Dane to receive this award. The Dreyer Foundation makes an annual award to an architect who has made an outstanding contribution to architectural thinking and to society. Lene Tranberg, jury member, in her citation states “Richard Leplastrier’s architecture reveals a profound understanding of sustainability in the deepest sense of the term. Through a philosophy that is best summarized in the statement – let’s cultivate less - he has developed a truly original and personal approach to living and creating with dignity and respect.” Richard was also awarded the Spirit of Nature Wood Architecture Award in Finland, a prize also received by Renzo Piano, Peter Zumthor, Kengo Kuma and José Cruz Ovalle. Richard is a friend and contemporary of Glenn Murcutt and is a principal tutor on the annual Glenn Murcutt International Architecture Master Class in Australia. A portfolio of projects by Richard Leplastrier is available on the web site – www.ozetecture.org. For information email – info@ozetecture,org

Glenn Murcutt Exhibition

Sectional model, 'blow-up' drawings and photographs of Glenn Murcutt's Magney House at Bingie Point in the exhibition at the Museum of Sydney.

A major exhibition of 'blow up' drawings and models of the built works of Glenn Murcutt, with stunning photographs by Anthony Browell, is running at the prestigious Museum of Sydney, a short walk from Sydney Opera House, from 13 June - 5 October 2009. The exhibition was presented by TOTO at the Gallery Ma in Tokyo from June to August 2008 and was curated by Prof. Tom Heneghan and academic colleagues from Sydney schools of architecture. It has been reproduced for display worldwide by the Architecture Foundation Australia. The exhibition is accompanied by two new books on Murcutt published by TOTO, a volume of photographs and a volume of drawings. Glenn Murcutt will be interviewed at a public event at Sydney Opera House on the last day of the exhibition - World Architecture Day, 5 October. The Sydney exhibition has been sponsored by the NSW Architects Registration Board. It is planned for the exhibition to be toured to Melbourne, Brisbane and to overseas venues. See www.ozetecture.org Contact info@ozetecture.org

Architecture Summer School 2010

Participants on the 09 Summer School under the shade of a mangrove tree on the shore at Morning Bay, Pittwater north of Sydney

PSST! - The sixth annual Pittwater "Total Immersion" residential Architecture Student Summer School will be held again 14 - 20 February 2010 with principal tutors Richard Leplastrier and Peter Stutchbury with Lindsay Johnston. 32 places are available on the design studio based program . Students must have completed at least two years, preferably three, at architecture school. Applications are now being taken. Information and application forms on the web site www.ozetecture.org

"A very big thank you to the three of you for such a special week and for providing a learning environment engendered with the sort of fun, integrity, honesty and inspiration so often missing from the industry. In these strange economic times as 'starchitecture' falters somewhat, the course is a timely reminder to the profession that simple and honest ideas produced from site can produce far richer architecture than a flash hunk of titanium. Admittedly we can't all build on a beautiful peninsula in a coastal National Park, but I can certainly take the idea of manifesting the essence of a place through the built form (however large or small the intervention might be) throughout my career." BS, Victoria University Wellington, New Zealand (2009)

2010 Murcutt Master Class - ON

Participants at work at Glenn Murcutt's 'Master Work' Riversdale, the Arthur and Yvonne Boyd Education Centre, on the banks of the Shoalhaven River south of Sydney, July 2009.

32 practising architects and senior students from 19 nations attended the ninth annual two week residential design studio Master Class with Glenn Murcutt 12 - 26 July.

Participants undertook the design for a gallery to display the paintings of Arthur Boyd who donated the Riversdale property to the people of Australia.

The 2010 Master Class with Glenn Murcutt, Richard Leplastrier, Brit Andresen and Peter Stutchbury will take place at Riversdale 11 - 25 July 2010. For information and application form - www.ozetecture.org or email info@ozetecture.org

South Africa Master Class

Richard Leplastrier and Peter Stutchbury debate the location of solar north at the Cradle of Mankind.

The Cement and Concrete Institute of South Africa in association with the Architecture Foundation Australia arranged a one-week residential professional Master Class for architects with Australian architects, Richard Leplastrier and Peter Stutchbury and leading South African architect Andrew Makin, at the Cradle of Mankind outside Jo'burg 26 April - 5 May 2009. The program has grown from the annual two-week Glenn Murcutt Master Class in Australia and the one-week New Zealand Master Class with Ian Athfield. See www.ozetecture.org

“I wanted to express my appreciation for the (first South African Architecture) Master Class arranged by the Cement and Concrete Institute, which I attended. It was a unique and life changing experience for me. One does not often have the opportunity to interact with great local and international practitioners. The standard of the teaching, the talks, the crit sessions and the design submissions from the groups was extremely high, I thought, and very inspiring. It has given me lasting inspiration and a renewal of vision for my practice in the future. The event was professionally organized, well structured and carefully coordinated.” Jon Jacobson, Managing Partner, Metropolis Architects

Murcutt International Family Grows

Jose Talavera 2005 Chula Sanchez 2003 and Candid Rogers 2007 alumni from different years of the Glenn Murcutt Master Class meet in Mercado Sta Catalina in Barcelona in January 2009. Apart from the 'life changing' experience of attending the two week residential Glenn Murcutt International Architecture Master Class in Australia, participants join a huge international family and are meeting up with participants from different years in different places around the world. For information - www.ozetecture.org

Glenn Murcutt AIA Gold Medal

Glenn Murcutt teaching at the annual Glenn Murcutt International Architecture Master Class (Photo Michael Nicholson)

Glenn Murcutt has been awarded the 2009 American Institute of Architects Gold Medal. 2005 Gold Medallist Tadao Ando writes of Murcutt - Recently our architectural field has experienced an ecological boom. However, without relation to such a trend of time, Glenn Murcutt has always been focusing on the geographical and regional conditions, from the very beginning of his career.

AIA Announcement -
http://www.aia.org/press2_template.cfm?pagename=release_a120408_gold
Video Clip of Murcutt Master Class -
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=TkvtyUVW3jc
Information of the annual Murcutt Master Class -
http://www.ozetecture.org

Catedra Luis Barragan for Stutchbury and Leplastrier

Peter Stutchbury teaching at the annual Glenn Murcutt International Architecture Master Class in Australia

Peter Stutchbury has been invited to take the Catedra (Chair) Luis Barragan in Mexico in November 2008, an annual invitation where the 8 schools of architecture in Mexico invite a professor/teacher for a 2-3 week intensive Master Class program of lectures and tutorials. Peter has proposed that he share the Catedra with his close friend and mentor Richard Leplastrier. Peter is a leading Australian practitioner whose work has been widely published internationally and he has received numerous architecture awards. He recently won the International Iron and Steel Institute competition for Sustainable Housing in Cherepovets, Russia. Richard is a Gold Medallist of the Australian Institute of Architects and was recipient of the 2004 Spirit of Nature Wood Architecture Award (Finland), also awarded to Renzo Piano, Peter Zumthor and Kengo Kuma Previous holders of the Catedra Luis Barragan have been Norman Foster, Nick Grimshaw, Tadao Ando and Glenn Murcutt. Peter and Richard are both 'Masters' on the annual Glenn Murcutt Master Class in Australia, the New Zealand Master Class and the Student Summer School. Details on www.ozetecture.org