Paul Andreu Architect

Paul Andreu is an architect and an engineer, a craftsman of solutions who has mastered the large scale better than almost any other figure of his generation. Through his airports in particular, he has touched many millions of people, most of them never having heard of the designer. The buildings, foremost among them Charles-de-Gaulle Airport in Paris, are most typically worlds unto themselves, ideal places where everything functions perfectly and where travelers go on their way feeling uplifted and well cared for. With the powerful backing of Aeroports de Paris, Andreu has had the opportunity to create his own universes, and that desire to make almost self-sufficient entities carries forward even into his newer, more urban projects. Since the last decade, Paul Andreu has taken on the design and construction of very large buildings in China and Japan with a gusto that certainly proves he has wanted to go beyond airport design. His most visible, and controversial project has been the National Grand Theater in Beijing. Paul Andreu has a humility which is somewhat rarer amongst the elite of the French cultural establishment, and that may be one of the secrets to his worldwide success. His route would not be one that others could easily follow, but examining his path is nonetheless an instructive activity in the context of the differing solutions proposed by contemporary architects for the needs of modern society.