inspiration

Sometimes you see such beautiful buildings, that you want to know all about the architect and his work. Santiago Calatrava is such an architect. Born in 1951 near Valencia he is nowadays one of the most inspiring architects in the world and makes wonderful futuristic Art

“ I started out wanting to go to art school,” recalls Santiago Calatrava. “ Then, one day, I went to buy some things in a stationary store in Valencia, and I saw a little book with beautiful colors. It turned out to be about Le Corbusier, whose work was a discovery for me. As a result of buying it, I transferred to architecture school.

After his study at the  Escuela Tèchnica Superior de Arquitectura in Valencia Santiago decided to begin postgraduate studies in vivil engeneering at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich. This decision changed his life in many ways.

“ The desire to start over from zero was extremely strong for me. I was determined to set aside all of what I worked with in architecture school and to learn to draw like an engineer and to think like one too. I was fascinated by the concept of gravity and resolute in feeling that it was necessary to work with simple forms”

In 1981 he started for himself in Zürich.

Recently I made pictures from his new railroad station in Luik  / Liège-Belgium, the 3 bridges in Hoofddorp-Holland en his amazing creations in Valencia-Spain. I just hope that  some day his Maastricht project will be realised  too

Click here if you like to watch a slideshow in full screen HD quality ( 720p ) on YouTube with beautiful music by dutch pianoplayer  Michiel Borstlap  ( 7 minutes ) or click one of the albums below for photo impressions.

Santiago Calatrava