The Boston Society of Architects and the American Institute of Architects will host a major retrospective of Somerville-based architect Moshe Safdie at BSA Space in downtown Boston beginning March 16. Perhaps best-known as the architect of Israel's official Holocaust memorial and the Habitat '67 model apartment complex (rendered above), the 77-year-old Safdie pioneered the design philosophy of "progressive contextualism," according to the BSA, or "the belief that a building should be an extension of its physical, historical, and cultural environments."
Habitat '67, or Habitat of the Future, started as Safdie's thesis at McGill University and then became reality as part of the 1967 World's Fair in Montreal. The design launched his international prominence. The BSA exhibit, divided into five parts covering Safdie's career, starts with his work as an undergraduate.
In our fair commonwealth, Safdie is best-known for the design of the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, done from 1996 to 2003.
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Safdie designed the Yad Vashem memorial in Jerusalem, where his firm has an office, from 1997 to 2005. It's triangularly shaped and resembles a prism.
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The Bishan Sky Habitat is brand-new, having gone up in Singapore from 2010 to 2015.
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The Salt Lake City Public Library's main branch was completed in 2003. Safdie's design features a soaring atrium.
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Safdie's Marina Bay Sands ArtScience Museum resembles a lotus flower opening. The project went up in Singapore as part of the larger Marina Bay Sands development, which was built out from 2006 to 2011 (the wider development is pictured below).
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Safdie designed the campus of Jerusalem's Hebrew Union College in 1988. The campus' courtyard is pictured above.
· Global Citizen: The Architecture of Moshe Safdie [BSA/AIA]
· Our Architecture Tours archive [Curbed Boston]
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