Poetic Construction

Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron are well-known figures in the tield of current architecture over the world. From the beginning of their career, they built up an inseparable cooperation, and created a great deal of excellent works together, therefore they were highly praised as architectural "duet" by the jury of Pritzker Architecture Prize in 2001. The scope and the type of their works are wide and various, and they not only distribute themselves in the architectural design but also served as professor in many universities. Moreover, in recently years, they have created lots of new influential masterpieces, publishing designs and announcing ideas on the professional publication continuously, so their thoughts and views are playing a more and more importani role in the realm of world architecture nowadays.During the course of their experience, Herzog and de Meuron pursue the most essential elements of architecture, emphasize its materiality, create and accumulate possibilities of material use, methods of structure, construction design, and look for direct dialogue with construction which acts as key factor in all problems of architecture. Their building is based on both basic construction discipline and poetical expression, having the characteristic of simple shape, skillful structure, elegant surface, sensitive material and pure space mostly. All of these show the two architects' unremitting endeavor on the craft, detail, material and the high quantity of construction.The present study is based on collecting related data of their work and life, understandingtheir living environment, growing up process and way of work, particularly on studies of their main works and professional books, then draw a conclusion on the development and formation of their thoughts and methods of design. Furthermore, the thesis paper was also writed from aspects of Western cultural tradition of tectonics and contemporary art, studied various factors that influence their thoughts, then established a more overall and thorough understanding about their design thoughts and works. The thesis aim at some problems existed in the field of architecture in China, hoping to draw some lessons and enlightenment from the study.