Vittorio Magnago Lampugnani

Design Critic in Architecture

Vittorio Magnago Lampugnani studied architecture at Sapienza University and the University of Stuttgart, where he obtained his PhD. He played a seminal role in the International Building Exhibition in Berlin, while serving as a member of the editorial board of the magazine Casabella in Milan. He later served as chief editor of Domus magazine and as the director of the German Architecture Museum in Frankfurt am Main. From 1994 until 2016 he held the chair for History of Urban Design at ETH Zurich. Since 1981, he has headed the Studio di Architettura in Milan and, since 2010 and together with a partner, Baukontor Architekten in Zurich.

In his writing, his teaching and his practice, Lampugnani has consistently advocated for architectural and urban sustainability. His own projects, from the Novartis Campus in Basel to the Richti urban quarter and the office building on Schiffbauplatz, both in Zurich, are examples of an urban architecture that tries to comply with the imperative of A Radical Normal (the title of his latest book) and with the challenges of our earth’s limited resources.