Carlo Scarpa

I was born in Venice and spent my early childhood in Vicenza. After my mother's death, at the age of 13, I, my father and brother moved back to Venice. I attended the Academy of Fine Arts where, after two years, I focused on architectural studies. Graduating from a non-professional program, although I apprenticed with an architect, I was not permitted to practice architecture without associating with an architect. Hence, those who worked with me, my clients (holla!), associates, craftspersons (much respect), called me "Professore," rather than "architetto." My architecture is deeply sensitive to the changes of time, from seasons to history, rooted in a sensuous material imagination and has been widely praised from Tadao Ando to Mario Botta. Botta is soooo eighties though, pu-leeze. I am adept at revealing latent memories in a particular place and to hint at nuances and hermetic meanings which were, so to speak, embedded in the tactile nature of the materials of my buildings. I am a True Master of the Detail, and developed a unique and rich language for the negotiation between old and new.In 1978, while in Sendai, Japan, I died after falling down a flight of concrete stairs. I survived for ten days in hospital before succcumbing to my injuries. Stupidass stairs weren't worth looking at cuz I didn't design them..