BBCSir Nicholas Grimshaw, the architect of the Eden Project in Cornwall, has died at the age of 85.
Sir Nicholas also designed the British Pavilion for the Seville Expo 1992 and the glass-and-steel International Terminal at Waterloo in London which won The Royal Institute of British Architects Building of the Year Award in 1994.
The news was announced on Monday afternoon by the architecture firm Grimshaw, which he founded in 1980.
In a statement, it said he had been “a man of invention and ideas” who would be remembered for “his endless curiosity about how things are made”.
“With this pragmatic creativity, Nick had an extraordinary ability to convince others that daring ideas were possible,” the firm added.
PA MediaSir Nicholas was knighted in 2002 for services to architecture.
He served as president of the Royal Academy from 2004 to 2011.
In 2022, he established the Grimshaw Foundation, which aims to promote innovative design, creativity and sustainability among young people.
In Cornwall, his design of the Eden Project was constructed in a former clay pit near St Austell and opened in 2001.
The visitor attraction and environmental charity’s huge bubble-like domes, called biomes, were built to recreate some of the Earth’s different climates, as well house thousands of different plant species and some animals.
PA MediaChairman at Grimshaw Andrew Whalley said: “From the very first day I arrived at the practice in 1986, I felt the warmth and generosity of Nick’s leadership.
“The lack of hierarchy in the studio, shaped by his amiable and open personality, was its true strength.
“His architecture was never about surface or fashion, but always about structure, craft, and purpose – about creating buildings that endure because they are both useful and uplifting and, in Nick’s words ‘bring some kind of joy’.”
The firm gave its condolences to Sir Nicholas’ family, his wife Lady Lavinia and their children Chloe and Isabel.
