Anupama Kundoo

The Jencks Foundation and the Royal Institute of British Architects gave the RIBA Charles Jencks Award of 2021 to Anupama Kundoo. This annual prize is conferred on a person, studio, or firm that has “made a major contribution to the theory and practice of architecture.” The awarding ceremony was held on 2 November at the institution’s London headquarters, at which the Indian architect spoke on the fundamentals of her work, characterized by the close attention given to the social, material, and climate context of sites. Kundoo trained as an architect in Mumbai, and is known especially for the projects that she carried out in the period between 1990 and 2005 in Auroville, where she made a name for herself as a pioneer in applying ecological technologies, including reuse of materials and the recourse to local and sustainable manual skills. Kundoo is equally devoted to teaching and has served as lecturer and professor in renowned universities all over the world, including Parsons and The New School for Design in New York, Yale, the University of Queensland, and more recently FH Potsdam.