This space was designed as a commemorative project for the fiftieth anniversary of the establishment of the UNESCO. The brief requested a ‘space of meditation’ for global peace, transcending all religions. The pavilion is located within the complex of the institution’s Paris headquarters, designed by Marcel Breuer, and the adjacent Japanese garden by Isamu Noguchi. While showing deference to the existing environment, the project theme was how this new space could express a strong, independent will.

The first step was to restore the Noguchi garden, which was in a state of disrepair. Next, two walls were put up to enclose an area separated from the surrounding spaces, and a body of water that descends towards the pavilion along the topography. Formally, the building is a reinforced concrete cylinder of 6.3 meters in diameter and in height. It is a massive volume whose only openings are the entrances and a slit-shaped perimeter skylight that seems to float over the interior space. As a reminder of the horror of war and an invitation to introspection, stone exposed to radiation was donated by the city of Hiroshima, and has been applied to the floor surface and the bottom of the pond...[+]