An architect whose career spans decades and continents, Kenzo Tange was one of the most significant architects of the 20th century. Born in 1913, when attending high school in Hiroshima, he discovered the works of Le Corbusier, a Swiss-French architect considered one of the pioneers of modern architecture, in a foreign art journal and subsequently decided to pursue a career in architecture himself (AD Editorial Team). He studied architecture at the University of Tokyo and, after graduating, began working for Kunio Maekawa who had practiced with Le Corbusier in his Paris studio in the late 1920s.
With his designs, Tange thought of how they would affect everyday people and considered the problems these designs could solve. His doctorate, completed in 1959, was titled, "Spatial Structure in a Large City," an interpretation of urban structure on the basis of people's movements commuting to and from work (“Biography”). His "Plan for Tokyo 1960" was the logical response to these patterns, giving thought to the nature of urban structure that would permit growth and change.
In all of his projects, there is a recurrent theme that Tange has verbalized as, "Architecture must have something that appeals to the human heart, but even then, basic forms, spaces and appearances must be logical. Creative work is expressed in our time as a union of technology and humanity. The role of tradition is that of a catalyst, which furthers a chemical reaction, but is no longer detectable in the end result. Tradition can, to be sure, participate in a creation, but it can no longer be creative itself" (“Biography”). The blend of both traditional Japanese design with modern architecture created a body of work that was instantly recognizable and uniquely his own.
One of the most significant structures in his portfolio was built after the end of World War II. The destruction caused by the war, most notably to the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was devastating and Japan set to rebuild itself from the rubble. Tange’s first major commission was hugely symbolic: the replanning of the city of Hiroshima after its destruction by Little Boy, the atomic bomb dropped by the USAF B-29 Enola Gay on August 6th, 1945 (Glancey). At the heart of the revived city, Tange built a peace center, raised on stilt-like, Le Corbusier-style columns, or piloti, faced by a monument that married ancient forms and the latest structural technology. This became the main building of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. In addition, Tange planned and designed the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park which includes the distinctive Cenotaph.
Tange’s works were not limited to Hiroshima or even just to Japan; they span across the globe. Structures in Japan include Yoyogi National Stadium for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, Akasaka Prince Hotel, and the Tokyo City Hall. Those outside of Japan include projects in Italy, multiple structures in Singapore, and some projects in the United States. Many of his structures are still standing today, deepening the impact they have on each generation.
Kenzo Tange was awarded The Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1987. Jay A. Pritzker, president of The Hyatt Foundation, established the prize in 1979 to reward a creative endeavor not honored by the Nobel Prizes (“Announcement: Kenzo Tange”). In making the award to Tange, the jury's citation read in part, as follows:
Given talent, energy, and a sufficiently long career, one may pass from being a
breaker of new ground to being revered as a classic. This has been the happy fate of
Kenzo Tange, who in his seventh decade, is celebrated as an architect of international
stature. His stadiums for the Olympic Games held in Tokyo in 1964 have been
described as among the most beautiful buildings of the twentieth century.
Noted author and journalist Brendan Gill, secretary to the Pritzker jury, said of Tange:
He has shaped, as architect, teacher, and philosopher of architecture, half a century
of Japanese building design and urban planning. In his youth, he was influenced by Le
Corbusier, and later, while teaching at MIT, by his close friend Eero Saarinen. Among
his students and colleagues in Japan, have been Fumihiko Maki and Arata Isozaki
(“Announcement: Kenzo Tange”).
His statement highlights the influence Tange has had and will continue to have on Japan and its architecture in profound ways.
Kenzo Tange died in 2005 at the age of 91 leaving behind his second wife, their son, Paul Noritaka Tange, who is also an architect, and a daughter.
Selected Readings
Kenzō Tange: Architecture for the World, Seng Kuan and Yukio Lippit 2012
Kenzo Tange and the Metabolist Movement: Urban Utopias of Modern Japan, Dr. Zhongjie Lin 2023
Related Media
Gallery of works by Tange Associates which include those by Kenzo Tange
Tange Kenzo, manga available for free on Tange’s life (in Japanese)
Works Cited
AD Editorial Team. “Spotlight: Kenzō Tange.” ArchDaily, 4 Sept. 2019, www.archdaily.com/270043/happy-birthday-kenzo-tange. Accessed 11 Mar. 2025.
Glancey, Jonathan. “Obituary: Kenzo Tange.” The Guardian, 23 Mar. 2005, www.theguardian.com/news/2005/mar/23/guardianobituaries.artsobituaries1. Accessed 11 Mar. 2025.
The Pritzker Architecture Prize. “Biography.” The Pritzker Architecture Prize, 7 Jan. 2010, web.archive.org/web/20100107030325/www.pritzkerprize.com/laureates/1987/bio.html. Accessed 9 Mar. 2025.
The Pritzker Architecture Prize. “Announcement: Kenzo Tange.” The Pritzker Architecture Prize, www.pritzkerprize.com/announcement-kenzo-tange. Accessed 11 Mar. 2025.