Tadao Ando. Sketches, Drawings, and Architecture - (Hardcover)

About the Book

With a selection of 750 sketches, drawings, models, and technical plans showcasing the process of his architectural oeuvre, Tadao Ando personally introduces us to the inspirations behind his architectural ideas. From his beginnings in the 1970s to his most recent projects, explore the iconic concept sketches of the Modernist master.

Book Synopsis

This hugely revealing journey through the mind and memory of one of architecture's great poets is told in Tadao Ando's own words. A very personal volume, it traces five decades of prolific creativity, gathering over 750 sketches, models, and technical drawings that reveal the essence of his practice. From the raw immediacy of pencil lines to the precision of technical drawings, witness the evolution of many of his most famous projects-- among them Row House in Sumiyoshi, Rokko Housing, Chichu Art Museum, Bourse de Commerce--not as isolated moments of inspiration, but as living architectural projects, shaped by time, travel, and reflection.

More than a monograph, this is a map of Ando's inner landscape. He remembers light of a stone monastery in southern France, the deep spatial resonance of a stepwell in Ahmedabad, and the labyrinthine mystery of cave dwellings in Cappadocia. Experienced during his early travels in his youth, these memories became seeds. Learn how these fragments of experience, filtered through body and emotion, reemerged as intense spatial dramas, rendered in concrete, glass and light.

Ando has remained faithful to the fragility of the hand-drawn line. For him, it is not the slick perfection of digital models, but the struggle and spontaneity of sketching that captures the true heartbeat of architecture. This book is both a record and a reverie: a meditation on how buildings begin, and how they belong to the flow of time, to memory, and the enduring pursuit of beauty. Also included is an appendix with a complete listing of Ando's built and unbuilt projects.

In Ando's own words: "Our imaginations may expand endlessly, shaping the invisible scenes in our minds--this is the never-ending story of architecture."

Review Quotes

"TASCHEN has compiled Tadao Ando's sketches and drawings in a volume comprising almost 600 pages. And as you leaf through the pages, look at the images, and read the texts that Ando has written to accompany them, you experience the same effect as when you enter his buildings. Calm, relaxation, contemplation. What a masterpiece by a great master."-- "Die Zeit"

"I want to condense the intent behind the design into a single drawing. Drawings are an architect's words."-- "Tadao Ando"