Asif Khan Becomes The First Cannes-Award Winning Architect
Alessandro Ilarda
Jul 4, 2014
If you have been following the 2014 Winter Olympics, you would have seen the Megafaces structure at one point or another. Yes, that building-like structure that was capable of recreating faces of visitors in 3D.
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The designer-architect behind this creation was recently honored with a grand prix at the Cannes Lions 2014 recently, a well-deserved award to say the least.
Meet The Winning Architect
Based in London, United Kingdom, Asif Khan is an architect who has presented incredible originality and creativity with his Megafaces project that was showcased at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. The pavilion was designed for the games and he is now officially the first architect to be holding a Cannes Lions award for innovation.
Design Of Megafaces
Megafaces was conceived specially for Megafon, a telecom operator based in Russia. The structure is a giant kinetic building with an exterior of about 11,000 actuators. Located right at the entrance of the Olympic Park in Sochi, the pavilion consisted of a 2,000 square meter cube that has a kinetic façade on it created by Asif Khan in collaboration with Basel-based engineering firm, iart.
A Transforming 3D Building
Recreating the faces of every other visitor to the Olympic park, the building was capable of transforming into three dimensions to showcase their portraits. Additionally, the photos of the participants of the games were also transferred to the façade to display it on the huge two meter long pin screen.
For The First Time Ever
At the Cannes Lions festival that is an award show especially for those from the industry of creative communication, Asif Khan became the first ever architect to receive an award. Gaining substantial critical acclaim, his idea of giant real life 3D selfies is the first Russian project of its kind to be awarded. Apart from this, Asif Khan is also currently the youngest of the shortlisted architects to design the UK Pavilion for the Milan Expo next year.
