Chiang Kai-Shek International Airport Terminal

TAIPEI, TAIWAN, 2003

The international air system is a place apart.  This “space of flows” handles the movement of over a billion people a year and represents, in many ways, the cultural future of the planet.  It is a place that enables human contact undreamed of until recent times, a planetary common ground.  But the air system also embodies much that is less happy: extreme levels of surveillance, a generic quality that frustrates any sense of place or locality, the feeling of being part of a mindless herd.

Great airports – like Chep Lap Kok or Dulles – are those that both maximize comfort and convenience and that offer powerful architectural experiences.  In the replacement of Terminal One, it is our ambition is to create a marvelous work of architecture that restores the pleasures of air travel while simultaneously offering new levels of efficiency, comfort, and environmental responsibility.

Credits: Michael Sorkin, Makoto Okazaki, Mirai Morita, Diego Wisnivesky