The British/Ghanaian architect David Adjaye has formally received his Knighthood for his services to architecture as part of the Queen’s biannual honours programme. Prince William, Duke of Cambridge performed the honours at an official Investiture ceremony held at Buckingham Palace.
“I am deeply honoured and delighted to have received a knighthood for my contribution to architecture” – David Adjaye
The knighthood follows two previous royal awards received by Sir David – the 2016 Queen’s Birthday Honours in October 2016 and an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2007.
Sir David said: “I am deeply honoured and delighted to have received a knighthood for my contribution to architecture, and absolutely thrilled to be recognised for a role that I consider a pleasure to be able to undertake. I would like to thank Her Majesty the Queen for this incredible privilege, which I see as a celebration of the potential architecture has to effect positive social change”.
The knighthood crowns a memorable 12 months for the architect, who celebrated his 50th birthday in September 2016 and at the same time completed the largest project in his career to date – the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History & Culture on Washington DC’s National Mall. He was named one of 2017’s most influential people by TIME magazine and became a new Royal Academician by the Royal Academy of Arts.
The past year has also seen Sir David’s firm Adjaye Associates win a host of industry awards and high profile commissions. Most recently, the practice was shortlisted to design the UK’s National Holocaust Memorial and revealed plans for One Berkeley, a mixed-use scheme situated on London’s iconic Piccadilly.
David Adjaye joins only a handful of architects to have been knighted – among them Norman Foster (1990), Richard Rogers (1991), Michael Hopkins (1995), Nicholas Grimshaw (2002), Peter Cook (2007) and David Chipperfield (2010).
Adjaye Associates was established by founder and principal architect, Sir David Adjaye OBE and has offices in London, New York and Accra. Renowned for their capacity to offer a rich civic experience, Adjaye Associates buildings differ in form and style, yet are unified by an ability to generate new typologies and to reference a wide cultural discourse. Two of the practice’s largest commissions to date are the design of the
Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall in Washington D.C. and the Moscow School of Management (SKOLKOVO). Further projects range in scale from private houses, exhibitions, and temporary pavilions to major arts centres, civic buildings, and masterplans.