Susana Torre
Encyclopedia
Feminist Architect, Susana Torre was born on November 2, 1944 in Puan, Argentina, but she has lived in the United States since 1968. Graduated with an architectural diploma from the University of Buenos Aires. Torre received her post graduate studies were at the University of Buenos Aires and Columbia University. Torre was the director of both Barnard College and University of Columbia Architecture Program and director of the graduate art program at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan from 1994 to 1995. At the University of Columbia, Torre wrote and edited many chapters of the book la Mujer En la Arquitectura Americana: una Perspectiva Histórica y Contemporánea (Women in American Architecture: a Historical and Contemporary Perspective. She was also the director of the exhibition Mujeres en la Arquitectura(Women in Architecture in 1977.
Torre is best known for her urban style and her many remodelings and renovations. Some of her work includes the renovation of The Pension Building in Washington, DC (1979)and a carriage house in Southhampton, NY, which received the Award of Excellence of Design from Architecture Record. Other achievements include recognition from the Edgar Kaufman Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Susana describes herself as a feminist. she works to improve the status of women in architecture. Her practice focuses on an ethical civic design with a postmodernist approach. One of the projects in which she demonstrated her great knowledge of architecture was the Fire station five in Columbus, Indiana. This project was very important because there were many architects competing against each other in order to complete the project. Some of the architects included, Frank Gehry,Peter Eisenman,Robert M. Stern, and Susana Torre. The committee who was in charged of hiring the architect was looking for a fire station design that would retain existing women firefighters and Torre was the only architect from the rest of the candidates that understood the project very well. At the end she was the only one hired.
References:
www.urv.cat
international Archive of Women in Architecture
A Guide to the Susana Torre Architectural Papers
Torre is best known for her urban style and her many remodelings and renovations. Some of her work includes the renovation of The Pension Building in Washington, DC (1979)and a carriage house in Southhampton, NY, which received the Award of Excellence of Design from Architecture Record. Other achievements include recognition from the Edgar Kaufman Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Susana describes herself as a feminist. she works to improve the status of women in architecture. Her practice focuses on an ethical civic design with a postmodernist approach. One of the projects in which she demonstrated her great knowledge of architecture was the Fire station five in Columbus, Indiana. This project was very important because there were many architects competing against each other in order to complete the project. Some of the architects included, Frank Gehry,Peter Eisenman,Robert M. Stern, and Susana Torre. The committee who was in charged of hiring the architect was looking for a fire station design that would retain existing women firefighters and Torre was the only architect from the rest of the candidates that understood the project very well. At the end she was the only one hired.
References:
www.urv.cat
international Archive of Women in Architecture
A Guide to the Susana Torre Architectural Papers