Professor Jose Antonio Martinez Lapeña received the title "Honorary Fellow" by the RIBA

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) awarded our teacher and Head of Projects and Workshops, Mr. Jose Antonio Martinez Lapeña, with the "Honorary Fellow" title. RIBA Honorary Fellowships are awarded to nine non-British architects that have had a significant impact throughout their careers in the world of architecture. They intend to reward those who have made a special contribution to Architecture in its broadest sense. This includes the promotion, management, dissemination and influence beyond borders, such as the role in building more sustainable communities and the education of future generations. Jane Duncan, president of RIBA, chaired the jury of this edition. The honour of this award allows its individual recipients to use the international initials FRIBA after their name. 2016 RIBA International Fellowships will be officially presented at a special event at the headquarters of the RIBA in London on February 1, 2016. As the event coincide with the Royal Gold Medal 2016 week, the new and existing RIBA International and Honorary Fellows will be giving master classes two days. In addition, the event will feature a lecture by Dame Zaha Hadid and a keynote addressed by Sir Peter Cook. Jose Antonio Martínez Lapeña, professor at the School of Architecture and Head of the Projects and workshops, works in association with Elías Torres. Their study has been working at a high level for over forty years. They are defined as the balance of opposites; while Elías is the energetic whirlwind, José Antonio is the quiet centre, the nucleus and anchor in practice. The prestigious Spanish architect Rafael Moneo, Royal Gold Medal by RIBA, recognized his sensitivity, freshness, sharpness and clarity. His style, of subtle interventions and fascinating sections, reminds of Gaudí and Jujol and at some stage Le Corbusier. The specific list of projects that this team of architects have undertaken, both public and private, is huge, and many of them have been awarded the FAD architecture awards. Among them are the garden of Villa Cecilia in Barcelona; the Hospital of Móra d'Ebre in Tarragona; the Barcelona Olympic Village housing complex, the escalator La Granja at Toledo; the restoration of the walk round at the walls of the city of Palma de Mallorca; and the sensitive restoration of Gaudi's Park Guell in Barcelona. Another of his most notable projects was the Annex of Kumamoto Museum in Japan, for which they received the Belca Prize in Tokyo in 1995.The esplanade of the Barcelona Forum photovoltaic power plant (2004) won the special prize of the International Venice Biennale of Architecture.