Structural engineer and AKT II co-founder Hanif Kara has been named the winner of this year's Soane Medal for "realising some of the most recognisable architectural projects across the globe".
Since co-founding London-based firm AKT II with Albert Williamson-Taylor and Robin Adams in 1996, Kara has overseen the engineering of several high-profile projects, including four Stirling Prize-winning buildings.
Hanif Kara has worked on Stirling Prize-winning buildings such as Peckham Library. Photo courtesy of All Design + Roderick Coyne
Stirling Prize-winning projects in Kara's portfolio include the Peckham Library in London by Will Alsop, the Sainsbury Laboratory in Cambridge by Stanton Williams, Bloomberg's European headquarters in London by Foster + Partners and Kingston University London ? Town House by Grafton Architects. The Uganda-born engineer has also worked on Herzog & de Meuron's One Park Drive residential skyscraper in London, BIG's The Twist art gallery in Norway, Zaha Hadid's Heydar Aliyev Center in Azerbaijan and the Masdar Institute campus in Abu Dhabi by Foster + Partners.
The engineer worked with Grafton Architects on a university building. Photo by Dennis Gilbert
"As the co-founder of renowned structural engineering firm AKT II, Kara is a leading advocate for interdisciplinary collaborations and approaches to the built environment, as well as realising some of the most recognisable architectural projects across the globe," read the So...