Movie: in the penultimate instalment of our exclusive video series, Julia Peyton-Jones explains why it was a gamble to commission the relatively young Sou Fujimoto to design the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion in 2013.
Photograph by Jim Stephenson
Born in 1971, Sou Fujimoto was the youngest architect to be commissioned to design a Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, until Bjarke Ingels was appointed this year.
Photograph by Iwan Baan
Gallery director Peyton-Jones explains in the movie that the Serpentine Gallery tends to appoint older architects because they are better known outside of the architectural profession.
Photograph by Jim Stephenson
"The financial plan is predicated on the pavilion being sold," she says. "So to work with a younger architect ? who maybe doesn't have that easy acclaim outside the profession ? was a risk to us." Photograph by Iwan Baan
If appointing Fujimoto in 2013 was a gamble, it certainly paid off.

Related story: "I tried to create something between nature and architecture" - Sou Fujimoto

"According to The Art Newspaper, it was the most visited free exhibition of design anywhere in the world in that year," Peyton-Jones says. "That's a great thing to be able to say."
Photograph by Jim Stephenson
Fujimoto created a cloud-like structure made from grids of white steel poles. Variations in the density of the lattice created a transparent structure, which revealed more or less of th...