Portuguese architect Eduardo Souto de Moura won the 2011 Pritzker Architecture Prize in March.

The annually awarded prize honours a living architect whose built work demonstrates a combination of talent, vision and commitment, and who has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture.

Souto de Moura worked for Portugal’s only other Pritzker Prize winner, Alvaro Siza, as a student. Since forming his own office in 1980, Souto de Moura has completed over sixty projects in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, the United Kingdom and Switzerland. The projects include single family homes, a cinema, shopping centres, hotels, apartments, offices, art galleries and museums, schools, sports facilities and subways.

The jury described Souta de Moura as always mindful of context and grounded in place, time, and function. Souto de Moura’s architecture reinforces a sense of history while expanding the range of contemporary expression.