Holl was born on December 9, 1947, and grew up inBremerton andManchester,Washington.[4] He is the son of Myron Holl of Washington state and Helen Mae Holl of Alabama.[5] He has described his father as "full blooded Norwegian".[6] Holl received aBachelor of Arts from theUniversity of Washington (department of architecture) in 1971,[7][8] pursuing architectural studies in Rome in 1970 underAstra Zarina.[9]
1960s and early '70s, he landed a job atLawrence Halprin's[10] before heading to London's vaunted Architectural Association. "He was doing private projects, trying to be an architect, looking for work," recalls bookseller-publisher William Stout, who shared an apartment with Holl on Telegraph Hill. Holl also was the first (very part-time) employee atStout's architectural bookshop in Jackson Square.[11]
Holl is a tenured professor atColumbia University, where he has taught since 1981[22] with Dimitra Tsachrelia.[23] He has also taught on the relationship between music and architecture.[24]
In 2010, Holl founded 'T' Space, a multidisciplinary arts organization inRhinebeck, New York. The organization runs a summer exhibition series and an emerging architects summer residency.[25]The 'T' Space Synthesis of the Arts Series presents 2 to 3 exhibitions annually. As of 2019, it has exhibited architectsJosé Oubrerie,Tatiana Bilbao, andNeil Denari,[26] as well as artists such asAi Weiwei,Pat Steir, andBrice Marden.[27]In 2017, 'T' Space began a summertime residency program for young architects and artists.[28] Program participants work on purpose-built architecture with a curriculum on ecological outcomes of design, and take part in pin-ups, field trips, and a public lecture series by invited architects, including Holl.[29][30]In addition to its arts and educational programming, 'T' Space maintains a publication program and a 30-acre nature reserve with outdoor installations. In 2019, construction was completed on 'T' Space's architectural archive and research library, which houses Holl's watercolors, models and drawings from his practice.[31]
2025 – Keynote lecture titled “Imaginary Causes in Architecture” during the Mextrópoli Architecture Festival in Mexico City.[33]
2024 – "Gazes on Material: the truth of making between architecture and art", public event at the Roman Aquarium (Casa dell'Architettura), Rome. Holl delivered the lecture "Art Drives Architecture";Mino Caggiula also spoke and was described byDomus as a student of Holl. The event was organized by Diasen and moderated by Walter Mariotti.[34][35]
Making Architecture, 2018–2025, on view at: The Dorsky Museum, New York, US (2025);[49]Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, US (2025);[50]Bellevue Arts Museum (2020);[51] Nanjing Sifang Art Museum (2019);[52] the Urban Network Office (UNO) and FU Space, Shanghai (2019); and ARCHI-DEPOT Museum, Tokyo (2019).[53]
Idea and Phenomena. Steven Holl, 2002-2021,Architekturzentrum Wien, Vienna, Austria. (2002);[54] Schwedisches Architekturmuseum Stockholm, Sweden (2003);[55]Garanti Gallery, Istanbul, Turkey (2003); The Roca Beijing Gallery, Beijing (2021);[56]
During his early years in New York, Holl, along with architect and book collector William Stout, launched the experimental publication seriesPamphlet Architecture.Pamphlet Architecture quickly developed into one of the most important publications of its kind, with authors likeLebbeus Woods,Zaha Hadid, and Alberto Sartoris.[61][62]
Holl received one of three first prizes in the 1988 invited competition for an addition to Berlin'sAmerika-Gedenkbibliothek (American Memorial Library).[63] The scheme was not realized following German reunification.[64] In 1989 theMuseum of Modern Art in New York presented the exhibitionEmilio Ambasz/Steven Holl: Architecture (February 9–April 4).[65] MoMA also holds models and drawings by Steven Holl Architects in its collection.[66] In the 1992 international competition for Helsinki's new museum of contemporary art, Holl's proposalChiasma was selected as the winner and the museum, namedKiasma, opened to the public in 1998.[67] The nameKiasma derives from the Greekchiasma, meaning "crossing".[68]
Holl designed the Chapel of St. Ignatius (built 1994–1997), aJesuit chapel atSeattle University. The building is sited in the center of a former street and elongates the plan to create new campus quadrangles to the north, west and south, with a future quadrangle planned to the east.[69] In 1997, the plan of the chapel won a design award in theAmerican Institute of Architects of New York. Holl designed the chapel around St. Ignatius's vision of the inner spiritual life, "seven bottles of light in a stone box", by creating seven volumes of different light. Each volume represents a different part of JesuitCatholic worship, and has differently colored glass so that various parts of the building are marked out by colored light. Light sources are tinted both in this way and by indirect reflection from painted surfaces, and each is paired with its complementary color. In 2022, theAmerican Institute of Architects bestowed the Chapel of St. Ignatius, Seattle, WA, with theTwenty-five Year Award.[70]
Along with Pallasmaa andAlberto Perez-Gomez, Holl wrote essays for a 1994 special issue of the Japanese architectural journalA+U under the title "Questions of Perception: Phenomenology of Architecture." The publication was reissued as a book in 2006.
Fred Rush,On Architecture, Routledge, London and New York, 2007.
Scott Drake, “The Chiasm and the experience of space”,JAE, Nov. 2005, vol.59, iss. 2, 53–59.
Alberto Perez-Gomez, Juhani Pallasmaa, Steven Holl,Questions of Perception. Phenomenology of Architecture, William K. Stout Pub., San Francisco, 2006 (2nd edition).
Alberto Perez-Gomez, “The architecture of Steven Holl: In search of a poetry of specifics”,El Croquis 93, 1999.
Philip Jodidio,Architecture Now!, Icons, Taschen, New York, 2002.
