Richard Hassell is an Australian-born architect and artist who has lived in Singapore since 1989.
In 1994, he founded the architectural practice WOHA with Wong Mun Summ. Since then, WOHA has received international renown for their projects, designed to harmonise with and incorporate natural ecosystems, proactively encouraging self-sufficient cities as a response to climate change and increasing urbanization. Today, their work is widely publicized as benchmarks for innovative, sustainable design.
WOHA has received numerous international awards for their work, including the Best Mixed-Use Building (2019), Best Tall Building Worldwide (2018), Urban Habitat Award (2019 and 2015) from the CTBUH; 11 President’s Design Awards, Singapore’s highest design accolade; and in 2018 they were awarded the prize for the World Building of the Year at the World Architecture Festival for their mixed use project Kampung Admiralty. Locally, their most recognizable projects include Oasia Hotel Downtown, the School of the Arts and PARKROYAL on Pickering.
As an artist, Hassell’s practice extends M. C. Escher’s work on tessellations and symmetry into new, complex geometries, which are often incorporated into the designs of WOHA’s buildings. His works have been collected by private and corporate collections in the United States, United Kingdom, Italy, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, India, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore, and in the Australian National University collection.