I.M. Pei

Ieoh Ming Pei was born in Canton, China in 1917. The family moved when his father became the director of the Bank of China in Hong Kong. Pei had the opportunity to go to university in China, England or the United States. He chose MIT in Boston because of his interest in structural engineering. A dean at the school convinced Pei that his future would be in architecture. After graduation, Pei worked for an engineering firm in Boston and then enrolled at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design to study with a faculty that included Walter Gropius and Philip Johnson. I.M. Pei’s first well known building was the Mile High Center in Denver, a black office tower with exposed structural elements, completed in 1959. Since that time, Pei has gone on to design the East Wing of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum in Cleveland, John Hancock Tower in Boston, Place Ville Marie in Montréal, Bank of China Tower in Hong Kong, Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas, Museum of Art in Portland, the metal and glass pyramid addition to the Musée du Louvre in Paris, and the Mihi Museum near Kyoto, Japan, amongst many other wondrous buildings all over the world.