Recent architects of acclaim, of French origin or working in France, have included Jean Nouvel, Dominique Perrault, Adrien Fainsilber, Paul Andreu, Swiss-born Bernard Tschumi, and Catalonian Ricardo Boffil of Spain.
The presenter of BBC4's recent Architects of the Divine (part of the Gothic season), and the current repeat run on the same channel of Chivalry and Betrayal, is Dr Janina Ramirez – this is how she appears on Twitter, Facebook and in the credits of her previous TV work.
But as much as Ms. Lui may want to project her high aspirations onto the buildings -- and however well recent architects have played down the suggestion of bunkers -- today's embassies send a very different message from the unassuming residences or Modernist showpieces of the past.
He also disliked the quantity of repeated smaller decorative elements added by the most recent architect, which diminished the effect of great size.
In a recent case, architects Kohn Pedersen Fox had to use a shadow study to prove that their odd design for an office block near the World Trade Centre site in New York wouldn't block out any more sunlight than a conventional shape.
Architecture shares certain myths with art that influence its commercial value, such as that of the singular author and singular work, but these are also relatively recent: Renaissance architects believed the peak of civilisation existed in antiquity, and so imitated ancient ruins.
In recent years, architects such as Zaha Hadid, Frank Gehry, Rem Koolhaas, Daniel Libeskind, Future Systems, Toyo Ito and UN Studio have turned the modernism of straight lines on its head, bending and twisting it into eye-boggling shapes and computer-aided rollercoasters.
In recent times architects and designers have gained control over the design process by using parametric design to produce an original sustainable design that interacts with the project's environment, climatic and sustainable constraints.
Since the main part of the building barely engages with art, it need not be compared with recent museums by architects such as Gehry, Renzo Piano, and Peter Zumthor.
The architects, recent graduates of the architecture school at the University of California at Los Angeles, were willing to act as contractors because of the opportunity to see one of their first designs built as a partnership.
In recent years, some architects and critics say, they have discovered a robust beauty in once-despised colossi like the Stadio dei Marmi, a 1937 track stadium that is part of the Foro Italico, a sprawling Roman sports complex built at Mussolini's behest.
