MADRID, SPAIN.- The Jury of the National Housing Award for 2005 selected architect Santiago Calatrava for this award. The jury considered the development of Santiago Calatrava and his international prestige. The jury has also highlighted Calatrava’s work in the construction of emblematic buildings commissioned by public administrations and private organizations all over the world.

Calatrava was born in 1951 in Benimamet, near Valencia, Spain, and began his formal instruction in drawing and painting at the age of eight at the Arts and Crafts School. In 1968, he enrolled in the Superior Technical School of Architecture in Valencia, where he earned a degree in architecture and took a postgraduate course in urbanism. In 1979, he earned a Ph.D. in civil engineering from the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, where he also met his wife, Robertina, with whom he has four children.

In 1983, he won his first design competition, for the Stadelhofen Railway Station in Zurich, where he created an office. His international reputation for bridge building was established in 1984 when he won the competition to design and build the Bach de Roda Bridge, commissioned for the Olympic Games in Barcelona. In 1991, Calatrava won the design competition to complete the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York City, a project that has not yet been realized.