Kjetil Trædal Thorsen
Founding Partner, Snøhetta, Norway
Kjetil Trædal Thorsen co-founded Snøhetta, an integrated architecture, landscape architecture and design company in 1989 together with Craig Dykers and Christoph Kapeller. The studio focuses on well-being, biodiversity, sustainability, and empowering the communities where they work. Snøhetta is based in New York City, USA and Oslo, Norway, and has five additional global offices.
As a founding partner of Snøhetta, Kjetil Trædal Thorsen has had a hand in some of the finest contemporary cultural buildings. From Oslo Opera House, which rises from the fjord like a glacier, to the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture in Saudi Arabia, which glistens under the desert sun like giant pebbles, and to the International Cave Art Centre in Lascaux, carved into the landscape like a ravine – his architecture takes on imaginative forms that are sensitive to their surroundings and conducive to human interaction.
He is a frequent lecturer internationally and worked as Professor of Architecture at the Institute of Experimental Architecture at the University of Innsbruck, Austria (2004-08).
He studied architecture in Graz, Austria (1985).
Ecogradia Podcast – Unleash the power of process
Good design often reveals what we do not know we need. But such a feat depends not only on what we tweak and improve, says Kjetil Trædal Thorsen, but how we re-imagine the process. The question is: where to start?
Co-founder of the Norway-based Snøhetta discusses their unique approach, one that has kept it relevant for over three decades since its inception in 1989. With nine studios globally, the firm offers consultancy in architecture, landscape, interiors, art, as well as product design, graphic and digital design.