Restoration of Japan's Hizuchi Elementary School Wins World Monuments Fund Modernism Prize

An architectural consortium’s restoration of typhoon-ravaged (and generally down-at-the-heel) Hizuchi Elementary School has cliched the 2012 World Monuments Fund/Knoll Modernism Prize, awarded biennially to an innovative architectural or design solution that has preserved or enhanced a modern landmark. The prize—$10,000 and a limited-edition Barcelona chair created by Knoll especially for the occasion—has previously gone to Bierman Henket architecten and Wessel de Jonge architects for their restoration of the Zonnestraal Sanatorium in the Dutch town of Hilversum and Brenne Gesellschaft von Architekten’s restoration of the former ADGB Trade Union School in Bernau, Germany.