Dato’ Dr Ar Ken Yeang

At 77, Dato’ Dr Ar Ken Yeang remains architecture’s most influential voice on bioclimatic design—a revolutionary approach that harnesses climate and natural systems to create buildings requiring minimal mechanical cooling and energy consumption.
Cambridge-educated and lauded by The Guardian as one of 50 people who could save the planet, Yeang has accumulated multiple prestigious awards, including the Aga Khan Award for Architecture and Malaysia’s Merdeka Award, fundamentally reshaping how buildings are conceived across Malaysia and beyond.

His career-defining breakthrough came in 1992 with Menara Mesiniaga, IBM’s headquarters near Kuala Lumpur. The 14-storey bioclimatic tower became a manifesto against conventional tropical high-rise design, featuring spiralling sky gardens, external sun shading and natural ventilation that transformed the building into a vertical ecosystem.

What distinguishes bioclimatic skyscrapers is their responsive intelligence: unlike sealed glass boxes, these buildings actively engage with their environment, using orientation, landscaping and passive systems to regulate temperature and airflow. Over 200 projects across his portfolio—from Singapore’s National Library and Solaris Tower to London’s Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital Extension, alongside residences like Roof-Roof House—demonstrate his unwavering commitment to ecological integration.
His rare synthesis of rigorous theory and practical execution, grounded in a Cambridge PhD, has positioned his 12 published books as foundational texts for generations of sustainable designers worldwide.