The Asturian princess award will be given to Japanese architect Ban, the creator of cardboard constructions.

Madrid - The Spanish Princess of Asturias Award for Concord will be awarded this year to Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, known for his buildings made of paper tubes and cardboard. Sixty-four-year-old Ban has dedicated half of his life to "humanitarian architecture," which refers to makeshift housing for refugees, according to the newspaper El País. He has even built a cathedral from cardboard in New Zealand and made headlines with transparent toilets in a Tokyo park.

A native of Tokyo, who received the prestigious Pritzker Prize for architecture eight years ago, began eco-friendly constructions at a time when the need for "sustainable development" was just beginning to be discussed. The use of nature-friendly materials was, as he himself said, directed by common sense.

"When I studied architecture, I realized that we do not work for the broader society but only for the privileged who have money,” Ban recalled a few years ago about studying in Los Angeles and New York in the 1980s. It was then that he decided to build for people who need it most.

Ban made a name for himself as a creator of emergency shelters for refugees after the genocide in Rwanda in the 1990s. He later designed temporary housing for people affected by earthquakes in Japan, Turkey, and Haiti.

In 2011, he devised temporary accommodation for people evacuated due to the earthquake and nuclear disaster in Fukushima. At that time, he insisted that in emergency situations, people need not only a roof over their heads but also a piece of privacy, and thus proposed creating simple separate cells with curtains in the local gymnasium.

Ban also designed, for example, a branch of the Paris Centre Pompidou in the French city of Metz and, together with Frenchman Jean de Gastines, is the author of the cultural center La Seine Musicale in the suburbs of Paris. Two years ago, Ban drew attention with public toilets in Tokyo that had transparent walls until someone locked themselves inside.

The Princess of Asturias Award has been awarded annually by the Princess of Asturias Foundation since 1981. Until 2014, it was called the Prince of Asturias Award (or Foundation), which referred to the current Spanish King Felipe VI at that time. The older of his two daughters, Princess Leonor, has since become the guarantor of the award.

Recipients receive a replica of a statue from sculptor Joan Miró, a diploma, and €50,000 (1.25 million crowns). The award is given in eight categories, including literature, scientific and technical research, international cooperation, and sports. In 1997, the then Czech President Václav Havel also received it for the humanities.