Renzo Piano was born in Genoa, into a family of builders. He studied in Milan, graduating in 1964 before going to work for Louis Kahn in Philadelphia and Makowski in London.
His first important commission was in 1969 to design the Italian Industry Pavilion at Expo '70 in Osaka, during which time he met Richard Rogers and they agreed to collaborate and enter the international competition for the Pompidou Centre in Paris. The result was a hundred thousand square metres in the heart of Paris, devoted to the figurative arts, music, industrial design and literature. In 1995, Piano alone renovated the Centre which had suffered from its popularity – it was reopened on the eve of new millennium.