Brazilian pavilion, Osaka Expo​, by Paulo Mendes da Rocha

This vast concrete and steel space-frame, perched delicately on an undulating artificial landscape, was typical of Brazil’s Modernist Paulista School and a crystallisation of Mendes da Rocha’s belief in architecture as a means of rethinking landscape. With an appearance that belied the temporary nature of the commission it was a hugely successful international debut and, despite campaigning by a local university to keep the structure, it was eventually demolished.