Ma Yansong, founder of MAD, is the new Guest Editor of Domus 2026

Domus announces Ma Yansong as its international Guest Editor for 2026. With him, the magazine enters a new phase of the 10x10x10 editorial project, conceived ahead of the centenary by the President of Editoriale Domus, Cav. Lav. Giovanna Mazzocchi. “I am pleased to welcome Ma Yansong: the most interesting, visionary and eclectic figure of the new season of Chinese architecture, and among the most important on the international scene,” she states. “The future he imagines is not dark and dystopian, but joyful and utopian, nourished by fantasy, narrative, body, transcendence, organism.” The appointment marks a significant cultural moment: Ma Yansong is in fact the youngest, and the first Chinese architect, to oversee the magazine’s ten annual issues, following figures such as Michele De Lucchi, Winy Maas, David Chipperfield, Tadao Ando, Jean Nouvel, Steven Holl with Toshiko Mori, Norman Foster and Bjarke Ingels.

Born in Beijing in 1975, trained at Yale University and raised professionally in Zaha Hadid’s studio, Ma Yansong founded MAD Architects, now with offices in Beijing, Los Angeles and Rome.

Ma Yansong, Guest Editor Domus 2026

His architecture—shaped by organic forms and a deep dialogue with nature—has defined new paradigms in projects such as the Absolute Towers in Canada, the first iconic work by a Chinese architect outside his home country; the Bay Culture Park inaugurated on the Shenzhen waterfront; and the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, where building and landscape become a single experience.

The manifesto accompanying the monograph dedicated to the new Guest Editor opens with a reflection on the void. “The outside is always the same. It’s just that I have changed my point of view. The one who has changed is me,” Ma writes in a passage introducing a symbolic journey through caves, sudden lights, mirrors that repeat without emotion, and horizons where sky meets earth. A poetic, imaginative text in which architecture appears as an extension of human perception, a way to “feel nature” and return its vibrations.

In its second half, the tone becomes more critical. Ma Yansong notes how contemporary architecture has lost social relevance, confined within a technical and self-referential space. “The once-dominant Western tendency, represented by Modernism, has lost its voice in today’s rapidly changing world. Technological advancement makes architecture appear as a relic in search of new meaning.”

For Ma, the discipline must reclaim its ability to speak to people. “I am searching for new definitions of architecture that can broaden its scope and make it more relevant to society,” he says in the interview featured in the monograph. “I see cultural space as the key to people’s emotions and to the longevity of a society. Architecture is part of the cultural profession.”

Walter Mariotti, Editorial Director of Domus

Editorial Director Walter Mariotti will accompany the entire journey. “Ma Yansong is reserved yet cheerful, introspective yet impactful. His design grammar interprets sustainability, technology and nature through an unprecedented lens, where emotions are sovereign,” he states. The first issue of Domus 2026, curated by Ma Yansong, will be on newsstands in January. As per tradition, the December issue—dedicated to Italian identity and produced by the editorial staff—will present the monograph and the new Guest Editor’s statement of intent, offering a first look at the year-long trajectory to come.

Opening image: Photo Greg Mei