Nobody influences urban-planning standards as decidedly as the unequal architect pair from Basel. Jacques Herzog, the versatile, Pierre de Meuron, the persistent, have been an omnipresent brand ever since they converted an old power station on the Thames into the Tate Modern in the middle of the 1990s.

The two of them love to surprise and to design unusual atmospheres with unusual materials. And since they freed themselves from the trap of minimalism, there has been no stopping their expansion as regards content and form. Whatever they build achieves cult status: whether the Prada shop in Tokyo, the Philharmonic Hall on the Elbe in Hamburg, the Allianz Arena in Munich or the “Bird's Nest” in Peking.

HdM, rewarded with the Oscar of their trade, the Pritzker Prize, have made architecture the place of pilgrimage for the global elite.

The extension to the Hotel Astoria is the first hotel project for Herzog & de Meuron: It is a striking sculpture with deep indentations and two faces.