So it is imperative that the conceiver imbues intellect and elegance to engender his thought into material reality. It's a tough job.

But for JK Cement's Great Master Architect Award winner, Professor Christopher Charles Benninger, it is a perpetuation of labour and excellence, most of it going unacknowledged. "In my life, 90 per cent of my work ended up in the trashcan of my dreams. Some works survived in the form of models and drawings. What got built was a mere fraction of my life's efforts. When people praise that small sliver of my truth and call me a 'Great Master', I feel truly elated. All of those trash can dreams get reborn with a new meaning," he muses forthrightly.

JK Cement's tribute given to him for his vivacious life-time contribution to the arena of architecture marks the year for this America born architect who has spent the past three decades in India, erecting dreams for others. And the man has made history by being the youngest architect to have claimed his stake to this much-coveted prize that was won in the past by celebrated architects like B.V.Doshi, Charles Correa, Joseph Stein and more.

Having studied in MIT and Harvard, he instituted the School of Urban Planning at CEPT, and the Center for Development Studies, Pune (1976). Guided by the

Gandhian tenet of ' Live in a village and plan for the world', Benninger involved himself in rural development and poverty alleviation while preparing urban plans for Indian and south-east Asian cities.