Sou Fujimoto might be called a marginal autodidact and outsider in Japanese architecture. Still, lacking the great Tadao Ando’s famous boxing past and architecturally educated at the architecture department of the Technical Faculty, University of Tokyo, Fujimoto simply does not fit in with the typical Japanese pattern for an architect’s self-realization. This celebrated model consists of the appreciation and emulation of a  genealogical line according to which young architects cooperate for several years with masters recognized in a worldwide context, and start their independent practice only after they have been trained for years.