Shigeru Ban has earned international acclaim for repurposing inexpensive materials to build cheap housing in communities struck by catastrophe. His pioneering technique of building with tubes of paper has been instrumental in sheltering refugees from natural as well as man-made disasters in places like Rwanda, India, Japan. Today, Ban becomes the latest recipient of the most prestigious award in architecture, the Pritzker Architecture Prize.

Since opening his architecture practice in 1985, Ban has designed everything from private residents to corporate offices to museums. But it’s his humanitarian work–building temporary yet sturdy shelters for refugees of earthquakes, tsunamis, and other disasters through his non-governmental organization, Voluntary Architects’ Network–that the Pritzker jury cites when pronouncing that Ban “reflects this spirit of the prize to the fullest.”

Ban’s commitment to humanitarian causes through his disaster relief work is an example for all.

These humanitarian projects, like the Cardboard Cathedral he built in Christchurch, New Zealand after a deadly 2011 earthquake, appear to contrast starkly with the Metal Shutter Houses, the New York City condominium where I meet Ban a few days before the announcement. Completed in 2011, Ban’s 11-story condo building in an area of Chelsea that has become a starchitects’ playground in recent years houses a handful of luxury duplexes. It’s located in what is starting to become Pritzker Row–Ban’s condo building abuts 1989 Pritzker winner Frank Gehry’s curvy glass IAC Building, and directly across the street is 100 Eleventh Avenue, a 23-story residential tower with a checkerboard facade of angled glass panels by French architect Jean Nouvel, who secured his prize in 2008. (To the east is the blue terra cotta entrance of Annabelle Selldorf’s 520 West Chelsea residences, another high-design condo building dominated by floor-to-ceiling glass, though she has yet to receive the Pritzker honor.)

Cardbord Cathedral Photo by Stephen Goodenough

Ban insists he sees no distinction between his luxury residences and his work on behalf of refugees. “For me there are no differences” between private commissions and his pro bono work, he says. “The only difference is whether I’m paid or not,” he explains, as if that’s no difference at all.

There are no differences between private commissions and pro bono work.

The Pritzker Prize, which comes with a $100,000 grant, aims to honor “a living architect whose built work demonstrates a combination of those qualities of talent, vision, and commitment, which has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture,” a description that certainly fits the bill here.

Paper Emergency Shelter for UNHCR Photo by Shigeru Ban Architects

“Shigeru Ban’s commitment to humanitarian causes through his disaster relief work is an example for all,” Tom Pritzker, chairman of the Hyatt Foundation, the prize’s sponsoring organization, said in a statement announcing the 2014 winner. “Innovation is not limited by building type and compassion is not limited by budget. Shigeru has made our world a better place.”

Ban, dressed in his trademark all-black and perched on a sofa in one of the Metal Shutter duplexes, remains exceedingly humble about joining the elite ranks of the Pritzker laureates. “Still, I cannot believe,” the 56-year-old architect says. “I originally thought this is too early for me, compared to the other laureates.” Indeed, the prize often goes to architects in their 70s. The 2013 laureate, Toyo Ito, was 71. Paulo Mendes da Rocha, who won in 2006–a year Ban served on the Pritzker jury–was 77. However, it’s not unheard of for the award to go to someone relatively young: 2012 winner Wang Shu was only 48.