The student architecture competition “120 Hours” has released the winners of its 2016 competition—“What Ever Happened to Architectural Space?”—which this year challenged entrants to imagine a space without program or site. In a time when the discourse of architecture is influenced more by program and environment than spatial quality, the brief was uniquely challenging in its simplicity. Entries were received from over 2863 students from 72 countries, with winners selected by a jury headed by Christian Kerez and including Maria Shéhérazade Giudici, Beate Hølmebakk, Neven Mikac Fuchs and Marina Montresor.
Originally devised by students in Oslo, the competition format is intended as a way of encouraging discourse among architecture students across the world, with competition briefs released just 120 hours (5 days) before the submission deadline. These unique restrictions have fostered a reputation for unconventional and challenging proposals and winning entries in the past have included giant scaffolds of hammocks and the use of robots to inhabit an abandoned town. Read on to see the top three award recipients for 2016.
First Place: “the last space without function” / Micha Ringger, Adrian Brunold and Jonatan Egli (ETH Zurich)
Second Place: “Florilegium” / Razvan Login (Université Catholique de Louvain)
Third Place: “Dichotomy” / Zuzanna Jędrzejewska (Warsaw University of Technology) and Bartosz Bukowski (ETH Zurich)
Correction update: Since it was originally published this post has been updated to correct an error in the headline regarding the name of the competition itself.
