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From April 25 to May 1, 2024, Logroño hosts the tenth edition of Concéntrico, a celebration of urban innovation and transformation. This year, the festival explores the future of cities, incorporating new formats, engaging diverse audiences, and tackling urban challenges through the lens of time as a catalyst for change in design. Featuring 20 interventions and activities involving over 100 professionals from 17 countries, the program encompasses processes such as renaturalizing public spaces, reimagining urban structures, and integrating recycled materials from previous editions.

Additionally, collaborations with educational centers ensure a lasting impact beyond the festival, fostering new collective practices in public spaces. Special projects such as  "The street in 10 years" or initiatives involving students and pupils from local schools and educational centers further enrich the festival's engagement with communities across Spain.

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Biennales, exhibitions, and architecture focused festivals provide a platform for opening debates, conducting research, and driving innovation, but they can also contribute to the incremental changes that shape the image and the character of a city. Through temporary installations and experiments, this type of events have the opportunity to open lines on inquiry into the quality of urban spaces, inviting visitors and residents to slow down, break away from their daily routine and interrogate their local environments. The effects might not be immediate, but by cumulating these impressions and moments of contemplation, architecture and design festivals can have a long-lasting impact on the cities that welcome them.

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Staged stories on community and identity, ephemeral architecture showed that in 2022 it doesn't have to be permanent to be powerful. A direct and popped-up public installation can shift from preparation to action, reclaiming and defining what makes a community unique. Highlighting installations to acknowledge linguistic diversity in NYC, a giant table to celebrate culinary in Barcelona, and a large-scale net in Dubai to represent the local culture, among others, these initiatives seek to understand ways in which local and regional expressions can help cities to be more equal and diverse.

Globalization has connected the world boundaryless. While it has also made information more accessible, it has led to homogeneity and identity crisis at melding unique societies and cultural expressions. Cultural differences are undeniable as globalization grows. Hence, as architecture produces common living standards, it can also highlight singularities. Festivals, installations, and pavilions, 2022 was the year to express local memories to be recognized and celebrated, setting Community and identity as central topics in ephemeral architecture throughout the year.

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As expressed by 2023 Venice Architecture Biennale curator and architect Leslie Lokko, "after two of the most difficult and divisive years in living memory, architects have a unique opportunity to show the world what we do best: put forward ambitious and creative ideas that help us imagine a more equitable and optimistic future in common."

From Venice's approach to Africa as the lab for the future to Seoul's road to its next 100 years as a megapolis; from Chicago's art-meets-architecture-meets-civic-participation to Sharjah's "beauty of impermanence" in the Global South motto, 2023 will witness a series of architectural events trying to embody those forward ambitious and creative ideas, as explained by Lokko.

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Located in northern Spain, Logroño is a crossroads of both borders and architecture. It is not only a key stop on the Camino de Santiago and a gathering place for lovers of fine food and excellent Rioja wine, but works from its long architectural history can be found seamlessly interwoven throughout the city, often going unnoticed: from the ancient ruins on Monte Cantabria to Rafael Moneo's modern City Hall—not to mention the contemporary design of the High-Speed Rail Station by Ábalos + Sentkiewicz or the upcoming Bosonit building by Kengo Kuma in the historic center.

There is no need to worry about getting lost. Over its eight editions, the team behind the Concéntrico Festival has curated an extensive series of locations: new squares, interior courtyards, and hidden public spaces that speak volumes about the role of the urban fabric when discussing architecture in Logroño.

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After two years of disrupted cycles of architecture events, due to the pandemic, 2022 has been witnessing a resurgence: biennials, triennials, design weeks, and festivals are back in the picture, with bigger interrogations and larger thematic approaches, aligned with the challenges of the world.

Relevant today more than ever, these happenings scattered around the globe are tackling climate-related issues, urban problems, as well as concerns engendered by covid-19 such as resilience, models of living, future of design, and the unknown.

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Every year, the Concéntrico festival in Logroño, Spain, brings together architects and designers from all over the world with the hope of employing creativity to create a better city. During this year's event, a few overarching themes could be observed as critical points of interest for the participating architects and designers. Many urban installations hoped to help citizens rediscover places of interest in their city and beyond, while others challenged the often-fixed ideas of what a home can and should look and function. Many designers saw opportunities in the concept of unstructured play, as the exploratory activity can activate unused public spaces and engage people of all ages.

Since 2015, the Concéntrico festival has presented 91 installations and pavilions during its seven editions. The festival is primarily known for bringing together emerging architects and designers who are given the freedom to experiment with new fields of environmental design. The festival is organized by the Cultural Foundation of the Architects of La Rioja together with Javier Peña Ibáñez, promoter of the initiative, in collaboration with the Logroño City Council, the Government of La Rioja, Garnica and Bodegas LAN, and 30 other supporting institutions.

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"Concéntrico wants to achieve a better city", says Javier Peña as he inaugurates the International Festival of Architecture and Design of Logroño in Spain. An event that since its first edition in 2015 has proposed rediscovering the spaces of interest in the historic center, reflecting on the urban environment through different proposals for installations and ephemeral exhibitions. This year, it celebrates its eighth meeting from the 1st to the 6th of September.

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Depending on the aesthetics of a space, the economy of the materials or even their long-term maintenance, there are various types of ceilings that are capable of meeting the technical and functional needs of architectural projects. Regardless of their manufacturing method, whether industrialised or handcrafted, ceilings represent a constructive element that constitutes the finish or interior cladding of roofs.

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