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After two intense weeks, with 40,000 nominations, the collective intelligence formed by the readers of ArchDaily has scrutinized close to 3,000 projects, creating the shortlist that now moves into the final voting stage.

As in previous years, we have to congratulate our readers, as the finalists are outstanding. Buildings from all over the world, by firms of all sizes and trajectories, ranging from social buildings with no budget to state of the art buildings. But they all have something in common: good architecture that can improve people’s lives.

You can vote for your favorite projects starting today and until February 13th, 2013 (read the complete rules).

Remember that the project with the most votes will receive an HP Designjet T520 ePrinter and the project with the 2nd most votes will receive an HP Designjet T120 ePrinter from our sponsor HP.

The winners of the iPad Minis that we are giving away during the nomination process are: Sunil Bald and Susana Carls (you’ll receive an email shorty). And remember that we are giving away two iPads during the final voting round!

Meet the finalists:

For the 4th consecutive year, we are proud to announce the Building of the Year Awards. During the past year we continued to grow, reaching over 280,000 daily visitors and close to 70 million page views per month. We also expanded our ever-growing network of architects on social media: 640,000 fans on Facebook, 105,000 followers on Twitter, 40,000 followers on Instagram and more than 100,000 photos contributed to our Flickr group.

But ArchDaily is more than numbers. The world faces fundamental problems, related to health, energy, climate, and more. And almost all these problems are related to the built environment.

We launched ArchDaily Mexico this year, which joins ArchDaily, ArchDaily Brasil and Plataforma Arquitectura in our mission to improve the quality of life for the 3 billion people who will live in cities in the next 40 years. How can we do this? By providing the inspiration, tools and knowledge to the architects who will face this challenge. By connecting the traditional hot-spots of architectural production with emerging economies (where a lot of innovation is happening). We believe that, in this way, the constant iteration of architecture will accelerate and result in better and faster solutions to the world’s issues.

That’s why the Building of the Year Awards are so important for us. It is a peer-based award process that identifies and recognizes projects with impact. It will be up to you, the architect, to nominate and choose the winners for each category. It will be up to you to be a part of a collective intelligence that will judge more than 2,700 projects – a scope we think is unprecedented in the world of architecture.

The task is up to you.

For the next 4 weeks, you’ll be in charge of nominating buildings for the shortlist, and then voting for the winners. We will give away iPad Minis and 4th Generation iPads for voters, and will include amazing plotters (courtesy of our friends from HP) for the firms behind the two projects with the most votes.

Rules at a glance: During the nominating stage, each registered user of the My ArchDaily platform will be able to nominate once per day for their favorite projects (published between Jan 1st 2012 and Dec 31st 2012), the counter resets at midnight EST. This stage starts on Jan 15th and ends on Jan 29th at 11:59PM. After this, five projects per category will move into the voting stage, starting January 30th and ending on February 13th. The winner will be announced on February 14th. Start voting here.

You can review last year’s awarded projects in our free iPad App.

Detailed rules after the break:

Dear readers,

We at ArchDaily are used to picking the best buildings for you, dear readers, but we felt it was time to turn the tables a bit. The following is the best of you. You didn’t always agree with us, but you opined intelligently, and for that we salute you.

The Top 3 Comments in March 2012

3. From Community-Oriented Architecture in Schools: How ‘Extroverted’ Design Can Impact Learning and Change the World, about the potential of architecture to transform the lives of students in low-income communities.

 ”Imagine if we designed all public space as if we lived in a democracy. Imagine if we treated participation as a right. Imagine if this was part of the core curriculum in architecture schools.”

– Graeme Bristol

Our Number 1 Comment, after the break…

After two weeks and more than 30,000 nominations, we are proud to announce the finalists for the 2011 Building of the Year Award, a selection of the best projects made by our readers.

The shortlist for the awards includes 70 projects in 14 categories, a selection that shows the diversity of projects featured at ArchDaily during the past year. From small interiors to large scale buildings, designed by renowned practices and young architects, in different locations around the world.

I’d like to thank everyone who participated during the nominations round, as the finalists are outstanding.

You can vote for your favorite projects starting today and until March 6th at midnight EST (all the rules here):

http://www.archdaily.com/building-of-the-year/2011/

Your votes will give you the chance to win an iPad, same as Annie Wang who just won one for voting during the nominations round.

Remember: the office of the project with most votes during the final round will receive an HP Designjet T2300 eMFP printer.

During the process we worked very hard to log and flag every attempt to abuse the voting system, removing fake accounts and automated votes, and we wil continue to do so during this stage.

And the finalists are:

The year 2011 was a great one for ArchDaily, and all thanks to you. In terms of web traffic, in our network we grew to more than 200,000 daily readers who viewed 350 million pages during 2011. Our social media reach has grown to nearly 500,000 Facebook fans, more than 60,000 followers on Twitter and an ever growing presence on Flickr, Instagram, Tumblr and Pinterest, all connecting with architects around our passion: Architecture.

ArchDaily is more than big numbers. It is recognized as the ultimate source of inspiration for thousands of architects around the world, who are covering new ground in architectural discussion, and generating new opportunities by being part of the world’s largest architecture network. During 2011, we participated in important events, such as the Pritzker Prize ceremony in DC, the AIA National Convention in New Orleans, among others, and visiting architects all across the US, in the UK, Switzerland, Israel, Brazil, Chile and Argentina. We’ve had the chance to interview renowned architects such as Steven Holl, Renzo Piano, Richard Meier, Peter Eisenman, and a long list of people who are advancing this profession. We spoke at the AIA Arkansas Convention, Harvard GSD, along with other events and schools. We launched our first local version, ArchDaily Brasil (more to come during this year!) and introduced our first tool to help architects collect and order information: My ArchDaily. We will continue to work very hard during 2012, with all our passion, to keep you connected to everything that is happening in the architecture world and help you with tools, as you will be the responsible of the noble task to shape our built environment.

Since 2009 we have held the Building of the Year Awards, an instance in which all of you make your voice heard by nominating and voting for the best projects featured on ArchDaily during the year. This is a peer based award that recognizes firms of all sizes, trajectories and locations. You can check the results of the previous editions here: 2009 and 2010.

Once again we have partnered with HP to present the 2011 Building of the Year Awards, starting today Feb 7th, 2012 at the following link:

http://www.archdaily.com/building-of-the-year/2011/

The nomination stage will run for 2 weeks until Feb 21st, 2011. All buildings featured under the available categories during 2011 are elegible for this round. You can nominate one building (in one category) per day.

Like last year, we will authenticate the votes with the My ArchDaily platform, so we can assure that the nominating and voting processes are conducted by the community. You can nominate once per day, so you can propose your favorite projects from Feb 7th to Feb 21st, after which 5 buildings per category will continue to the voting round, between Feb 22nd and Mar 6th. The winners will be announced on Mar 7th, 2012.

Given that you are in charge of the selection process, we have decided to give away 2 custom engraved iPads 2 during the nominating/voting stages (more details on the rules below). Also, the most voted firm will receive an HP Designjet T2300 eMFP printer (MSRP US$8,000).

Once again I’d like to thank all our readers for your support in 2011, and rest assure that we are working on new ways to improve ArchDaily in 2012. Our inbox is always open, so feel free to leave your feedback, recommendations and support on the contact page.

Rules after the break:

Dear readers,

Dear readers,

Next week we will be taking our Architecture City Guide to Shanghai and we need your help. To make the City Guides more engaging we are asking for your input on which designs should comprise our weekly list of 12. In order for this to work we will need you, our readers, to suggest a few of your favorite modern/contemporary buildings for the upcoming city guide in the comment section below. Along with your suggestions we ask that you provide a link to an image you took of the building that we can use, the address of the building, and the architect. (The image must be from a site that has a Creative Common License cache like Flickr or Wikimedia. We cannot use images that are copyrighted unless they are yours and you give us permission.) From that we will select the top 12 most recommended buildings. Hopefully this method will help bring to our attention smaller well done projects that only locals truly know. With that in mind we do not showcase private single-family residences for obvious reasons. Additionally, we try to only show completed projects.

Next week we will be taking our Architecture City Guide to Beijing and we need your help. To make the City Guides more engaging we are asking for your input on which designs should comprise our weekly list of 12. In order for this to work we will need you, our readers, to suggest a few of your favorite modern/contemporary buildings for the upcoming city guide in the comment section below. Along with your suggestions we ask that you provide a link to an image you took of the building that we can use, the address of the building, and the architect. (The image must be from a site that has a Creative Common License cache like Flickr or Wikimedia. We cannot use images that are copyrighted unless they are yours and you give us permission.) From that we will select the top 12 most recommended buildings. Hopefully this method will help bring to our attention smaller well done projects that only locals truly know. With that in mind we do not showcase private single-family residences for obvious reasons. Additionally, we try to only show completed projects.

Next week we will be taking our Architecture City Guide to Paris and we need your help. To make the City Guides more engaging we are asking for your input on which designs should comprise our weekly list of 12. In order for this to work we will need you, our readers, to suggest a few of your favorite modern/contemporary buildings for the upcoming city guide in the comment section below. Along with your suggestions we ask that you provide a link to an image you took of the building that we can use, the address of the building, and the architect. (The image must be from a site that has a Creative Common License cache like Flickr or Wikimedia. We cannot use images that are copyrighted unless they are yours and you give us permission.) From that we will select the top 12 most recommended buildings. Hopefully this method will help bring to our attention smaller well done projects that only locals truly know. With that in mind we do not showcase private single-family residences for obvious reasons. Additionally, we try to only show completed projects.

Next week we will be taking our Architecture City Guide to London and we need your help. To make the City Guides more engaging we are asking for your input on which designs should comprise our weekly list of 12. In order for this to work we will need you, our readers, to suggest a few of your favorite modern/contemporary buildings for the upcoming city guide in the comment section below. Along with your suggestions we ask that you provide a link to an image you took of the building that we can use, the address of the building, and the architect. (The image must be from a site that has a Create Common License cache like Flickr or Wikimedia. We cannot use images that are copyrighted unless they are yours and you give us permission.) From that we will select the top 12 most recommended buildings. Hopefully this method will help bring to our attention smaller well done projects that only locals truly know. With that in mind we do not showcase private single-family residences for obvious reasons. Additionally, we try to only show completed projects.

We want to try a new bottom-up approach to our Architecture City Guides and we need your help. To make the City Guides much more engaging we are asking for your input on which designs should comprise our weekly list of 12. In order for this to work we will need you, our readers, to suggest a few of your favorite modern/contemporary buildings for the upcoming city guide in the comment section below. Along with your suggestions we ask that you provide a link to a Flickr image you took of the building that we can use, the address of the building, and the architect. From that we will select the top 12 most recommended buildings. Hopefully this method will help bring to our attention smaller well done projects that only locals truly know. With that in mind we do not showcase private single-family residences for obvious reasons.

Summer is around the corner, and many of you are wondering what to do with all that precious free time you didn’t have until now. What about spending it doing your internship at the most read architecture website, working with a highly motivated group of architecture lovers, contributing to keep the architecture community informed about projects and news around the world?

If you live in USA (London is also a possibility), please follow the break for all the details on what we are looking for (and what you can expect from us). More information after the break.

After two weeks and more than 15,000 nominations, we are proud to announce the finalists for the 2010 Building of the Year Award, a selection of the finest architecture made by our readers.

70 projects in 14 categories are running for the award, and the finalists list is incredible. From headquarters of large corporations, luxury hotels and incredible museums, to a temporary bar, a parking building and small apartments. The list of offices includes renowned international practices such as Herzog & de Meuron, Foster + Partners, REX, BIG, to small young firms from Sweden, Portugal, Slovenia and more.

I’d like to thank everyone who participated during the nominations round, the selection is amazing!

You can vote for your favorite projects starting today and until Feb 13th at midnight EST (all the rules here):

http://www.archdaily.com/building-of-the-year/2010/

Your votes will give you the chance to win an iPad, same as Cody McNeal who just won one for voting during the nominations round.

Remember: the office of the project with most votes during the final round will receive an HP Designjet T2300 eMFP printer.

And the finalists are:

Last week to vote for the Building of the Year Awards! The finalists chosen by you represent a wide scope of projects, in terms of scale, budget, materials, programs, location, etc.