Architectural competitions play a crucial role in developing the architectural profession and in advancing the quality of the built environment. They are also an opportunity for architects to showcase their creativity and experiment with innovative or unexpected architectural solutions, be it for real or imagines contexts. This week's curated selection of Best Unbuilt Architecture highlights different competition-winning designs submitted by the ArchDaily Community.
From a spa and wellness center seamlessly integrated into the mountainous landscape of Austria to a refurbished city center that creates opportunities for social interaction in one of Bulgaria’s largest pedestrian city centers, the round-up spans various programs, scales, and attitudes toward the built or natural environment. The selected projects represent explorations in various design solutions, materials, and construction methods. They also showcase the broadness of possible responses ignited by site-specific conditions, from the volcanic landscape of Iceland, to the picturesque hills of the Kerala region in India or the lively central plaza in one of Israel’s largest cities.
The Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda (Mitma) revealed in November 2022 the winning proposal for the curation and exhibition design of the Spanish Pavilion at the 18th edition of the Venice Architecture Biennale, which will take place from May 21 to November 26, 2023. Developed by Eduardo Castillo Vinuesa and Manuel Ocaña, "Foodscapes" focuses on the biennale's theme "The Laboratory of the future", by choosing as the object of its research the architecture related to the food production, distribution, and consumption chain, from the domestic to the territorial level.
On April 6, SPACE10 will introduce a global design competition to reimagine home — using AI. Over the past year, generative AI tools have enhanced imaginative and creative capabilities, allowing millions of people to visualise worlds beyond those we ever thought possible. In a first of its kind competition, SPACE10 challenges participants to apply new AI tools to future homes and cities. Regenerative Futures is part competition, part open-source research, and open to everyone. The competition encourages play and imagination to create visual concepts of future homes, communities, and cities that help address some of the biggest challenges facing everyday life.
BIG has won a proposal to design a 300 m tall residential tower and a 250 m tall office tower for the Guiwan district, located in the metropolitan city of Qianhai, what is most commonly known as the international finance city of China. Part of the new development plan for Qianhai Bay, the Prisma Towers aim to transform the greater bay area. The project will include workspaces, residences, and 20,000m2 of leveled public spaces.
The A' Design Awards - the world's leading annual international juried design competition - were established to promote and recognize the best design work in all countries and in all creative disciplines. The Award has 100 main categories, including Architecture, Building and Structure Design,Interior Space and Exhibition Design, and Furniture Design, in addition to others related to the world of Lighting, Landscape, Building Materials, and many others. This year's edition is now open for entries; designers can register their submissions here.
The World Architecture Festival (WAF) revealed the 420 shortlist for this year’s festival, with entries from all around the world, including Portugal, Malaysia, Finland, Mexico, Turkey, Australia, Japan, India, and the UK. The awards program celebrates the best new completed buildings and landscape design projects, ranging from rural villas to contemporary religious buildings and healthcare facilities built during the pandemic.
As the world's leading annual international juried design competition, the A' Design Awards were established to promote and recognize the best design work in all countries and in all creative disciplines. The Award has 100 main categories, including some of the most popular categories such as Architecture, Building and Structure Design,Interior Space and Exhibition Design, and Furniture Design, in addition to others related to the world of Lighting, Landscape, Building Materials, and many others. This year's edition is now open for entries; designers can register their submissions here.
https://www.archdaily.com/966287/top-20-a-design-award-winners-well-being-and-material-innovationArchDaily Team
As their entry in a competition for The Arbour, a new academic building for the campus of George Brown College on Toronto’s Lake Ontario waterfront, Montreal-based firm Provencher_Roy have revealed their design for an adaptable mass timber building that could grow and change in time.
Using a staggered truss structural system that divides the building into modular cells measuring 8.4 meters tall, 17.4 meters wide and 40 meters long, the firm explains that the stacked program elements can be reorganized as necessary, with classrooms and double-height auditorium spaces able to be converted to basketball courts or column-free open offices by adjusting the cross-laminated timber flooring, which can be adjusted without compromising the rest of the structure.
A collaboration between Moriyama & Teshima Architects and Acton Ostry Architects have been announced as the winner of the competition for a new timber building in Toronto. Their proposal beat out several other notable firms including Shigeru Ban, who is known for his timber constructions, Patkau Architects who worked with MJMA, and Provencher_Roy who partnered with Turner Fleisher. The winning design scheme, called The Arbour, will be a net-zero tower to house a new school of computer technology as part of an expansion at George Brown College.
France-based Hamonic + Masson Architects has been selected as one of the winners for the Imagine Angers Competition, which asked teams to propose innovative designs to be built on one of six different sites in the town of Angers, France. The winning teams were announced by the mayor of Angers at MIPIM, a real estate conference, held in Cannes. Other participating architects include Manuelle Gautrand, Steven Holl, Duncan Lewis, XTU, Sou FUJIMOTO and OXO architects.
eVolo Magazine has announced the winners of its 2018 Skyscraper Competition. Now in its 13th year, the annual award was established to recognize “visionary ideas for building [high-rise] projects that through [the] novel use of technology, materials, programs, aesthetics, and spatial organizations, challenge the way we understand vertical architecture and its relationship with the natural and built environments.”
This year, 3 winners and 27 honorable mentions were selected from a pool of 526 entries. Among this year’s winners are a foldable skyscraper inspired by origami, an urban building for rice farming, and a prototype for vertical housing in areas damaged by wildfires.
For the "Imagine Angers"international design competition, Vincent Callebaut Architectures worked in collaboration with Bouygues Immobilier group to submit a proposal for the French city at the intersection of social and technological innovation, with a focus on ecology and hospitality. Named Arboricole, meaning “tree” and “cultivation,” this live-work-play environment gives back as much to the environment as it does its users. Although WY-TO prevailed in the competition, the Callebaut scheme succeeded in winning the public vote.
Exterior View. Image Courtesy of Lipinsky Lasovsky Johansson
An international team of young architects based in Copenhagen have won first prize for their proposal ‘Finnskogens Hus’ in a competition for a new Museum of Forest Finn Culture in Svullrya, Norway.
The fourth largest architectural competition in Norway, the new museum aims to inform and educate visitors about the Forest Finns, Finnish migrants who settled in Swedish and Norwegian forests in the late 16th to 17th centuries.
Front view. Image Courtesy of J. Mayer H. Architects
J. Mayer H. Architects has revealed their design for the new Kärcher Musuem that took 3rd prize in a recent closed competition. Designed for international cleaner manufacturer Kärcher, the museum will feature exhibits on the company’s 80+ year legacy and the history of cleaning technologies.
Located on a 2,500 square meter site in Winnenden, Germany, J. Mayer H. Architects’ proposal takes the form of a large, sawtooth cut volume inspired by the surrounding commercial and industrial structures. This monolithic form is cut into at the entrance, revealing the hollowed out interior within. Additional cuts into the body offer views to neighboring company buildings, toward the city and to the surrounding landscape.
The members of Future Architecture have selected 21 ideas out of more than 200 submissions in this year's open call for ideas. The winners will be invited to the two days Matchmaking Conference in February at the Museum of Architecture and Design (MAO) located in Ljubljana, where they will present their submissions and earn a chance to participate in the conference’s series of events.
Check out the list of winners and their proposals after the break.
Established in 2011, the competition aims to foster the creativity of young architects by challenging them to complete “innovative, audacious and promising projects” that imagine new methods of sustainable development within the realms of sea and space.
Architectural submissions were awarded this year within three categories: Innovation and Architecture for the Sea, Innovation and Architecture for Space, and Architecture and Sea Level Rise. Within these categories, projects were selected in three disciplines: the overall Grand Prix, the “Focus” theme award, and the Coup de Coeur.
A mirror-clad shopping mall has been awarded the first prize for its innovative materiality and strong connection to the city in the “2017 Unbelievable Challenge” architectural design competition. “Unwrapped”, submitted by Ben Feicht, a recent graduate of the University of Oregon, was chosen as the winner out of the proposals from 22 different countries. Three other projects were awarded as runner-up.
Take a closer look at the winning design, after the break.
Elizabeth de Portzamparc has been selected as the winner of an international competition for the design of the new Taichung Intelligence Operation Center in Taichung, Taiwan. Conceived as a ‘vertical interconnected neighborhood,’ the tower grows from a series of terraces at its base that turn to become the facade.
Viewed as an extension of the city, the five levels of the podium will be accessible to the public, offering a variety of retail and restaurant options as well as access to the 24,000-square-meter Digital Cultural Center. These spaces will be connected by a series of ribbon-like ‘vertical streets,’ passing through spacious, light-filled atriums and connecting to rooftop green spaces.
.jpg?1517424651 "SOLAR SPORE, An algae photobioreactor in outer space / Pierre-Jacques Truyman, Alexandre Brassart, Sylve Truyman; France. Image Courtesy of Jacques Rougerie Foundation")
.jpg?1517424637 "Refuge-ground : Towards habitable offshore salt platforms / Lambert David, France. Image Courtesy of Jacques Rougerie Foundation")
.jpg?1517424660 "Currents for Currents, Blue is the new green / Deo Alrashid T. Alam, Robert Andrew P. Galano, Pierre Michael Monjardin; Phillippines. Image Courtesy of Jacques Rougerie Foundation")
