Europe: The Latest Architecture and News

For a long time, architecture was understood as an essentially individual activity, dependent on the figure of a creative genius and centered on the ability to solve problems through drawing. Over time, this image began to fade. The protagonism once concentrated in a few names reached its peak during the era of the starchitects and gradually became distributed among offices, collectives, and multidisciplinary teams. Today, architects are expanding their boundaries into other fields such as gastronomy, music, design, and the corporate world, applying spatial thinking to address challenges of various kinds. As social, environmental, and political crises deepen, the role of the architect continues to evolve from a solitary author to a mediator, activist, and collective agent of transformation. This shift reflects an ethical awakening and a recognition that design, regulation, and care are inseparable dimensions of contemporary practice.

The Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction has announced the Grand Prize Winners of the 2025 Holcim Awards, selecting one project from each global region to represent the most impactful approaches to sustainable design in this cycle. This edition marks the introduction of the Grand Prize format, replacing the previous tiered distinctions to better acknowledge diverse regional contexts and avoid hierarchical rankings. Evaluated by juries chaired by Sou Fujimoto (Asia Pacific), Kjetil Trædal Thorsen (Europe), Sandra Barclay (Latin America), Lina Ghotmeh (Middle East and Africa), and Jeanne Gang (North America), the winning projects reflect the Foundation's principles of holistic, transformational, and transferable design.

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The second edition of the Ammodo Architecture Award has recognized 26 recipients for their contributions to socially and ecologically responsible design. Selected from 168 submissions spanning over 60 countries, the laureates represent a wide range of practices, from established offices to emerging collectives and community-led initiatives. Each recipient receives a grant ranging from €10,000 to €150,000 to support the continued development of their projects. Beyond recognition and financial support, the Ammodo Architecture initiative also functions as a knowledge platform, connecting awardees across regions and facilitating the exchange of ideas on key themes identified by the advisory committee.

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The EUmies Awards are organized annually by the Fundació Mies van der Rohe and the European Commission, with the support of the European Union's Creative Europe Programme. Based on the principle that "architecture is not merely a technical or aesthetic matter, but a cultural, environmental, and democratic issue," this 19th cycle of the Prize brings together 410 works from 40 countries and 143 regions across Europe. Beyond recognizing contemporary architecture projects, the Awards also aim to reflect European values such as cultural diversity, sustainability, democracy, and solidarity. This year, most nominated works (23%) are residential projects, including both collective and single-family housing, followed by cultural (13%) and educational (12%) programs. The selection shows a balance between transformations of existing buildings (44%) and new construction (56%), while 12% of the nominees are transnational works and 33% of the studios are 10 years old or younger, underscoring the growing visibility of emerging practices.

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21st Europe, a Copenhagen-based think tank founded by former SPACE10 creative director Kaave Pour, has introduced its second major blueprint, Continent of Play. Developed in collaboration with design and architecture studio Spacon, the proposal reimagines playgrounds as vital civic infrastructure, positioning them alongside museums, transport hubs, and energy grids as defining spaces for Europe's future.

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All materials come from somewhere, embedded in a chain of extraction, supply, production, and disposal that, depending on its scale, leaves more or less significant marks on the environment. In architecture, we usually approach this trajectory through the lens of materials' circularity, considering how they can re-enter production cycles rather than become waste. Yet, broadening our view to unexpected places reveals parallel systems where by-products from one industry become resources for another. This approach has found fertile ground in organic waste transformed into biomaterials, with one of the most recent examples being the work of Fahrenheit 180º. Through their installation, "From the Tagus to the Tile", they repurpose oyster shells initially discarded by food systems to create a reinterpretation of Lisbon's iconic tiles.

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The 2024–2025 edition of the Europe 40under40 Awards has announced its selected architects and designers, recognizing emerging professionals under the age of 40 working across Europe. Organized by The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies and The Chicago Athenaeum, the program highlights a range of built and conceptual work that reflects contemporary approaches to architecture and design. This year's selection brings together young architects and designers from Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Turkiye, offering a wide-ranging perspective on Europe's contemporary architectural discourse.

The selection was made by a jury composed of Melike Altınışık, Hans-Petter Bjørnådal, Eleni-Stefania Kalapoda, and Adrian Yap, who evaluated submissions from a range of scales and typologies. The winning projects will be presented in the exhibition "40 Young European Architects with New Visions," opening on December 5th, 2025, at The European Centre, Contemporary Space Athens. A special yearbook publication by Metropolitan Arts Press will also document the selected works, making them accessible to international audiences. Submissions are now open for the 2025–2026 edition, with a deadline of December 15, 2025.

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Soleil·s, the second edition of the Solar Biennale, is currently open at mudac, the Museum of Contemporary Design and Applied Arts in Lausanne, Switzerland. Following the first edition hosted at Het Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam in 2022, this exhibition explores how design can drive the adoption of solar innovations toward a sun-powered future. The event is initiated by The Solar Movement, founded by designers Marjan van Aubel and Pauline van Dongen, an initiative dedicated to making solar energy the default power source by combining design, technology, and advocacy. This year's exhibition is curated by mudac and offers an immersive experience featuring new and existing projects by TAKK, ecoLogicStudio, Olafur Elíasson, and Andreas Gursky.

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CRA-Carlo Ratti Associati, in collaboration with The Blossom Avenue Partners, has been announced as the winner of the international competition for the urban and architectural design of X-Change, a major multimodal logistics hub located on the site of a former railway yard in Alessandria, Italy. The project reimagines a traditionally introverted typology, rail distribution infrastructure by integrating logistics with energy production, ecological regeneration, and public life. Conceived as one of Southern Europe's largest intermodal hubs, X-Change is set to support Alessandria's evolving role as a backport to Genoa, leveraging future fast rail freight connections.

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During 2024, the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) launched a three-part documentary and exhibition series titled Groundwork, exploring alternative modes of practice in light of the current climate crisis. The process began with a series of studio visits in search of offices addressing substantial questions for contemporary architecture through practice, culminating in the selection of three projects: Xu Tiantian's "minimal intervention" museum on Meizhou Island, Carla Juaçaba's community pavilions in a coffee field in Minas Gerais, and bplus.xyz (b+)'s European Citizens' Initiative for a new legal framework to facilitate the renovation and transformation of existing buildings. The latter, HouseEurope!, was recently recognized as the winner of the seventh edition of the OBEL Award and was showcased at the international exhibition of the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025.

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The European AHI Award recognizes architectural heritage interventions across Europe, highlighting their role as a forward-looking model for 21st-century architecture with tangible social, environmental, and economic benefits. In its seventh edition, the award honored six projects, four first prizes and two special mentions, during a ceremony held in early June at the Paranimf Ceremonial Hall of the Escola Industrial in Barcelona. A total of 238 projects from architecture studios in 24 European countries were submitted. The selected winners are located in Antwerp, Kortrijk, Olot, Ancient Corinth, and Milan.

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The summer of 2025 has brought extreme heat across Europe and beyond, with record-breaking temperatures and widespread climate-related impacts. Red alert warnings have been issued in France, Italy, and Spain as temperatures exceeded 46°C in parts of the Iberian Peninsula. These conditions have led to school closures, restrictions on outdoor work, and pressure on urban infrastructure, including power grids and public transport systems. The heatwave has simultaneously intensified wildfire risk across the Mediterranean. In western Turkey, ferocious wildfires near Izmir forced the evacuation of over 50,000 people as high winds and low humidity fueled rapidly spreading flames. In Spain's Catalonia region, two people died in a wildfire that raced across farmland and old structures in Torrefeta on July 1. Similar disasters have occurred in Greece, France, and Italy, with evacuations throughout southern Europe as widespread heat‑induced drought exacerbates fire season intensity.

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A series of recently announced projects across Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and North America reflects an ongoing shift in architectural thinking toward approaches that integrate buildings with their landscapes, programs with public life, and design with long-term environmental goals. In Nantes, France, a healthcare campus redefines medical education through climate-conscious planning, while in San Antonio, Texas, a new arboretum transforms a former golf course into a research-driven public landscape. Residential towers are rising beside Bangkok's Lumphini Park, a new coastal community is underway in the UAE, and an expansion to the Nelson-Atkins Museum in Kansas City reconsiders how cultural institutions connect with their surroundings. Together, these announcements point to a growing interest in projects that embed architecture within broader ecological and civic systems, proposing new models of spatial integration, accessibility, and resilience.

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