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WAF: The Latest Architecture and News

World Architecture Festival Launches Manifesto for the Architectural Profession

The World Architecture Festival has announced the launch of the 10th edition of the event referred to as the “Oscars of architecture” by launching the “WAF Manifesto,” which identifies key challenges the profession will face over the next ten years. Aimed at generated funding for architectural research, the manifesto outlines a range of topics where architects can use their influence to affect society as a whole.

"Creative Cynic" Peter Cook Explains Why Archigram Designs Were Always Meant to Be Built

Last week ArchDaily attended the 2016 World Architecture Festival in Berlin. We chatted with Sir Peter Cook and asked him about the current state of global affairs (Brexit, the US election, etc). He explained how his experience and work has influenced a career that has spanned over five decades, and reminds us of the inspiring power of architecture.

Peter Cook: You have to understand that I'm a very particular kind of animal both politically and in my general opinions. I'm what I would call a creative cynic. I'm an old person and I've seen a lot of not very good things happen. On the other hand I was privileged as a child to have free education and free college. 

Robert Konieczny + KWK Promes' National Museum in Szczecin Named World Building of the Year 2016

Robert Konieczny + KWK Promes' National Museum in Szczecin - Dialogue Centre Przełomy has been named the World Building of the Year 2016 as the World Architecture Festival (WAF) in Berlin comes to a close. The project consists of an atmospheric underground museum below an expansive, undulating public plaza, adjacent to Barozzi Veiga's Mies van der Rohe Award-winning Philharmonic Hall Szczecin.

The National Museum in Szczecin - Dialogue Centre Przelomy is now the ninth project to hold the World Building of the Year title. Last year, the award was given to "The Interlace" by OMA and Buro Ole Scheeren.

Winners of the year's Future Project, Landscape, and Small Project awards were also announced. Read on to see the winning projects with comments from the jury. 

World Architecture Festival Awards 2016 Announces Day 2 Winners

The second group of winners of the World Architecture Festival’s (WAF) 2016 category awards have been announced today on day 2 of the event, held this year in Berlin, Germany.

The 16 Day 2 winners will now go on to compete against the 14 Day 1 winners for the title of 2016 World Building of the Year. The projects will be presented in front of a Super Jury, which includes Kai-Uwe Bergmann (BIG), Louisa Hutton (Sauerbruch Hutton), David Chipperfield, Ole Scheeren, and ArchDaily's co-founder and Editor-in-Chief David Basulto.

Check out the Day 1 winners here and view the Day 2 winners after the break.

Winners of Day 1 World Architecture Festival Awards 2016 Announced

Fourteen projects have been announced as category winners of the The World Architecture Festival’s (WAF) 2016 awards on Day 1 of the festival. Winners in 32 categories will be named over the first two days of the conference, and will then go on to compete for the title of the World Building of the Year 2016, to be announced on Friday.

The world’s largest architectural awards program, the 2016 WAF Awards consisted of 343 projects from 58 countries around the world. Finalists projects will be invited to present their project live at the festival to a "super jury" that includes Kai-Uwe Bergmann (BIG), Louisa Hutton (Sauerbruch Hutton), David Chipperfield, Ole Scheeren, and ArchDaily's co-founder and Editor-in-Chief David Basulto, who will determine the grand prize winner.

You can check out the full shortlist here, and see which built and future projects took home awards after the break.

UNStudio's Ben van Berkel Among 3 New Speakers Revealed for WAF 2016

Three new sessions have been announced for the 2016 World Architecture Festival (WAF), held from November 16-18 in Berlin, Germany. Adding to the impressive list of speakers at the event will be Ben van Berkel, founder of UNStudio, who will lecture on “Superliving - from exclusive to inclusive”; Carlos Zedillo of Infonavit discussing “Architect as instigator”; and Qutub Mandviwala, MQA, who will present on “Housing and cultural difference.”

Said Ben van Berkel about the event: “It is essential to understand that ‘housing for everyone’ is not simply a matter of providing homes for all, it is also a question of what the home of the future should be; how we can meet the demands of all future residents and provide housing that fulfils their varied and changing needs.”

Inspired by the Concept of Blooming Flowers MOB Architects' Residential Project is Shortlisted for the 2016 WAF

MOB Architects’ project Liaisons has been shortlisted for the 2016 World Architecture Festival in the Future Projects \ Residential category and has won the Residential category for the 2016 AR MIPIM Future Projects Awards.

Designed for the MOLEWA (Mount Lu World of Architecture) competition, Liaisons is a residential project in Ruichang, China near the “Flower Ocean Garden,” one of the world’s largest flower theme parks.

Inspired by the concept of blooming, the project centers on introducing a flourishing essence to the neighborhood by analyzing floral and vegetal properties in pixels and converting them into patterns, which are applied in arrangements and spatial organization principles.

Inspired by the Concept of Blooming Flowers MOB Architects' Residential Project is Shortlisted for the 2016 WAF - Image 1 of 4Inspired by the Concept of Blooming Flowers MOB Architects' Residential Project is Shortlisted for the 2016 WAF - Image 2 of 4Inspired by the Concept of Blooming Flowers MOB Architects' Residential Project is Shortlisted for the 2016 WAF - Image 3 of 4Inspired by the Concept of Blooming Flowers MOB Architects' Residential Project is Shortlisted for the 2016 WAF - Image 4 of 4Inspired by the Concept of Blooming Flowers MOB Architects' Residential Project is Shortlisted for the 2016 WAF - More Images+ 11

Peter Cook, Patrik Schumacher Lead List of Speakers at WAF 2016

The program for the 2016 edition of the World Architecture Festival (WAF) has been announced. Being held from November 16-18 at the Arena Berlin, Germany, the festival will feature 3 days and 4 nights of events including conferences, lectures and seminars, architect-led city tours and networking opportunities, as well as live critiques of the 411 projects shortlisted for the 2016 WAF Awards. An all-star list of speakers will include leading architectural figures such as Patrik Schumacher, Ole Scheeren and Peter Cook.

This theme of this year’s festival is “Housing For Everyone.” Inspired by a variety of influences, markedly the condition of displaced communities of political and disaster refugees, lectures will focus on “the growing understanding of how demographics and global urbanization are forcing change; and the imperatives to create shelter at one end of the spectrum, and sufficiency for occupation and investment at the other.”

62 Projects Shortlisted for INSIDE World Interior of the Year 2016

INSIDE World Festival of Interiors has announced the over 60 nominees being considered for the World Interior of the Year 2016 award. Occurring alongside the World Architecture Festival, INSIDE celebrates of the most original and exciting interiors.

Nominations in the 9 categories include projects from across the globe. From bars and retail spaces to schools and hotels, the nominees will present their projects live during the festival in November. Read on for a complete list of the shortlisted projects and check out all of the projects in the image gallery.

What Makes a Good Project? A Guide to Successful Competition Entries

The following is taken from ‘Design Review’, written by Peter Stewart for the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE), 2002. In light of the upcoming World Architecture Festival, whose finalists were announced this morning, Stewart gives a few tips on what makes a good project and a successful competition entry.

The Roman architect Vitruvius suggested that the principal qualities of well- designed buildings are ‘commodity, firmness and delight’:

  • Commodity – buildings should be fit for the purpose for which they were designed
  • Firmness – they should be soundly built and durable
  • Delight – they should be good-looking; their design should please the eye and the mind. 

Shortlist Revealed for World Architecture Festival Awards 2016

The World Architecture Festival have announced the shortlist for their 2016 awards, featuring 343 projects from 58 countries across 32 categories. As the world's largest architectural awards program, the shortlist contains completed and future projects from every corner of the globe.

All finalists will be invited to present their project live at the festival in November at the Arena Berlin in Germany to a "super jury" that will include Kai-Uwe Bergmann (BIG), Louisa Hutton (Sauerbruch Hutton), David Chipperfield, Ole Scheeren, and ArchDaily's co-founder and Editor-in-Chief David Basulto. A winner for each of the awards' 32 categories will be selected. From this, an overarching World Building or Future Project of the Year award will be selected. Tickets for the festival can be booked here.

World Architecture Festival to Address International Housing and Immigration Issues

The World Architecture Festival (WAF) has announced that Lars Krückeberg, Founding Partner of GRAFT, and Juergen Mayer, Founder of J. Mayer H., will speak at this year's festival as part of a session titled ‘Architect as Instigator,’ exploring issues of housing, immigration, and how architects can drive social change through the buildings and spaces they create.

The world’s largest, annual, international architectural event, WAF will be held from November 16 to 18, at Franz Ahrens’ historic former bus depot now known as Arena Berlin, in Berlin, Germany. WAF also features the biggest architectural awards programme in the world. Projects can be submitted for consideration for an award until May 19th via this link.

World Architecture Festival to Move to Berlin After Four Years in Singapore

The World Architecture Festival (WAF), the largest annual international gathering of architects, is decamping from its four year home in Singapore for Berlin later this year. The annual event, consisting of awards, a conference, and an exhibition, recognizes outstanding projects in a variety of categories, and is attended by over 2,000 visitors from 65 countries. The venue for this year’s festival is the Berlin Arena, a bus terminal designed by Franz Ahrens in 1927 and repurposed as an event space in the 1990s. This is the ninth edition of the festival and the first to occur in Europe since 2011.

Monocle 24 Report from the World Architecture Festival

For this episode of Section D, Monocle 24's weekly review of design, architecture and craft, Sophie Grove and the team explore the World Architecture Festival (WAF) in Singapore, take a considered look at post-war buildings across England, as well as hear from some longstanding manufacturers in East London who are "bucking the trend of constant change" that’s come to define their ever-developing neighbourhood.

Monocle 24 Report from the World Architecture Festival - Image 1 of 4

March Studio's Hotel Lobby in Australia Named World's Best Interior of 2015

The "fragmented" lobby of Australia's Hotel Hotel in Canberra by March Studio has been named World Interior of the Year 2015. Announced at the INSIDE World Festival of Interiors in Singapore, concurrently with the World Architecture Festival's Building of the Year award, the winning project was selected over 100 nominated and 50 shortlisted projects for being the best global interior completed within the last 12 months. It also took top prize in the award's hotel category.

The project has created a "Bilbao effect" that has helped rejuvenate the area, said the judges. Adding, it's a "masterful integration of different spaces into a seamless and delightful interior."

OMA and Ole Scheeren's Interlace Named World Building of the Year 2015

OMA and Buro Ole Scheeren's vertical village in Singapore, The Interlace has been named the World Building of the Year 2015 at culmination of the World Architecture Festival (WAF). Celebrated for being "an example of bold, contemporary architectural thinking," as WAF Director Paul Finch described, the project is eighth building to ever win the illustrious award. It is considered to be a "radical new approach to contemporary living in a tropical environment."

Winners of the year's Future Project, Landscape, Small Project and Color Prize awards were also announced. Read on to see the who won with comments from the jury.

Fernando Guerra Wins Arcaid Award for World's Best Building Image

Fernando Guerra's stunning image of Richter Dahl Rocha & Associés' EPFL Quartier Nord in Ecublens, Switzerland, has won the Arcaid Images Architectural Photography Award. Announced at the ongoing World Architecture Festival (WAF) in Singapore, the image was selected by a panel of judges for its ability to "translate the sophistication of architecture into a readable and understandable two dimensions."

"The architecture itself is the focus and the image regarded only as the medium. The Arcaid Images Architectural Photography Award aims to put the focus onto the skill and creativity of the photographer," said the Award's organizers.

Each shortlisted image was judged on the merits of the photography for composition, sense of place, atmosphere and use of scale; Guerra had the highest scoring image overall.

"The high level of photography has made it a very difficult the task to choose the winners. The most important thing for us has been the concept and atmosphere of the images. How they have been perceived and expressed through the creativity and inspiration of the photographer," said architects and jury members Fabrizio Barozzi and Alberto Veiga.

The runners up included...

WAF Day 2 Winners Announced

The second group of winners of the World Architecture Festival’s (WAF) 2015 category awards have been announced today with BIG’s future Vancouver House in Canada and People's Architecture Office’s The Courtyard House Plugin in China among the awarded projects.

The 14 winners from day two of the festival will go on to compete against the winners of day one to receive the title World Building of the Year. The projects will be presented in front of a Super Jury, which includes Manuelle Gautrand, Sou Fujimoto and Peter Cook.

Check out the Day 1 winners here and view the Day 2 winners after the break.