Winners of the regional Holcim Awards 2014 for Europe

The announcements of the regional winners for the Holcim Awards 2014 have begun -- with the first set of winners coming from the Holcim Awards for Europe. During a recent ceremony in Moscow, 12 projects from throughout the continent were recognized as top examples of sustainable construction that illustrate the evolving state of sustainable construction and address challenges in the building and construction industry.

The winning projects received a shared money prize of more than US$300,000. Aside the top three winners, the first-ever Honorable Mention award was given. Additionally, two Acknowledgement Prizes and six Next Generation-winning projects were recognized.

Check them out below.

Holcim Awards Gold 2014: Anthropic Park: Freshwater ecological reserve and remediation, Saline Joniche, Italy
MAIN AUTHORS: Francisco Leiva - Grupo aranea, Alicante, Spain; Marco Scarpinato - AutonomeForme, Palermo, Italy
FURTHER AUTHORS: Marta García Chico - Grupo aranea, Alicante, Spain; Lucia Pierro - AutonomeForme, Palermo, Italy

"An environmental remediation project on the coast of Southern Italy that connects nature with the imprints of humanity won the top prize. Architects Francisco Leiva of Grupo aranea (Spain) and Marco Scarpinato of AutonomeForme (Italy) integrate the process of restoration in an area that has been degraded during the industrial age. The shape-shifting ecosystem generates a flooded landscape filled with flora and fauna, with a special focus on migrating birds.

At the prize handover event in Moscow, jury representative Arno Brandlhuber (Germany) applauded the Holcim Awards Gold winning project for its bold philosophical posture – investigating the roles of architecture, landscape design, and urban planning and their constraints through the necessity to allow human existence. 'The project frames a discourse on potential forms of relationship between human activity and the natural environment, offering strategies for understanding architecture as a form of action in a symbiotic rapport with nature,' he said."

For further project details, click here.

Holcim Awards Silver 2014: Public Condenser: Low-cost flexible university building, Paris, France
MAIN AUTHORS: Gilles Delalex - Muoto, Paris, France; Yves Moreau - Muoto, Paris, France; Thomas Wessel-Cessieux - Muoto, Paris, France

"A building that will host a mix of activities including indoor and outdoor sports facilities, cafés, street terraces and a pedestrian square on the new university campus of Paris-Saclay received the Holcim Awards Silver. Gilles Delalex, Yves Moreau and Thomas Wessel-Cessieux from Muoto architects (France) have designed a minimal structure that uses rough materials, robust and long-lasting techniques, and vertical stacking to superimpose different activities above one another. The jury acknowledged the minimal deployment of architectural and technical means that is resilient and adaptable to future needs: 'The elegant design merges economic and aesthetic considerations in such a way that the low-cost structure turns limitation into a quality'."

For further project details, click here.

Holcim Awards Bronze 2014: The Commons: Participatory urban neighborhood, Vienna, Austria
MAIN AUTHORS: Enrique Arenas Laorga - Arenas Basabe Palacios arquitectos, Madrid, Spain; Luis Basabe Montalvo - Arenas Basabe Palacios arquitectos, Madrid, Spain; Luis Palacios Labrador - Arenas Basabe Palacios arquitectos, Madrid, Spain
FURTHER AUTHORS: Andreas Käfer - Traffix Verkehrsplanung; Robert Korab - Raum & Kommunikation, Vienna, Austria; Thomas Proksch - Land in Sicht Landschaftsarchitektur, Vienna, Austria; Christian Seethaler - Mascha & Seethaler ZT, Vienna, Austria

""An urban design project in Vienna that identifies a set of rules for establishing a sustainable urban neighborhood received the Holcim Awards Bronze. The urban plan by Enrique Arenas, Luis Basabe and Luis Palacios of Arenas Basabe Palacios arquitectos (Spain) uses a framework of gardens for the project’s physical and social development. The approach establishes a minimally-invasive intervention that will develop over time according to the needs of the community at every stage. The jury especially commended the focus on questions of procedures, including stakeholder participation and its effects on physical form: 'The proposal offers a method for a step-by-step urban densification, combining both bottom-up/top-down and formal/informal practices to create an urban commons'."

For further project details, click here.

• Merging architectural and technical considerations: Honorable Mention to energy-efficient office building in Holderbank, Switzerland:  A competence center including research labs, office space and training facilities, with a state-of-the-art energy concept received the first-ever Holcim Awards Honorable Mention. Designed by Swiss architect Christian Kerez,the perfectly circular atria cut through ceilings and floors crisscross the building, creating opportunities for employees and visitors to meet one another while also providing a sense of the building’s size from within. As the project was designed to become the new Competence Center of Holcim, the jury decided to bestow a non-monetary honorable mention “respecting the exceptional value of the proposal”. Further project details.
   
• Acknowledgement prizes for materials projects from Belgium and Germany: A team from TETRA architecten in Belgium received an Acknowledgement prize for their materials village in the Port of Brussels that distributes construction materials to the city, and also collects and recycles construction materials waste from the city. (Further project details). Karola Dierichs and Achim Menges from the University of Stuttgart’s Institute for Computational Design received an Acknowledgement for a multi-disciplinary materials research project that examines aggregate architectures made from injection-molding of designed, self-solidifying bioplastic granules. (Further project details)
   
• “Next Generation” prizes for project visions in Austria, France, Ireland, Russia and Spain: The Holcim Awards competition also seeks visions and bold ideas in the “Next Generation” (young professionals and students) category. The jury decided to confer an unprecedented six prizes in recognition of the outstanding quality of submissions from across Europe. The “Next Generation” 1st prize, went to Hani Jaber, Ricardo Mayor, Héctor Muñoz, and Ignacio Taus of DAT Pangea (Spain) for a series of three socially-focused architectural designs. Their portfolio of projects includes a spatial plan and agricultural restructure, a productive urban garden as well as temporary spaces for public engagement. The jury was impressed by the design propositions that aim for a dialog between architecture and politics, taking key social problems into consideration while offering appropriate design solutions to address specific issues at hand.
  The “Next Generation” 2nd prize was handed over to Aleksandr Veshniakov, Dimitry Ivanov, Natalia Mikhailova, Aleksandra Tyron, and Nadezhda Pavlova, a group of Russian architects, for a network of civic centers for small towns which form a virtual network using online connectivity. The jury was primarily interested in the idea of creating an “architectural instrument” that promotes vitality in small towns across Russia.
  The 3rd prize went to Iker Luna from Spain for a materials research project on moss-grafted clay tiles for green roofs. The materialenables moss to grow on roof tiles, improving air quality and alleviating urban heat island effects.
  Additional “Next Generation” prizes were awarded to András Dankházi for a symbiotic water supply and landscape regeneration in Ireland (4th), Grégoir Arthuis for a high-rise tower rehabilitation in France (5th), and Nikola Znaor for a responsive sustainable shading system in Austria (6th).

Holcim Awards submissions for projects in Europe were evaluated by an independent jury hosted by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) and included: Jean-Philippe Vassal (Head of jury, France), Horia Adrian (Romania), Marc Angélil (Switzerland), Arno Brandlhuber (Germany), Antón García-Abril (Spain), Hiromi Hosoya (Switzerland), Hrvoje Njiric (Croatia), Stuart Smith (United Kingdom) and Holger Wallbaum (Sweden).

All images courtesy of the Holcim Foundation.

Check out the Acknowledgement Prizes and "Next Generation" Prizes are in the image gallery below.