DETAIL Prize selects joint main winners in Barcelona and Cape Town

Winners of the international DETAIL Prize 2018 have been revealed, and the jury selected not one but two projects to jointly receive the main award: Heatherwick Studio's Zeitz MOCAA in Cape Town and the Harquitectes-designed Civic Centre Cristalleries Planell in Barcelona, both conversions of long-vacant historical buildings, won praise for their thoughtful approach and added value for their respective communities.

The DETAIL Inside Special Prize went to Christensen & Co Architects and Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter for the atrium of the Life Science & Bioengineering Building of the Technical University of Denmark in Lyngby. 

Undurraga Deves Arquitectos received the DETAIL Structure Special Prize for the Chilean Pavilion at EXPO 2015 in Milan, now a cultural center in the southern Chilean city of Temuco. 

The DETAIL Readers' Prize winner was chosen via online polling, and the RAW/deAbajoGarcia-designed Impluvium community center in Reinosa, Spain came out at the top. 

DETAIL Prize 2018 joint winner: Zeitz Mocaa, Museum of Contemporary African Art
Heatherwick Studio

"Grain has been stored since the 1920s in what was once the highest building in South Africa. Today the edifice contains contemporary art from African artists all over the continent. Featuring upper storeys that glow at night, the intricate building is a flagship project, and not only in architectural terms – some 20 years after the end of apartheid, it places African art in the international limelight." — DETAIL

DETAIL Prize 2018 joint winner: Civic Centre Cristalleries Planell
Harquitectes

"Only two external facades of the former Planell glass factory in the northwest of Barcelona had survived. Behind them, Harquitectes added a brick building that, thanks to a sophisticated ventilation concept, requires hardly any heating or cooling energy." — DETAIL

DETAIL Inside Special Prize: Atrium of the Life Science & Bioengineering Building of the Technical University of Denmark
Christensen & Co Architects in collaboration with Rørbaek og Møller Arkitekter

"The interiors of the DTU 202 Institute building in Lyngby are composed of freely-stacked cubes that provide a suitable space for exchange and communication between the different departments." — DETAIL

DETAIL Structure Special Prize: Chilean Pavilion at Expo 2015 in Milan
Undurraga Deves Arquitectos

"Recycling is currently the subject of much discussion in architecture. Rarely has it been implemented as consistently as in this building, which served as the Chilean Expo pavilion in Milan in 2015 and which has now found a new use as a cultural centre in southern Chile. [...] Structural logic is combined with elegance in this structure, because steel components have been systematically minimised or cleverly removed from view. Instead, traditional wood joining techniques celebrate a renaissance here." — DETAIL

DETAIL Readers' Prize: Impluvium, Community Centre
RAW/deAbajoGarcia

"In Reinosa in northern Spain RAW/deAbajo García replaced the burned down market hall with an open, clearly structured new building made of timber. Externally chestnut wood slats provide shade for the glass facades, while internally the building opens onto a courtyard." — DETAIL