News

LafargeHolcim Awards winners Joana Dabaj and Riccardo Luca Conti from CatalyticAction highlighted the importance of ethical standards and social inclusion at the Strelka “Future Architect” Conference in Moscow, Russia. The winners of the LafargeHolcim Awards Bronze 2017 for Middle East Africa explained how their work not only addressed sustainable design from the perspective of building materials – but also created opportunities to empower local communities.

The first LafargeHolcim Research in Practice Grant (RPG) recipients updated members of the Academic Committee (AC) of the LafargeHolcim Foundation on the progress of their research. The RPG update meeting was held at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) and followed on from an initial meeting in April 2019 at the 6th Forum in Cairo. The core aim of the RPG program is to mentor and financially-support emerging professionals to conduct leading edge, practice-related research in the field of sustainable construction.

The LH Accelerator is a six-month program that selects, hosts and supports innovative companies and startups to bring their groundbreaking solutions for the material and building construction industry to life. Led by sponsor of the LafargeHolcim Foundation, LafargeHolcim together with CCCC and Sika, the program offers a unique access to a high level technical, market and entrepreneurial expertise. The program is entering its second season and is open for applications until September 15, 2019.

The Global LafargeHolcim Awards jury praised the work of architects Wonjoon Han and Gahee Van of VHAN, and executive director Suki Yook of NGO Make Africa Better, South Korea. They considered the shea butter storage concept for the Nyingali community to be sophisticated and community focused. The prize was presented during the closing session of the 6th LafargeHolcim Forum by Brinda Somaya, Principal Architect and Managing Director, Somaya & Kalappa Consultants, India and member of the Board of the LafargeHolcim Foundation in April 2019.

Independent juries will evaluate entries in the 6th International LafargeHolcim Awards for Sustainable Construction in five regions of the world. Each jury consists of nine experts in sustainable design and construction. The Awards seek real projects as well as bold ideas that combine sustainable construction solutions with architectural excellence. The competition offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money and is open for entries until February 25, 2020.

A jury of nine experts headed by Loreta Castro Reguera, Design Director and Founder of Taller Capital (Mexico), will evaluate entries in the 6th International LafargeHolcim Awards for the region of Latin America. The Awards seek real projects as well as bold ideas that combine sustainable construction solutions with architectural excellence. The competition offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money and is open for entries until February 25, 2020.

A jury of nine experts headed by Jeannette Kuo, Founding Partner of Karamuk Kuo Architects (Switzerland), will evaluate entries in the 6th International LafargeHolcim Awards for the region of Europe. The Awards seek real projects as well as bold ideas that combine sustainable construction solutions with architectural excellence. The competition offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money and is open for entries until February 25, 2020.

A jury of nine experts headed by Nirmal Kishnani, Professor of Architecture, School of Design & Environment, at the National University of Singapore, will evaluate entries in the 6th International LafargeHolcim Awards for the region of Asia Pacific. The Awards seek real projects as well as bold ideas that combine sustainable construction solutions with architectural excellence. The competition offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money and is open for entries until February 25, 2020.

A jury of nine experts headed by Mariam Kamara, Principal and Owner of atelier masōmī (Niger), will evaluate entries in the 6th International LafargeHolcim Awards for the region of Middle East Africa. The Awards seek real projects as well as bold ideas that combine sustainable construction solutions with architectural excellence. The competition offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money and is open for entries until February 25, 2020.

A jury of nine experts headed by Reed Kroloff, Rowe Family Dean, College of Architecture, at the Illinois Institute of Technology (USA), will evaluate entries in the 6th International LafargeHolcim Awards for the region of North America. The Awards seek real projects as well as bold ideas that combine sustainable construction solutions with architectural excellence. The competition offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money and is open for entries until February 25, 2020.

Building a cultural facility in a village in Niger called for the delicate approach of both Mariam Kamara, founder of Atelier masōmī, and Yasaman Esmaili, founder of studio chahar, laureates of the LafargeHolcim Awards Gold Middle East Africa in 2017 and the Global LafargeHolcim Award Silver the year after.

What if building components were decoupled from the single-use paradigm – and were sold and resold and resold again? Enabling greater reuse of building materials is a strategy that is best applied at the very beginning as part of sustainable design. Circular lifecycles increase the potential to reuse building materials by factoring-in the need for components to be recovered, inspected, stored, and resold. Institutions that make this exchange, verification, and re- valuing possible could be exciting new actors in the material supply chain.

Columbian practice Colectivo720 envisioned the transformation of these reservoirs into cultural and leisure facilities. “When we awarded the Medellín project, we valued the way in which an infrastructural area had been transformed into an urban site providing a recreational space for the neighbourhood and fostering a sense of belonging in the community,” explains Fernando Diez, member of the jury of the LafargeHolcim Awards for Latin America and director of the Argentinian architecture journal Summa+. As a result, the proposal was crowned with a regional Gold Award in 2014, a Global Award Gold in 2015 as well as a Building Better Recognition Prize for Latin America in 2017. These recognitions, in addition to showcasing an exemplary project, had many positive consequences for the development of Colectivo720.

In March 2019, British Colombia became Canada’s first province to approve mass timber buildings up to 12 floors. This evolution paved the way for construction to start using building technology advanced by a Global LafargeHolcim Awards 2018 finalist project by a team led by Cindy Wilson and Oliver Lang of LWPAC + Intelligent City. They received a certificate from the LafargeHolcim Foundation in recognition of their work.

Water plays a role of primary importance in the culture of India. Here it is both a vital resource for daily life and also an element charged with sacred, even spiritual value. Architect Vedhant Maharaj, whose firm Rebel Base Collective is located in Johannesburg, South Africa, developed a proposal on this theme which won a LafargeHolcim Next Generation Prize for Asia Pacific in 2017. 

Today, everyone in Berlin is focused on the improbable reconstruction of the “Schloss”, the former palace of the Hohenzollern sovereigns. However, another project unfolding at its feet – less spectacular but altogether more avant-garde – seems to be earning so much praise from the profession that it won the LafargeHolcim Awards Gold for Europe in 2011, followed by a Global Award Bronze the year after.

Architect Milinda Pathiraja explains that the greatest benefit of winning the Global LafargeHolcim Award was the international exposure it gave Robust Architecture Workshop as a young architectural practice from Sri Lanka. “We were less than three years into the practice when we won the Awards – the regional and the global one – and the library project was only the third building we had completed”, he explains.

The LafargeHolcim Awards give architects the chance to provoke, excite, and launch their careers. says architecture critic Edwin Heathcote in a special issue of L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui (AA).

Architecture is, whether we acknowledge it or not, a culture of competition. From crits at school to jostling for jobs, from architectural competitions and shortlists to awards and honours and to the existential, intellectual and financial struggles an architect encounters and has to overcome to create a building which has cultural, capital and public value, competition is rife.

From the manufacturing of building materials and construction, operation and maintenance, through to dismantling and recycling – CO₂ is produced at every stage of a structure’s use cycle. The construction sector is directly or indirectly responsible for almost half of all global CO₂ emissions, and as a consequence, has many touchpoints where reducing CO₂ can be addressed. Research and design play an important role in creating more CO₂-efficient materials, building-use and resource recovery.

The LafargeHolcim Foundation and Awards proudly presented the opening lectures of EASA 2019, the European Architecture Students Assembly which is being held in Villars-sur-Ollon (Switzerland) and attended by more than 600 participants from 50 countries. Both speakers urged the next generation of architects to take action that radically changes the design and construction of the built environment compared to what we know today.