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The focus of the second day program of the LafargeHolcim Awards ceremony North America was on architecture in the city of Chicago. Mark Lee, Artistic Director of the Chicago Architecture Biennial 2017, introduced the participants to the Chicago Cultural Center and led through “his” exhibition; later the guests enjoyed a Chicago Architecture Foundation river cruise.

Sustainability has become a core principle of architecture and construction in North America. Winners of the LafargeHolcim Awards for Sustainable Construction presented in Chicago show how the leading edge of sustainable design means reaching far beyond “common sense”. Their approaches use proven instruments that are cleverly applied to improve the quality of life. So the world builds better.

This is the fifth time the LafargeHolcim Awards competition is being conducted. Over the years, more than 200 projects have been awarded worldwide. More than half the winning projects have been built or are scheduled for completion soon. Thus, the LafargeHolcim Awards are not about “castles in the air” but about tangible measures that advance the science of construction. This aspect of tangible change is underscored by a prize that’s being awarded for the first time in 2017: the LafargeHolcim Building Better Recognition. It is awarded for a winning project from a previous competition cycle, one which has been realized and has stood the test of time as a particularly successful example of sustainable building.

Creating and improving public space, solving issues related to water and generating electricity from tidal flows were topics presented by the five projects at the media briefing to conclude the LafargeHolcim Awards prize hand-over ceremony for Latin America, held in Costa Rica.

The path of Tropical Storm Nate across Central America and the Caribbean – with heavy winds and torrential rain pummelling Costa Rica – delayed the journey of the Next Generation 3rd prize winning team from Argentina. The group of five students from Universidad Nacional de Córdoba were unable to reach San José in time for the LafargeHolcim Awards ceremony for Latin America, so received their prize at the farewell dinner the day following the ceremony.

Water is the hot topic among the project entries for the LafargeHolcim Awards in region Latin America. Whether for wastewater, drinking water, or tidal water, many of the prize winners have innovative and often surprising proposals for ways to master the use of this precious resource in Latin America.

This is the fifth time the LafargeHolcim Awards competition is being conducted. Over the years, more than 200 projects have been awarded worldwide. More than half the winning projects have been built or are scheduled for completion soon. Thus, the LafargeHolcim Awards are not about castles in the air, but about tangible measures that advance the science of construction. This aspect of tangible change is underscored by a prize that’s being awarded for the first time in 2017: the “LafargeHolcim Building Better Recognition”. It is awarded for a winning project from a previous competition cycle, one which has been built and has stood the test of time as a particularly successful example of sustainable building.

The days when the sustainability of a construction project was a matter of ad hoc measures are over – sustainable construction has become systematic and specific. This was emphatically shown by the results of the LafargeHolcim Awards in region Europe: The first prize was shared by two projects in Brussels, both of which excel in terms of their multi-functionality.

The first LafargeHolcim Building Better Recognition for region Europe was presented to Gilles Delalex and his team from Muoto Architecture Studio for their low-cost flexible university building Lieu de vie campus hub at the University of Paris-Saclay. This is the fifth time the LafargeHolcim Awards competition has been conducted and more than 200 projects have been awarded worldwide. Over half are either soon to be built or have been completed. Thus, the LafargeHolcim Awards are not about castles in the air, but about tangible measures that advance the science of construction. This element of real change is underscored by a prize that is awarded for the first time in 2017: the “LafargeHolcim Building Better Recognition”.

The two gold Awards winning projects in Brussels were in the center of the media briefing following the prize hand-over ceremony of the 5th International LafargeHolcim Awards for Europe. Rolf Soiron, founding Chairman of the LafargeHolcim Foundation, emphasized the responsibility of industry to drive sustainability. Edward Schwarz introduced the activities of the Foundation, which was created as initiative of LafargeHolcim back in 2003 to promote and reward sustainability in construction.

Sustainability in building is rapidly gaining significance in the Middle East Africa region – particularly among female professionals and young graduates in architecture and engineering. This was clearly seen at the prize-handover ceremony for the regional LafargeHolcim Awards in Nairobi, Kenya. The majority of the 11 prize-winning projects dealt with education and the contemporary promotion of traditional manual skills.

An impressive number of Kenyan and international journalists attended the media briefing following the prize handover ceremony of the LafargeHolcim Awards for Sustainable Construction in region Middle East Africa.

The first LafargeHolcim Building Better Recognition Middle East Africa goes to Kéré Architecture, Berlin, Germany, for “Secondary school with passive ventilation system,” a project that earned the Global LafargeHolcim Awards Gold 2012. The jury was impressed by its “beauty and innovative architectural concept and example for new sustainable construction from a materials and technology perspective.” Today, the secondary school is reality for hundreds of children and standing the test of time.

This is the story of Élodie, Ductal and Airium – a testimony of how LafargeHolcim embraces sustainability and innovation. So the world builds better. Wearing appropriate protection equipment, Élodie pours Ductal into a mold of acrylic glass. Making a base for the LafargeHolcim Awards trophy requires skill, patience, and stamina. The result, a rectangular block with a perfectly smooth surface is also a great source of satisfaction and pride for Élodie.

The latest issue of “Foundations” is online, with features dedicated to the 5th cycle of the regional LafargeHolcim Awards. Sarah Nichols and Marc Angélil set foot on five continents to represent the LafargeHolcim Foundation at each of the regional LafargeHolcim Awards jury meetings. Entries must stand out to get nominated for a prize, they conclude, “and for that you must deliver truly special results.”

LafargeHolcim Awards Global Gold winner Francis Kéré continues to create work that lives up to the “target issues” of sustainable construction and captures international imagination. His Serpentine Pavilion has opened in London, with a design that reflects on the role of a tree as meeting point in his hometown of Gando in Burkina Faso.

Architecture Snob and the LafargeHolcim Foundation were invited by renowned German architect Jürgen Mayer H. to explore their experiences of “Communicating Architecture” at the 10th conversation on “Curating Architecture” at Soho House Berlin, Germany. After the two-hour session, the audience had not just met two organizations but two individuals: Marcin Szczelina from Warsaw, and Edward Schwarz from Zurich.

Prof. Guillaume Habert will present a special guest seminar at the University of Melbourne on Monday July 1, 2017 at Engineering-106 (Brown Theatre). The Chair of Sustainable Construction at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) is in Melbourne for the LafargeHolcim Awards jury meeting for Asia Pacific, held at the Melbourne School of Design (MSD) over the weekend.

The LafargeHolcim Awards for Sustainable Construction gives many projects the boost to achieve realization and is part of countless success stories being written by aspiring and established professionals. A prize in the competition opens new doors for many of the winners, like the Spanish architect Carlos Piles: thanks to two prizes from the LafargeHolcim Foundation, he has made an exciting step in his career – to LafargeHolcim!

A heavy snowfall in the Spanish town of Cehegín caused a landslip that destroyed a cluster of houses on a steep embankment in the old quarter. The area was not repaired and became known as “El Coso”. Little by little, the area deteriorated even further and interrupted the flow of adjacent streets, while the townsfolk created ad hoc paths to traverse the urban void.