The 30 buildings to be visited in consideration for the RIBA International Prize includes nominated projects from China to Colombia, Ireland and Azerbaijan. A full list of the buildings is available below

• The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) announces the buildings to be visited this summer in contention for RIBA’s first global architecture award, The RIBA International Prize
• Entries were submitted from 50 countries, the judges have selected projects to visit in over 20 countries
• Billie Tsien, founding partner of award winning architecture practice, Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects | Partners, joins the Grand Jury for the Prize led by Lord Rogers of Riverside
• The winner of the first RIBA International Prize will be announced in December 2016
• For more details please contact riba@flint-pr.com

The RIBA is delighted to announce the 30 buildings it has selected to be visited by the RIBA awards committee this summer under consideration for the inaugural RIBA International Prize. These will be whittled down to 20 of the best buildings, after which six finalists will be chosen and visited by the Grand Jury this autumn. Setting a new global standard for architectural achievement, the prize will be judged by an expert panel led by world-renowned architect, Richard Rogers.

From hundreds of entries, the 30 buildings selected range in size and budget. Projects range from large urban infrastructure schemes to private residential projects; cultural destinations to civic spaces; academic buildings to places of worship. The RIBA International Prize will be awarded to the most significant and inspirational building of the year. The winning building will demonstrate visionary, innovative thinking and excellence of execution, whilst making a distinct contribution to its users and to its physical context. Unlike any previous RIBA award for architecture, the RIBA International Prize is open to any qualified architect in the world.

Billie Tsien, founding partner of Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects | Partners based in New York City joins the Grand Jury adjudicating the Prize, chaired by Richard Rogers. Fellow jurors are Kunlé Adeyemi, founder and principal of NLÉ, Marilyn Jordan Taylor FAIA, the dean of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Fine Arts and Philip Gumuchdjian, founder of Gumuchdjian Architects and Chair of RIBA Awards.

Speaking today, RIBA President, Jane Duncan commented:

“We have been delighted with the response to our inaugural RIBA International Prize, which has brought a huge range of exceptional entries from all around the globe. It will be fascinating to see insights from the judges and entrants into the power and value of great architecture, wherever you are in the world.”

Billie Tsien, Founding Partner of TWBTA speaking on joining the jury said:

“It is a huge honour and responsibility to consider work for premiation. Of importance to me personally is the opportunity to recognize work of integrity, both aesthetically and in the value system under which it is made.”

The list of buildings to be considered include the following:

• The RIBA International Prize is in association with the UIA (Union Internationale des Architectes).
• Wallpaper* Magazine is the exclusive lifestyle media partner for the RIBA International Prize.
• CNN Style is the exclusive video media partner for the RIBA International Prize.
• Dezeen is the exclusive Professional media partner for the RIBA International Prize.
• To find out more, visit www.architecture.com/Awards2016

ENDS

Notes to Editors:

1. For further press information please contact – Fiona Russell or Rosie Marsh on riba@flint-pr.com

2. The winner of the RIBA International Prize will be chosen from a shortlist of six, in turn selected from the 20 winners of RIBA Awards for International Excellence. These will be given to buildings worldwide that stretch the boundaries of architecture. Irrespective of style, complexity and size of both scheme and budget successful projects should demonstrate visionary or innovative thinking and excellence of execution. Architecture in the UK will be represented by the RIBA Stirling Prize winner.

In the inaugural year of the RIBA International Prize, buildings entered for consideration must have been completed within the past 3 years (between 1 January 2013 and 1 February 2016). For each year thereafter, the Prize will be awarded to a building completed within 2 years.

3. The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) champions better buildings, communities and the environment through architecture and our members.

4. RIBA awards have been running since 1966. RIBA inspires and rewards excellence through across a programme of regional, national and international Awards including the Royal Gold Medal, RIBA Stirling Prize and RIBA House of the Year. The RIBA International Prize is the first global award for buildings open to all architects in the organisation’s history.

5. For more information visit www.architecture.com

6. Social media:

7. Judges’ biographies:

Richard Rogers

Richard Rogers is the 2007 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate, the recipient of the RIBA Gold Medal in 1985 and winner of the 1999 Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation Medal. He is also winner of the 2000 Praemium Imperiale Prize for Architecture, the 2006 Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement and the 2007 Tau Sigma Delta Gold Medal. Richard Rogers was awarded the Légion d’Honneur in 1986, knighted in 1991 and made a member of the House of Lords in 1996. Most recently, in 2008 he was made a Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour.

He is a Partner at Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners which has won a number of awards including the Stirling Prize for Terminal 4 at Madrid Barajas Airport, in 2006 and again in 2009 for Maggie’s London. Currently, the practice is working on a number of international projects including an office tower on the World Trade Center site in New York and a new terminal at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport.

Billie Tsien

Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects | Partners

Born in Ithaca, NY, Billie Tsien began working with Tod Williams in 1977 and established their joint architectural practice in 1986. Located in New York, their studio focuses on work for institutions including schools, museums, and not ­for ­profits—organizations and people who value issues of aspiration and meaning, timelessness and beauty. Their buildings are carefully made and useful in ways that speak to both efficiency and the spirit. A sense of rootedness, light, texture, detail, and most of all experience, is at the heart of what they build. Over the past three decades Tod and Billie have received more than two dozen awards from the American Institute of Architects, as well as numerous national and international citations.

Billie is the current President of the Architectural League of New York and a Director of the Public Art Fund. She and Tod are both Fellows of the American Academy in Rome, and have been inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, National Academy, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In parallel with her practice, Billie maintains an active academic career and lectures worldwide.

At various times, she has taught at the Cooper Union, Harvard University, Cornell University, University of Texas, City College of New York, and Yale University. As both an educator and a practitioner, she is deeply committed to making a better world through architecture.

Kunlé Adeyemi

Kunlé Adeyemi is an architect, urbanist and designer. His recent work includes ‘Makoko Floating School’, an innovative, prototype, floating structure located on the lagoon heart of Nigeria’s largest city, Lagos. This acclaimed project is part of an extensive research project – ‘African Water Cities’ – being developed by NLÉ, an architecture, design, and urbanism practice founded by Adeyemi in 2010 with a focus on developing cities and communities. NLÉ is currently developing a number of urban, research and architectural projects in Africa; one of which is Chicoco Radio Media Center; an amphibious building in Delta city of Port Harcourt in Nigeria.

Born and raised in Nigeria, Adeyemi studied architecture at the University of Lagos where he began his early practice, before joining Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in 2002. At OMA he led the design, development and execution of several large prestigious projects around the world including the Shenzhen Stock Exchange tower in China, the Qatar National Library in Doha and Prada Transformer in Seoul. Adeyemi was one of 5 members of the International Advisory Council for the World Design Capital 2014, a juror for the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale, a Fellow of the World Technology Network, an international speaker and lecturer at various institutions. He is currently the Gensler Visiting Critic at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.

Philip Gumuchdjian
 BA (Econ) MA (RCA) RIBA ARB FRSA

Philip Gumuchdjian founded Gumuchdjian Architects in 1998. He has gained a reputation for designing innovative and contextual buildings in the public and private sectors. The practice has won multiple RIBA Awards, including two Stephen Lawrence prizes, five National Awards and a European Award for his collaboration on the Pompidou Centre in Metz. He now chairs the Awards committee.

Philip Gumuchdjian spent 18 years and was Associate Directorship at the Richard Rogers Partnership where he co-wrote Richard Rogers’ ‘Cities for a Small Planet’ in 1995. He was Rapporteur at the UN Habitat II conference and was a member of the German Government’s Urban 21 panel. He has written, lectured and broadcast on the subject of architecture, sustainability and urban development, and his work has been published and exhibited internationally. Philip has been a visiting critic to the Architectural Association, the Royal College of Art, and has taught Urban Design at the Bartlett School of Architecture

Marilyn Jordan Taylor, FAI

Dean and Paley Professor, University of Pennsylvania School of Design, Philadelphia, PA, USA

Marilyn Jordan Taylor became Dean of the School of Design and Paley Professor at the University of Pennsylvania in 2008. Throughout her term she has been a strong advocate of the power of design and the significant role of designers in creating more vibrant, resilient, diverse and just communities and societies. She is working closely the school’s distinguished chairs and faculty to enhance the role and value of design through experimentation and use of data, robotics, technology and innovative design thinking.

Before that, Taylor served for 33 years as architect, urban designer, and partner at Skidmore Owings & Merrill LLP, where she led the firm’s worldwide practices in airports, transportation, and urban design; in 2001, she became the first woman to serve as Chairman of the SOM partnership. Acclaimed for her work in civic design and community engagement, she has been involved with campuses, airports and train systems, and urban districts across the North America, the Middle East, and Asia. Most recently her project for the Denver Union Station Transportation Hub and its new post-industrial urban district won a prestigious Global Award from the Urban Land Institute.

Taylor is a Trustee of global ULI where she was the first woman to serve as its Chairman. She has been elected as a David Rockefeller Fellow of the Partnership for New York City, President of the American Institute of Architects (New York), Chairman of the AIA City and Regional Planning Committee, Chairman of the New York Building Congress, and President of the Forum for Urban Design. She is a board member of the Regional Planning Association, the Forum for Urban Design, and the Delaware River Waterfront Corporation, as well as a Housing Commissioner of the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, DC and a member of the Nominating Committee for Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew World Cities Prize.

Posted on Tuesday 10th May 2016