A community school and regenerated riverside plaza receive World Architecture Festival 2024 accolades
SINGAPORE, 13 NOVEMBER 2024 – [MEDIA PARTNER] World Architecture Festival (WAF)’s ultimate accolades, including World Building of the Year and Landscape of the Year were announced on Friday, 8 November 2024 at the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore. The announcement marked the final day of WAF, in which prize winners across 42 categories have been competing for the winning titles.
As media partner, FuturArc magazines were displayed at the Media Gallery to WAF delegates from around the world.
World Building of the Year supported by GROHE: Darlington Public School in Australia by fjcstudio
This community school is located on the outskirts of Sydney and has a strong connection to Aboriginal people embodied in its redesign. The transformed school seamlessly connects to its surroundings, offering glimpses of the inner courtyard from the main entrance, promoting a sense of privacy and community for the children. Facilities that are publicly accessible include the community hall, covered outdoor learning area and library.
The architects collaborated with educational consultants and the school community to inform the brief for an inclusive learning environment. The redesign embraces the rich indigenous culture through the artistic heritage of the school, conserving and displaying aboriginal artworks around the school to preserve stories of the country for future generations.
A community garden with indigenous plants has also been created to teach students indigenous cooking and culture. The school continued to operate during construction, minimising time, cost and disruption. The building also embraces sustainable principles with passive design elements such as sawtooth roofs angled to the sun, high-level glazing for indirect daylight, and protective curved screens for filtered daylight.
Alessandro Rossi, Associate at fjcstudio commented: “It’s very humbling given the modest scale of the building—it’s a little school project so to have won against all the other big projects at WAF is a testament to the client and the community engagement that helped drive design process. The real winners are the children who will spend time in the building—a place of enrichment for many years to come.”
The Super Jury for World Building of the Year chaired by Sonali Rastogi comprised Emre Arolat, Mario Cucinella and Ian Ritchie. On behalf of the jury, Paul Finch, Programme Director of the World Architecture Festival commented: “The architect of the winning project explored and extended the formal programme of the client, to include the views and experience of the local community and a variety of users. This generated a reading of the history of place, culture and time.”
Landscape of the Year: Regeneration of Vitality – Shenzhen Guanlan Riverside Plaza in China by LAY-OUT Planning Consultants Co., Ltd.
The renovation of Shenzhen Guanlan Riverside Plaza has been designed to meet the diverse needs of the city and its citizens today, responding to a rapid urbanisation lacking character in its spaces and consideration for people. Based on the concept of a ‘park-like plaza’, the design has been divided into three distinct activity areas.
An ecological garden aims to create a natural experience in the city, with original large trees on the site retained and 200 native plants have been planted to create a space for gatherings, camping, picnics, sunbathing, frisbee, art performances, etc.
Serving as a performance space for large-scale urban events, the central area of the plaza features a flexible multifunctional fountain and lawn. It can accommodate various urban activities such as gatherings, festivals, singing and dancing, art exhibitions, marathons, markets, flag-raising ceremonies, and also serves as an emergency urban shelter.
Enclosed by rows of trees, a square provides space for activities for all ages, such as resting for the elderly, elderly exercise, children’s slides, hide-and-seek, cafe, book bar, gym, markets and small concerts.
Taking into consideration the hot climate in southern China, the design incorporates evergreen trees as the main tree species to provide shade year-round. The tree coverage has been increased from 30% to 65%, alleviating the urban heat island effect, creating a comfortable and diverse space for activities. The multifunctional fountain in the centre of the plaza also helps to cool down the plaza.
To enhance the plaza’s resilience to natural disasters, a 300-square-metre garden has been created to collect rainwater, and a 200-cubic-meter underground storage system has been installed to store excess rainwater. After purification, the collected water is used for plant irrigation and surface cleaning.
View the full list of WAF 2024 winners here.
Are you an architecture student or recent graduate? Submit your school work to be featured in FuturArc!