Archiprix International.

From its origins as a national competition for the best student work in The Netherlands, Archiprix has now gone international. Here we survey the nine winners and look a diverse selection of unplaced projects.

From its origins as a national competition honouring the best graduation projects of Dutch architecture students, Archiprix has expanded internationally (AR October 2000). For the first time, student projects drawn from around the world were assessed by an international jury comprising Aaron Betsky (newly installed as director of the Netherlands Architecture Institute), Aurelio Galfetti, Paolo Mendes da Rocha and Jo Coenen (chairman). The aim is to encourage interaction between universities and colleges teaching architecture and to stimulate debate among an emerging generation of young designers. Academic institutions were invited to submit their best graduation projects from the past year. The resulting exhibition, jury and public conference (held in the Van Nelle factory in Rotterdam earlier this year) were intended to encourage debate on the nature of architectural education and the place of architecture in society. Prizes were presented by Dutch State Secretary for Culture Rick van der Ploeg, and the even t coincided with Rotterdam's tenure as cultural capital of Europe.

Archiprix International received 138 entries from around the world, although, as might be expected, the majority came from Europe, with Africa under-represented. Projects ranged in scale from simple to highly complex buildings and from fragmented urban models to ambitious masterplans and landscaped geography. Although most offered idealistic visions rather than pragmatic solutions, some schemes were perfectly feasible. Several concerned housing projects or public buildings, while others explored hybrid functions, set in a range of climates and social conditions. In their formal expression, entries drew freely on the rich vocabulary of Modernism and popular architecture, both old and new.

In assessing the large number of entries, the jury rewarded inventive proposals that addressed topical issues of worldwide concern. Judging criteria included poetically and ecologically building with nature; reinventing time-honoured traditions of shaping the landscape; intensifying and alleviating urban density; and striking an intelligent and coherent balance between architectural artifice and its natural context. The jury shared the conviction that it was necessary to reaffirm the quest for a universal language of architecture to address global concerns, rather than to pursue regional or vernacular approaches.

The jury selected nine winning projects, which are shown here, with a selection of the more interesting unplaced schemes. Embraced without political agendas or preconceptions regarding architectural schools or styles, the first Archiprix International can be regarded as a highly encouraging pilot project with the potential to emulate the success of its original Dutch counterpart. C. S.

winner

Danilo + Daniela Romani + Brascugli, Universita di Chieti, Pescara, Italy. Re-use of oil and gas platforms

Of the 6500 offshore oil and gas installations worldwide, about 100 are in the Adriatic Sea. Exploitation of its oil fields began in the '60s and now about a third of the platforms are older than their physical life cycle of 25-40 years. This proposal envisages decommissioning and re-using the platforms for functions such as marine research, undersea farming and generation of renewable energy. New layers are added to the structure such as a modular support system, shell, stairs and a technical plate into which different units can be plugged.

winner

Jamie Bromley, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, England. Floating city

Seventy-one percent of the Earth's surface is water. As an investigation of humankind's ability to adapt and inhabit the oceans, this project explores the notion of a floating city. The linear form follows a fault line of divergent tectonic plates in the Pacific to the east of the Philippines. The city is a semi-submersed, buoyant. tethered megastructure anchored to the seabed and positioned above hydrothermal vents supplying energy. Organized around courtyards, clustered towers provide maximum three-dimensional permeability as well as ocean breezes and light.

winner

Jarrik Ouburg, Serge Schoemaker, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands. IMAGEbuilding

Located at the mouth of the rivers Rhine, Meuse and Schelde, this scheme is for a new city - a 'Deltametropolis' planned around giant reservoirs to contain rain and meltwater. Traditional storage solutions, such as drainage pools and inlet polders, are not always practicable. This plan links city and country and integrates them within a new water-filled landscape.

winner

Veronica Carvajal Cortes, Catholic University of the North, Antofagasta, Chile. Ecotourist project

This project is on the Mejillones Peninsula, north of Antofagasta City in Chile's Atacama Desert. The peninsula has the potential to become an important visitor destination and this proposal is for an ecologically aware tourist complex, with a hotel, cabins and areas for sports and leisure activities. The generation of form is rather related to the evolution of the landscape through time, involving a detailed and sensitive study of the origins of the desert topography. Various new structures are integrated into the natural environment.

winner

Lars R van Es, Cooper Union, New York, USA. Urban pause Urban pauses, or mental spaces, exist as part of the pedestrian realm at street level. They create a different, human-scale layer of public spaces in the city by adding or replacing. Manifest as fragments scattered through Manhattan, such pauses are suggestive spaces that sidestep reality between fixed notions of place and placelessness. This project is an attempt to define a different quality of public spaces in an urban environment. These unexpected spaces act as hinge points and consist of thin fragmented layers woven through the urban environment. They create breathing spaces for the mind.

winner

This is a proposal for a house on an urban site in Lisbon, but it avoids the preconception and formality that respect for such historical places usually generate. The building allows the inhabitant to devise his own patterns of use and to interact positively with space. A single longitudinal service zone connects four transversal distinct and self-sufficient spaces. The four spaces differ in luminosity, and thermal and acoustic climate, but can sustain a range of domestic activities.

Jose Paulo Ferreira Rodrigues, Universidade Lusiada, Lisbon, Portugal. House for a fictional character

winner

Atsuo Okishino, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan. Transtation

A superhighway links Japan's three biggest cities of Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka. This project proposes a commercial, leisure and transportation base along this highway. Within a circle of 1km in diameter are various commercial and retail facilities, together with new restaurants and public parks. The project is a critique of current Japanese infrastructure design. The aim is to integrate roadside strip development and preserve traditional Japanese landscape from the effects of indiscriminate sprawl.

winner

Alexandra Stage, University of Applied Arts, Vienna, Austria. Hotel in the desert

This hotel is in Israel, near Moshav Zofar. The building consists of two incisions cut deeply into the hilly desert landscape. Seen from outside, the hotel seems to disappear, as the main functions are underground. Thus the interior assumes added significance. The two incisions are connected at subterranean level. Common functions are concentrated around this connection, with rooms placed along the longer incision. In the desert, the presence of shade and protection against the sun is vital. These are exploited to achieve an impressively dramatic composition of light and shadow.

winner

Adam Collaitz Kurdahl, School of Architecture, Aarhus, Denmark. Rotterdam central station The coming of high-speed train links provides an opportunity for the development of Rotterdam's Central Station. This would precipitate an economic and social quantum leap for the city, but also has the potential to cause problems in meshing with the existing urban fabric. To develop the area in a subtle way, phased development is proposed. This begins with the construction of a garage for 3000 cars. Other new infrastructure projects are integrated into the station.

Some commended schemes

Michael James Chapman, University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia. White Collar Prison

The project is on a site on the edge of a derelict theme park in Sydney. The proposal is for a commercially operated white collar prison, which would contribute labour and expertise to the management of the park, as well as providing a permanent infrastructure that would contribute to the long-term economic viability of the foreshore.

Tuomas Silvennoinen, Helsinki University of Technology, Helsinki, Finland. Centre for orthodoxy and nature

Informed by different periods and cultural spheres of the Orthodox world, this centre provides both information and experience. The main building comprises two wooden masses connected by a glass pavilion. The transparent church forms a temple that embodies the mystery of the Orthodox church.

Evelyn Sze Yee Chin, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia. Mother and child clinic

This is a welfare and maternity clinic in East Timor to combat the decline of public services in the aftermath of the country's recent independence conflict. The site is one among the war-ravaged landscape of Desa Bairo Sentral in Diii. Facilities include daytime pediatric, obstetric and counselling clinics, patient wards, theatres, workshop/seminar and staff quarters.

Amy Jo Holtz, Auburn University, Auburn, USA. Corrugated construction

This is a design-build thesis project on uses for waste corrugated board. When the board is made, clippings are created. These are baled and sent to a recycler. The process is complicated, however, by the use of a wax treatment for water resistance. The project aims to investigate construction applications and build a prototype house.