EMERGING ARCHITECTURE.

Response was astonishing to the ar+d award, organized by The Architectural Review and d-line, the distinguished Danish ironmongery company. Peter Davey, chairman of the jury, opens this special issue on the results.

THE AR+D AWARD [1], WHICH IS INTENDED TO DISCOVER talent in an as yet generally unrecognized generation of architects and designers, attracted more than 900 entries from over 50 countries, ranging from India to Italy, Australia to the Arctic. Work submitted ranged from small domestic conversions to large public buildings, light fittings to landscapes.

In setting the terms for the Award, the jury [2] decided to choose 45 as the top age for entrants. This was because there have been too many clones of 40 under 40': exhibitions and publications of the work of 'young architects', in which people are selected on the strength of striking drawings or a sexy noodle bar. Because of the enormous length of training and apprenticeship, and the great difficulties of finding a suitable platform on which to practise with clear personal expression, it is often extremely difficult for a lot of people to produce anything of their own before they are 45.

At first, entries seemed to fall into six rough categories.

First, houses, of which there was naturally a large number from architects of the age group, who often start their independent careers with houses.

Second, other buildings of all kinds, ranging from large commercial complexes (often presumably by young architects working in large offices) to small galleries.

Our third apparent category was working wib old buildings, another naturally large section for the generation.

Our fourth category was interiors -- again an area of strength.

The fifth proposed category was products, and submissions ranged from a beautifully made child's cradle to a wild motorway bollard in the form of a twisted car tyre, from bed sheets which retained thermal images of sleepers to very chaste light fittings. There was much invention here but, sadly, no entries quite got over the final hurdle.

Our sixth category could be called nothing else than 'other', but it was splendidly varied: including bridges, landscapes, and monuments.

While these categories seemed to work for a while, they broke down under examination. Obviously, for instance, old buildings and interiors overlapped; a house could incorporate a studio; an installation could be a monument -- like the extraordinarily poignant walking Finnish barns by Casagrande & Rintala (p58). The work in front of us could not be pigeon-holed so simply -- it was clearly impossible to make prizes by category. Another strategy had to be evolved.

We were rather overwhelmed. After much effort, we had a preliminary selection, but it was not small. Massimiliano Fuksas wisely proposed that we should spread the discretionary element of the award as far as possible to recognize the range of excellent work. So we decided to give 21 prizes in all: one first prize of [pounds]5000, as required by the Award conditions, and 20 equal other premiums. We were all impressed by the quality of the final 150 or so entries. We could easily have opted for 31 or even 41 prizes, but had to stop somewhere. We crawled over the floor (there were far too many schemes to put on screens). We lectured to each other. We sat, looked, discussed and thought.

IN RETROSPECT, THERE were factors common to most premiated schemes. Many were small, because small work is what most architects start out with, though there were spectacular exceptions like the library in Bangalore, India by Chandavarkar & Thacker Architects (p64), the Budapest office court by Mihaly Balazs (p72) and the cultural centre in Nuuk, Greenland by Schmidt, Hammer & Lassen (p46). All these were important urban statements, attempting to humanize and make more gentle unpropitious circumstances.

A second tendency was to manipulate means economically: architects starting independent careers usually have pretty limited budgets. There were exceptions like the Munich jewellery shop by Landau + Kindelbacher (p70) but, even there, it could be argued that the relatively expensive materials were carefully honed and used minimally for maximum effect. In general, there was a fierce degree of commitment to using readily available materials and construction techniques. The strange properties of polycarbonate sheeting for instance were explored in several of the Japanese entries, notably in Katsuyasu Kishigami's villa in Imazato (p75); vernacular galvanized corrugated steel was celebrated by Stephen Atkinson in his Louisiana house (p6 7), while Engelen Moore ennobled plasterboard and blockwork in the Sydney studio (p76). Shigeru Ban brought revolutionary imagination to bear when he used a previously unconsidered material, cardboard, in his Kobe church (p71). In parallel with these cheap industrial products were e xplorations of readily available natural materials used with traditional simplicity, as for instance in the timber Colorado house by Todd MacAllen and Stephanie Forsythe (p45), and the stone primitive hut on the flanks of Mount Pelion by Katerina Tsigarida (p49). In a sense, the conversion of the Prague block by Lazzarini & Pickering (p56) with its thoughtful use of steel, practically the only decent craft still available in the Czech Republic, falls into this category too.

Initially, a third common factor seemed to be beautiful locations. There are some quite staggering sites, ranging from the top of an Austrian Alp (the ski lift station by Ute Wimmer-Armellini and Peter Wimmer, p53), to the flanks of Table Mountain in South Africa (the Miszewskis' house, p78) and the studio gallery at Fukuoka, Japan by Hiroyuki Arima+Urban Fourth which looks out from its boulder strewn slope over the paddy plain to the distant sea (p42). However beautiful the sites, I do not think that we were seduced by them (at least I hope not). In fact, numerous schemes on beautiful sites did not make it to the final 21. One of the chief reasons we chose the schemes seen on these pages is that they celebrated genius loci with invention and sympathy.

PLACE-MAKING WAS NOT limited to such beautiful locations. Sauerbruch Hutton have attempted to transform a tired industrial area of Berlin with their Photonics Centre (p54). Anin, Jeromin & Fitilidis are trying to give figure and dignity to a new commercial estate built on the ruins of nineteenth-century industry in Gelsenkirchen, Germany (p60). The Garcias are in the process of giving a rather nondescript little Spanish town a proper focus of civic life (p50). Martin Despang has attempted the task of giving each of the metro stations on the new Hanover Expo line identity using an admirably integrated and economical system (p68). On a completely different scale, Scott Marble and Karen Fairbanks have tried to give a sense of occasion to the inevitably dull business of queuing to get into a great institution (MOMA, New York, p63).

Of course, these groupings are not mutually exclusive: all overlap. Our choices of the final 21 were guided by a set of underlying principles which, though they were not articulated at the time, can perhaps be suggested in retrospect. We were all convinced that building should have fine tectonic and constructional quality. We wanted to make an award to a building which had spatial qualities of notable kind. We were all, of course, committed to the ideal of ecological appropriateness, of greenness: to doing the least damage to the planet when building. We were concerned to find buildings which give a sense of placedness. We were concerned to ensure that, at its outset, the ar+d award should have commitment to improving human life: that it should not be simply concerned with form and the notion of architecture as an autonomous art.

The final choice of award winner was very difficult indeed, but clearly the Orphanage in Chhebetar in Nepal by Hans Olav Hesseberg + Sixten Rahlff with Eli Synnevag (p38) fulfilled all our criteria. Further, and more importantly perhaps, it has a modesty and tenderness which few of the other entries achieved - though the other 20 were all close runners-up in one way or another.

This issue is devoted to the 21. We are sorry not to have been able to find space to show more of the entries, but we shall be showing some in future issues on other themes.

The award is to be annual. We shall be publishing details of next year's event shortly, [3] and hope that response will be as rich, varied, imaginative and enthusiastic as it has been this time.

(1.) We worked in partnership on the project, and the Award was designed by Knud Holscher who designs all d-line's products. In addition to the object, there was a first premium of [pounds]5000. The remainder of the [pounds]10000 total prize-money was distributed equally among the other prize winners. d line international partners are: vola Vertriebs GmbH, Austria; MCH modern comfort home nv., Belgium; Carl F a-s Denmark; TAMSALE OY, Finland; Euxos Diffusion S.A., France; HIGH TECH Vertriebs GmbH, Germany; EXPO Ltd., Greece; Tung Fat Ho Building Material Limited, Hong Kong; Aseta ehf., Iceland; Architectural Hardware Limited, Ireland; d line italia srl, Italy; Sugatsune Kogyo Co. Ltd., Japan; ABS Marketing Sdn. Bhd., Malaysia; AXA Stenman Holland B.V., Netherlands; Dizain interior as, Norway; Hamburg International Sales Corp., Philippines; Philman Commercial Inc., Philippines; Carvalho, Bastista & Ca. Lda., Portugal; Architectural Building Supplies Pte. Ltd., Singapore; MODUL BESLAG Kungsbacka AB, Sweden; Beschl age U.S.W., Switzerland; Allgood Holdings Ltd., UK; Handrail Design Ltd., UK; MRH Marine Ltd., UK; Norup/Clarke Inc., USA

(2.) Theo Bjerg, Professor of Architecture at the Royal Academy, Copenhagen; David Chipperfield, principal of David Chipperfield Architects, London; Massimiliano Fuksas, principal of Massimiliano Fuksas Architetto, Rome, Paris and Vienna; Billie Tsien, principal of Tod Williams Billie Tsien & Associates, New York (with Tod Williams). And me.

(3.) Developments via email: [e-mail] or our website: www.arplus.com