A Buddhist temple in Singapore, an invisible eco-tourism resort in Turkey, a maritime museum in Copenhagen and the new masterplan for Gatwick Airport are among the projects that have today been shortlisted for the World Architecture Festival (WAF) awards 2014 – the world’s biggest architectural awards programme.

Taking place at this year’s seventh annual World Architecture Festival, the WAF awards 2014 have attracted entries from more than 50 countries. The festival organisers, i2i Events Group, received entries from across the globe, from countries such as Costa Rica and Kuwait, to Japan and Jordan.

The organisers have seen a huge increase in entries from Asian countries, with projects in China, Malaysia and Vietnam up on last year by 87%, 71% and 140% respectively. The geographic spread of entries on the shortlist is further complemented by the variety of projects, from an opera house in Italy, to a variety of health facilities in Australia and a chapel in Brazil.

Buildings designed by established global practices such as Zaha Hadid Architects, OMA, Foster & Partners, BIG, Woods Bagot, KPF, Farrells, Perkins & Will and Aedas, feature in the shortlisted entries. Practices will compete across 27 individual award categories, spanning completed buildings, landscape projects and future projects, presenting their shortlisted designs live to international judging panels and delegates at this year’s festival.

For the first time, this year’s festival will have a separate small projects category as the judges wished to highlight design skill which had a disproportionate relationship to the physical size of a project.

Paul Finch, WAF Programme Director said: “From small structures to industrial complexes, the breadth of projects shortlisted this year reveals the diversity and strength of global architectural design. It also demonstrates the creativity and tenacity of the international architectural community in creating these truly remarkable schemes. We’d like to congratulate the architects responsible as they prepare to present the merits of their schemes live at the festival in October.”

The 2014 festival is being held in Singapore for the third time, taking place between 1 – 3 October. The winners of each future project and completed building category are put forward to compete for the coveted World Building or Future Project of the Year award, presided over by the festival’s ‘super-jury’, with the presentation of the award being the culmination of WAF 2014.

This year’s ‘super jury’ comprises a selection of the world’s leading architects and designers, led by renowned British architect Lord Richard Rogers. Rogers will be joined on the super-jury by Rocco Yim (Hong Kong), Julie Eizenberg (USA), Enric Ruiz Geli (Spain) and Peter Rich (South Africa).

Two additional prizes will be awarded at this year’s festival for the first time to reward the creative use of colour and materials: The Exterior Colour Prize, sponsored by AkzoNobel; and the Wood Excellence Prize, sponsored by the American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC).

The theme for WAF’s main conference sessions in 2014 will be ‘Architects and the City’. Speakers will examine the contribution architects can make, and the way they affect and are affected by, politics, infrastructure, planning, communities and technology. Presentations and panel discussions will feature prominent architects including keynote speeches from Lord Richard Rogers (UK); Moshe Safdie (Canada) and Rocco Yim (Hong Kong); and representatives from policy-makers and urban organisations.

World Architecture Festival is collocated with INSIDE World Festival of Interiors www.insidefestival.com. INSIDE celebrates the world’s finest interiors of the last year and also has at its heart a live international awards programme.

For more information visit: www.worldarchitecturefestival.com

Ends

For further press information on the World Architecture Festival, images of the shortlisted projects and project details contact:

Philip Sorensen at FTI Consulting

+44 (0) 20 7269 7218

[email protected]  

Twitter: @worldarchfest

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ArchitectureFestival

Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=1840224

Notes to editors

About WAF

World Architecture Festival (WAF) is the largest annual festival and live awards programme for the global architecture community.

It will take place at the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore between 1^st – 3^rd October 2014.

WAF has three central pillars of activity:

• A wide-ranging conference programme, featuring keynote lectures, dozens of expert-led talks and seminars from thought-leading architects and designers from across the globe.
• The world’s largest annual awards programme in which practices from around the world compete across 28 award categories for global recognition. Architects of every shortlisted project are invited to attend the festival to give a live presentation to a panel of judges, asserting their case for why their project should win. The winners of each category are put forward to compete for the coveted World Building of the Year award, presided over by the festival’s ‘super-jury’, with the presentation of the award being the culmination of WAF 2014. This year’s super jury members are Richard Rogers (chair), Rocco Yim, Julie Eizenberg, Enric Ruiz Geli and Peter Rich.
• Three festival halls where all award entries are displayed in a unique awards gallery and where sponsors and suppliers can interact with delegates, make new contacts and showcase their services and products.

As well as this the festival plays host to an international, live student charrette; parties and receptions in some of Singapore’s most exciting locations; exclusive tours to Singapore’s most recent architectural sites of interest and a celebratory gala dinner and awards ceremony.

WAF has welcomed over 12,500 attendees to date, including over 2,000 in 2012. The Marina Bay Sands in Singapore, itself a previous WAF Award winner, is WAF’s home for the third year running, having been held in Barcelona for four years previously, providing the perfect backdrop to this truly global architectural extravaganza.

WAF is proud to work with Founder Partner, Grohe and Headline Partner, AzkoNobel.

WAF awards Programme

The WAF awards are the global industry benchmark for excellence. Entries are welcome in 27 categories, spanning completed buildings, landscape projects and future projects.

Individual Categories:

Completed Buildings:

• Civic and community
• Display
• Civic and community
• Culture
• Display
• Health
• Higher education/research
• Hotel/leisure
• House
• Housing
• New and Old
• Office
• Production/energy/recycling
• Schools
• Shopping
• Sport
• Transport
• Villa

Landscape Projects:

• Completed designs

Future Projects:

• Commercial mixed-use
• Competition entries
• Culture
• Education
• Experimental
• Health
• House
• Infrastructure
• Leisure-led development
• Masterplanning
• Office
• Residential

About WAF’s organisers – i2i Events Group

i2i Events Group delivers world-class exhibitions and large scale events in key sectors including home and gift, fashion, retail, healthcare, energy, environment, education, technology and media. Its portfolio of world-wide events includes World Retail Congress, RWM, Spring Fair, Naidex, BVE, Bett and Pure London. It prides itself on opening up possibilities for its customers and each year brings more than 250,000 decision makers together to network, source, test, buy and sell brilliant products,  services, ideas and solutions. The company is headed up by Mark Shashoua who joined EMAP as Group MD of EMAP Connect in November 2011 and became CEO of i2i Events Group in March 2012.  i2i Events Group is powered by Top Right Group, formerly known as Emap International Ltd.