If you’ve got a great sustainable design project you still have time to win some generous prizes on offer through the Holcim Foundation Awards 2025.
The awards are one of the world’s most significant competitions in the field, with a total prize pool of $A1.5 million.
Nominee projects must be client-supported and in the late design phase or already under construction but not completed before February 11, 2025.
Applications are open to projects from five regions – each assessed by a separate jury, including Asia Pacific, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and North America.
Among the benefits for winners will be global exposure for their project as well as the opportunity to attend the foundation’s prestigious ceremony on November 20, 2025, bookending the famous Venice Biennale of Architecture.
Wong Mun Summ, WOHA Singapore
Australia’s design community is well familiar with Singaporean urban design and architecture firm WOHA co-founded by Aussie architect Richard Hassell and WOHA Wong Mun Summ.
The pair won a 2017 Holcim foundation award for their BRAC University campus in Dhaka, Bangladesh. BRAC is a not for profit dedicated to empowering people and communities facing poverty, illiteracy, disease, and social injustice. The building was praised for setting a new benchmark for sustainability in the APAC region, with sustainability “deeply integrated into the building design and conceived as a larger rejuvenation project for the city”, providing Dhaka with much-needed remediation of polluted swampland and green spaces amongst a congested urban environment.
Loreta Castro Reguera
Water management is an increasingly pressing issue in Mexico City, which is beset by both droughts and flooding and lacks sufficient infrastructure to tackle either. Loreta Castro Reguera led design of the La Quebradora Waterpark to divert rainwater that flows into the city from the mountains into two basins in the park, where the water seeps through a series of screens and filters. Locals are encouraged to use the open-air theatre, skate park and various sporting facilities at the park.
Bjarke Ingels, BIG
In response to the devastation caused by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, the BIG U (nicknamed the Dryline) is an urban scale initiative that goes beyond conventional flood protection measures to create a more resilient and enjoyable waterfront for Lower Manhattan. The project showcases creative solutions that can be replicated in other at risk coast cities worldwide. The project houses “some of the more socially challenged inhabitants” of the East Side, which were the most vulnerable during the hurricane. The project was codesigned with different NGOs who worked on various public housing projects.