Wienerberger Brick Award jury shortlists 50 projects
To this year’s Brick Award competition, a total of 300 projects were submitted from all over the world. The prestigious architecture prize is awarded to outstanding architectural solutions using fired clay. The competition has been held by Wienerberger AG, Vienna, every two years since 2004. The Brick Award is presented in a total of five categories.
In Vienna, the jury including the Pritzker architecture prize-winner Wang Shu short-listed a total of 50 projects for the categories Single-Family House, Residential Building, Non-Residential Building, Conversion and Refurbishment as well as a future-orientated architecture. With eight nominations, Germany accounts for the largest contingent of projects.
The submitted German projects include Ravensburg Art Museum (Lederer Ragnarsdóttir Oei, Stuttgart), the North Rhine Westphalian State Archives in Duisburg, (Ortner & Ortner Baukunst, Berlin), a building at Munich University of Technology, (Hild und K Architekten, Munich), the Oecumenical Centre at Hamburg’s Hafencity (Wandel Hoefer Lorch & Hirsch, Saarbrücken), the cafeteria at Georg Büchner School in Darmstadt (Opus Architekten, Darmstadt) as well as the St Mary’s Church on the Sea, Schillig in Wangerland (Königs Architekten, Cologne). Two single-family houses by La‘ket Architekten, Hamburg, and by Jörg Rösler Architekt, Berlin, also made it onto the short list. All the submissions reflect how ceramic building materials solutions and high-calibre architecture go together.
In his statement Wang Shu emphasized the sustainability of the proven building material: “When it comes to clay bricks, many people think just about traditional methods of building. But this competition shows numerous projects based on new approaches. They give the clay brick new meaning and at the same time a new look and feel.”
Heimo Scheuch, CEO at Wienerberger AG, is convinced that the competition conveys an important message: “As in the past competitions, the projects show the enormous variety of clay as a natural building material in architecture. Buildings made of clay bricks are healthy, economic and energy-efficient – properties that are growing in importance for sustainable architecture.”
The award ceremony will take place in Vienna on 8 May 2014. All details on the award-winning and nominated projects will be documented in the book “Brick ’14” published by Callwey.
