The jury of nine experts are currently selecting the global prize winners in the 6th International Holcim Awards for Sustainable Construction. The 33 finalist projects from 25 countries are displayed as a poster exhibition in Zurich and are also made available via an online platform for jury members who were unable to travel due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Head of the Academic Committee (AC) of the Holcim Foundation, Marilyne Andersen, provided a “virtual tour” of the exhibition for the jury members unable to travel to Zurich. She is also Professor of Sustainable Construction Technologies, EPFL Lausanne (Switzerland), a member of the Board of the Holcim Foundation, and represented the AC on all five regional Awards juries in 2020.

“I’m very excited to be able to walk through this exhibition of 165 posters that bring outstanding examples of sustainable construction from around the world to life. It is remarkable to see the progress of many submissions since the regional phase of the competition,” she said.

The global jury of experts is led by Hashim Sarkis, Dean of the School of Architecture & Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, MA, USA. He is also Director of the Venice Biennale of Architecture 2021 under the theme of “How will we live together?” and was previously a member of Holcim Awards juries in 2011 and 2018.

The jury includes Angelo Bucci, Co-Founder, spbr arquitetos and Professor of Building Design, Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil); Bruce Gibbons, Managing Principal, Thornton Tomasetti (USA); Anne Lacaton, Principal, Lacaton & Vassal Architectes (France); and Mun Summ Wong, Co-Founder, WOHA (Singapore). In addition, Maria Atkinson AM, Founding CEO, Green Building Council of Australia; Meisa Batayneh Maani, Founder & Principal Architect, Maisam Architects & Engineers (Jordan); and Brinda Somaya, Principal Architect & Managing Director, Somaya & Kalappa Consultants (India) are members of the jury, representing the Board of the Holcim Foundation.

All projects nominated for a Main Category prize in the regional phase of the competition in 2020 were invited to provide an updated project submission for evaluation by the global jury. The authors were requested to include additional information on the carbon footprint and circularity of materials of their project. AC Coordinator, Luisa Pastore, led a team who examined responses by each project team to the Environmental Impact / Circularity & Lifecycle performance of their project. The jury will evaluate the submissions based on the five posters and the result of the assessment made by the AC.

General Manager of the Holcim Foundation, Edward Schwarz, explained that the Covid-19 pandemic required the celebration of regional Holcim Awards winners of 2020 to be postponed. All global and regional Awards prizes will be announced, and the prizemoney will be distributed before the end of 2021.

“We continue to plan for a range of possibilities including face-to-face events, hybrid and fully virtual events. Ultimately, the competition is about promoting sustainable construction across professional practice and the ideas of the next generation. We will definitely keep this spirit of the Awards alive this year!” he said.

The Holcim Awards is the world’s most significant competition for sustainable design. It offers a total of USD 2 million in prize money per three-year cycle and foregrounds exemplary approaches to architecture, engineering, urban planning, materials science, construction technology, and related fields. Submissions are evaluated using the five Target Issues for sustainable construction of the Holcim Foundation. Under the headings of Progress, People, Planet, Prosperity, and Place the Target Issues outline the critical factors on making the environments we build and inhabit truly viable, as the building sector moves towards net-zero emissions and circular material flows.