The Capilla del Retiro (Retirement Chapel) by Chilean office Undurraga + Devés has been announced as the winner of the prestigious Premio Internazionale di Architettura Sacra Frate Sole, now in its 5th edition.

(Chinese readers can watch this video at Youku)

Last Friday we attended the 2012 Pritzker Prize ceremony in Beijing, where Chinese architect Wang Shu from Amateur Studio received the “Nobel of Architecture”.

Last year the ceremony was held in Washington DC with the presence of President Obama, and this year the event was also held in an important political context, at the People’s Hall of Beijing, with the presence of important Chinese government officials related to the urban process of China, including the Mayor of Beijing and the Minister of Housing and Urban-Rural Development.

In my opinion Wang Shu’s architecture presents a contemporary and progressive approach that acknowledges the rich tradition of Chinese architecture, considering not only projects in dense urban contexts but also in the rural areas of China. As the next generations of Chinese architects are influenced by his architecture, a generation that will be an active part of China’s growth, he will indirectly influence how millions will live in the next years.

I think that for the first time the Pritzker Prize became something beyond a mere recognition to the great work of a living architect, turning into a statement on how architecture should face the rapid growth of our cities in the Urban Age to improve the quality of life of the next 3 billion that will move into cities in the next 40 years.

Wang Shu’s acceptance speech:

Last week we went to Ingolstadt, Germany, to attend the launch of the Audi Urban Future Initiative. The program, now in its second version, invited a group of six architecture offices from different regions of the world, all with big urban populations, to think about the future of mobility. During this stage, the architects presented their initial research and diagnosis of their respective regions. In October, the architects will present their projects and an overall winner will be announced.

• Urban Think Tank (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
• NODE Architecture & Urbanism (Perl River Delta, China)
• Höweler + Yoon (Bostong / Washington, USA)
• CRIT (Mumbai, India)
• Superpool (Istanbul, Turkey)
• Junya Ishigami + Associates (Tokyo, Japan)

During the event, we had the chance to talk with the architects and ask them about the role of the Architect in our contemporary society.

The first edition of this program took place in 2010, and included Alison Brooks Architects, BIG, Cloud 9, J. MAYER H. and standardarchitecture. You can see J. Mayer’s winning entry previously featured at ArchDaily. More info about the program after the break:

During the launch of the META Project in Chile, we had the chance to interview Bijoy Jain, founder of Studio Mumbai.

Now in its fifth year, the World Architecture Festival moves from Spain to Singapore (October 3rd-5th). And for this year, we are happy to announce ArchDaily as a media partner, and as part of the jury!

The architecturally intense event includes the awards and a festival gallery, with more than 700 entries from around the world in 30 categories, accompanied by live presentations from the finalists, a seminar and keynotes with renowned international architects. In these, and other activities (full summary), you will be able to exchange ideas with over 2000 architects representing more than 65 countries, broaden your horizons and your contacts book.

Learn more about the conference rates, and details on how to submit your projects.

More details about the WAF after the break.

As we announced back in February, Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron and their Chinese collaborator Ai Weiwei will design this year’s Serpentine Gallery Pavilion at Hyde Park in London, a special edition that will be part of the London 2012 Festival, the culmination of the Cultural Olympiad. This will be the trio’s first collaborative built structure in the UK.

Back then, it was announced that their design will explore the hidden history of the previous installations (see all the previous pavilions in our infographic), with eleven columns under the lawn of the Serpentine, representing the past pavilions and a twelfth column supporting a floating platform roof 1.4 metres above ground, which looks like a reflecting water-like surface in the renderings. The plan of the pavilion is based on a mix of the 11 previous pavilions’ layouts, pavilions that are represented as excavated foundations from which a new cork cladded landscape appears, as an archeological operation.

São Paulo native Márcio Kogan has become an internationally recognized Brazilian architect known for his minimal designs that are often contrasted by intricate materiality. His work has been highly praised by our readers, and he is in the top 5 of individual architects searches at our site. His houses and institutional projects respect the modern principles of Brazilian architecture, with a special care on the design of interior spaces and their details, resulting in a mix of tradition and contemporary design. My favorite? Paraty House (and its section!)

Recently awarded the prestigious Maybeck Award by the AIA California Council (AIACC), Steven Ehrlich (FAIA, RIBA) has earned international recognition for his distinctive architecture and philosophy that has greatly influenced the architectural community. As the Design Principle of Ehrlich Architects, the Los Angeles-based architect is dedicated to the philosophy of Multicultural Modernism – a unique approach to architecture and planning that is centered on architectural anthropology; an idea that strives to identify and celebrate the uniqueness of each individual culture through design.

We had the incredible opportunity to interview Winy Maas, the M in MVRDV, one the most influential contemporary practices, which has been able to push the boundaries of our field in different scales, from buildings to master plan, from construction to theory. In this interview Winy shares interesting thoughts on the role of the architect and how he runs this design/research practice.

We are only 100 days away from the 2012 London Olympics, and LEGO has announced the release of their latest model in the Architecture Landmark series: The Big Ben.

The Big Ben, officially known as the Clock Tower, is one of the UK’s most recognizable buildings and a global symbol of Victorian London and the Gothic Revival style. It was designed by the unlikely team of Classical architect Charles Barry and Gothic Revival pioneer Augustus Pugin and completed in 1859.

Big Ben is the fourteenth model in the LEGO Architecture range, which uses the LEGO brick to interpret the designs of iconic architecture around the world. It is the first model to be designed by Rok Zgalin Kobe from Slovenia who joins Adam Reed-Tucker as a LEGO architect.

During the 2011 AIA Arkansas Convention I had the chance to meet one of the most influential architects in the state: Marlon Blackwell.

The year 2011 was a great one for ArchDaily, and all thanks to you. In terms of web traffic, in our network we grew to more than 200,000 daily readers who viewed 350 million pages during 2011. Our social media reach has grown to nearly 500,000 Facebook fans, more than 60,000 followers on Twitter and an ever growing presence on Flickr, Instagram, Tumblr and Pinterest, all connecting with architects around our passion: Architecture.

Wang Shu, Chinese architect and founder of Amateur Architecture Studio, has been just announced as the recipient of the 2012 Pritzker Prize.

The Pritzker Prize’s purpose is “to honor a living architect whose built work demonstrates a combination of those qualities of talent, vision, and commitment, which has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture”.

In my opinion Wang Shu’s architecture presents a contemporary and progressive approach that acknowledges the rich tradition of Chinese architecture. As the future generations of Chinese architects are influenced by his architecture, a generation that will be an active part of China’s growth, he will indirectly improve how millions will live in the next few years.

He calls his office Amateur Architecture Studio, but the work is that of a virtuoso in full command of the instruments of architecture — form, scale, material, space and light - Karen Stein, Pritzker Prize jury.

You can check our interview with Pritzker Jury Alejandro Aravena about Wang Shu’s work.

Works by Wang Shu:

You can see more projects by Wang Shu, Amateur Architecture Studio, and our infographic about the history of the Pritzker Prize.

More about the announcement:

We had the exclusive opportunity to interview Pritzker Prize Jury Alejandro Aravena about Wang Shu’s work and the reasons of his selection as the 2012 Pritzker Prize laureate, where he cites extracts of conversations with the Chinese architect.

Wang Shu’s outstanding architecture may be the consequence of being able to combine talent and intelligence. This combination allows him to produce masterpieces when a monument is needed, but also very careful and contained architecture when a monument is not the case. The intensity of his work may be a consequence of his relative youth, but the precision and appropriateness of his operations talk of great maturity.

Consider Ningbo Museum of History: it is so powerful, so overwhelming that it deserves to be called a masterpiece. You don’t visit the building; you are hit by the building. I remember having felt the same only a few times in my life, like when visiting Kahn’s Parliament in Bangladesh or his Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad. Being “hit” by a building happens very rarely in architecture, because that kind of impact tends to belong more to music or film, where the experience of a piece can be extremely moving and touching to the point of altering the mood in a deep positive way. Unfortunately this cannot be transmitted by photographs.

After two weeks and more than 30,000 nominations, we are proud to announce the finalists for the 2011 Building of the Year Award, a selection of the best projects made by our readers.

The shortlist for the awards includes 70 projects in 14 categories, a selection that shows the diversity of projects featured at ArchDaily during the past year. From small interiors to large scale buildings, designed by renowned practices and young architects, in different locations around the world.

I’d like to thank everyone who participated during the nominations round, as the finalists are outstanding.

You can vote for your favorite projects starting today and until March 6th at midnight EST (all the rules here):

http://www.archdaily.com/building-of-the-year/2011/

Your votes will give you the chance to win an iPad, same as Annie Wang who just won one for voting during the nominations round.

Remember: the office of the project with most votes during the final round will receive an HP Designjet T2300 eMFP printer.

During the process we worked very hard to log and flag every attempt to abuse the voting system, removing fake accounts and automated votes, and we wil continue to do so during this stage.

And the finalists are:

Nearly two years after OMA was announced the winner of a two-stage international competition, the construction of the new Taipei Performing Arts Center has commenced. This ambitious project, led by OMA partners Rem Koolhaas and David Gianotten, generated a lot of debate among architects when it was announced back in 2009 due to its particular form. Morphed by a series of programmatic operations, the form intersects three types of theater in order to accommodate a variety of performances.

The Proscenium Playhouse, which seats 800, is expressed on the exterior as a large sphere while the other two theaters, respectively capable of seating 1,500 and 800, are represented as peripheric cubes. All the stage accommodations are brought together within the central cube, allowing for more flexibility as theaters can be used independently or combined, thus expanding the possibilities for experimental performances – an art that is very strong in Taiwan. At the same time, and in a similar way as OMA’s CCTV building in Beijing, China, a “public loop” channels circulation through the building, exposing the spaces that make the TPAC work, areas typically are hidden from the public but are as revealing as the performances themselves.

In this aspect, the building is like a machine at work with its engine exposed, somehow reminding me of OMA’s Prada Transformer – a machine-like building (the anti-blob) that changed its configuration to host different types of events.

The 180 million dollar project is set to be completed in 2015. More details, including sections and updated renders, after the break:

Photographer Cristobal Palma shared with us the extended version of his video of the Xi’an Expo, a project by Plasma Studio + GroundLab that we saw during several stages, from the award winning entry in 2009, to conceptual design and opening, when it was visited by more than 200,000 people on the first weekend.

The Expo embodies the idea of transformation as the site was formerly a sandpit where the water was severely degraded during the 1980s. Efforts over the past two decades have restored the ecosystem and now the Expo is able to demonstrate what can be accomplished through the use of the most advanced technology, ideas, and materials, as seen on the video. As we reported earlier, the 37 ha complex includes three buildings that are interconnected with a dynamic landscape of unfolding paths and networks of water, circulation and foliage.

More videos by Cristobal Palma at ArchDaily:

The year 2011 was a great one for ArchDaily, and all thanks to you. In terms of web traffic, in our network we grew to more than 200,000 daily readers who viewed 350 million pages during 2011. Our social media reach has grown to nearly 500,000 Facebook fans, more than 60,000 followers on Twitter and an ever growing presence on Flickr, Instagram, Tumblr and Pinterest, all connecting with architects around our passion: Architecture.

ArchDaily is more than big numbers. It is recognized as the ultimate source of inspiration for thousands of architects around the world, who are covering new ground in architectural discussion, and generating new opportunities by being part of the world’s largest architecture network. During 2011, we participated in important events, such as the Pritzker Prize ceremony in DC, the AIA National Convention in New Orleans, among others, and visiting architects all across the US, in the UK, Switzerland, Israel, Brazil, Chile and Argentina. We’ve had the chance to interview renowned architects such as Steven Holl, Renzo Piano, Richard Meier, Peter Eisenman, and a long list of people who are advancing this profession. We spoke at the AIA Arkansas Convention, Harvard GSD, along with other events and schools. We launched our first local version, ArchDaily Brasil (more to come during this year!) and introduced our first tool to help architects collect and order information: My ArchDaily. We will continue to work very hard during 2012, with all our passion, to keep you connected to everything that is happening in the architecture world and help you with tools, as you will be the responsible of the noble task to shape our built environment.

Since 2009 we have held the Building of the Year Awards, an instance in which all of you make your voice heard by nominating and voting for the best projects featured on ArchDaily during the year. This is a peer based award that recognizes firms of all sizes, trajectories and locations. You can check the results of the previous editions here: 2009 and 2010.

Once again we have partnered with HP to present the 2011 Building of the Year Awards, starting today Feb 7th, 2012 at the following link:

http://www.archdaily.com/building-of-the-year/2011/

The nomination stage will run for 2 weeks until Feb 21st, 2011. All buildings featured under the available categories during 2011 are elegible for this round. You can nominate one building (in one category) per day.

Like last year, we will authenticate the votes with the My ArchDaily platform, so we can assure that the nominating and voting processes are conducted by the community. You can nominate once per day, so you can propose your favorite projects from Feb 7th to Feb 21st, after which 5 buildings per category will continue to the voting round, between Feb 22nd and Mar 6th. The winners will be announced on Mar 7th, 2012.

Given that you are in charge of the selection process, we have decided to give away 2 custom engraved iPads 2 during the nominating/voting stages (more details on the rules below). Also, the most voted firm will receive an HP Designjet T2300 eMFP printer (MSRP US$8,000).

Once again I’d like to thank all our readers for your support in 2011, and rest assure that we are working on new ways to improve ArchDaily in 2012. Our inbox is always open, so feel free to leave your feedback, recommendations and support on the contact page.

Rules after the break: