CHART ARCHITECTURE Competition’s Finalists Propose Sustainably Constructed Pavilions


Adapt, Harry Clover, Jack Cripps, Sebastian Gatz And Fabrian Puller, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Adapt, Harry Clover, Jack Cripps, Sebastian Gatz And Fabrian Puller, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Calling for entries to design pavilions in line with notions of sustainable construction and fabrication methods, urbanization, and renewable materials, CHART ARCHITECTURE has announced the five finalists for its annual competition, addressing the theme ‘LIVING CITY’. Proposals included the use of IKEA bags, biogas reactors and solar energy amongst other innovative design solutions, judged by a jury headlined by Bjarke Ingels. The eventual winner will be awarded a mentorship program with a professional architect, a construction expert and a developer, intended to “support a young architect’s career as well as to promote cross-sector collaboration and networking.”

Here are the five finalists of the 2017 CHART ARCHITECTURE Competition:


Algae Dome, Aleksander Wadas, Rafal Wroblewski, and Anna Stempniewicz Anna Astempniewicz, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Algae Dome, Aleksander Wadas, Rafal Wroblewski, and Anna Stempniewicz Anna Astempniewicz, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Algae Dome / Aleksander Wadas, Rafal Wroblewski, and Anna Stempniewicz, The Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Kadk

“We propose a pavilion that is a
simple and direct translation of 
a photo-bioreactor’s diagram 
into architecture. By arranging the tubular system with algae into a dome-like shape we create a pavilion that functions as a photo-bioreactor. The very utilitarian and technological infrastructure becomes architecture. It’s inviting, yet enclosed form provides shelter and creates an oasis for social interaction.”


Adapt, Harry Clover, Jack Cripps, Sebastian Gatz And Fabrian Puller, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Adapt, Harry Clover, Jack Cripps, Sebastian Gatz And Fabrian Puller, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

 Adapt / Harry Clover, Jack Cripps, Sebastian Gatz and Fabrian Puller, The Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Kadk

“ADAPT is a pavilion which
 opens itself as the day warms
 and closes itself as the day
 cools without the need for
 external sources of energy, like a plant. It promotes a revolutionary new form of architecture that regulates itself independently and adapts spatially as a result of the kinetic performance of the materials from which it is made. ADAPT is the forerunner of a living city of buildings which lean, open or retract, changing form, function and regulatory state without the need to be connected to energy grids, taking the sustainability of buildings to the next level.”


Stick Box, Miki Morita, Suguru Kobayashi and Keita Shishijima, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Stick Box, Miki Morita, Suguru Kobayashi and Keita Shishijima, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

 Stick Box
/ Miki Morita, Suguru Kobayashi and Keita Shishijima, The Royal Academy Of Fine Arts, Kadk and Kanagawa University, Japan

“This pavilion project aims to work as a prototype using smaller timber modules made from forest thinning and left over wood from lumbering which is not usually regarded as an architectural material. We hope that people, when 
experiencing the pavilion, will feel 
the familiar sized piece of the
material and how it can 
potentially become an 
architectural material and create awareness about the environmental problem of forest thinning around the world.”


Paper Pavilion, Kazumasa Takada, Yuriko Yagi and Yohei Tomioka, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Paper Pavilion, Kazumasa Takada, Yuriko Yagi and Yohei Tomioka, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Paper Pavilion / Kazumasa Takada, Yuriko Yagi and Yohei Tomioka, The Royal Academy Of Fine Arts, Kadk

For the theme of Sustainability, 
we set up the design goal to 
create a pavilion which has an 
appropriate durability for an 
event which to be held for a short time like CHART. We believe for a sustainable future it is necessary to reconsider the excesses acts of our daily life and adjust them appropriately. Therefore, by designing a pavilion with an appropriate architectural durability rather than using a material with excessive strength, which is often the case for this type of pavilion, the proposal attempts to imply a message against such excess. The paper pavilion is intentionally designed to be able to last a week rather than three months, for example.


Sunday Temple, Mia Frykholm And Astrid Gabrielsson, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Sunday Temple, Mia Frykholm And Astrid Gabrielsson, 2017. Image © CHART ART FAIR

Sunday Temple / Mia Frykholm And Astrid Gabrielsson, The Royal Academy Of Fine Arts, Kadk

“Ritual spaces have come to have a new purpose in our society. The shape of the pavilion is a reference to the Hampi temple in India. Today the religious and ceremonial spaces have in many cases been replaced by something else – instead of going to church on Sundays we take a ritual walk through IKEA’s warehouse or do our laundry comfortable with the familiar blue bag.

The blue IKEA bag is a symbol in 
society – the laundry bag that is an 
essential reminder of Sunday laundry 
rituals. It’s made to be durable/cheap /
ideal size, to be mass-produced and spread worldwide.
 A simple wood support structure is used to create a temple embedded with the blue bags and labelled handles hang as ornaments. By mounting the bags on a supporting structure, to take the shape of a temple, they will bring another form of representation. The openings of the bags are being suspended pointing in different directions so that when the wind fills the bags, the facade will come to life and have a constant moving or waving face. With lights inside, the pavilion will emit a blue glow during night-time.”

The full jury consisted of:

  • Bjarke Ingels, architect and founder of BIG Bjarke Ingels Group
  • Bjørnstjerne Christiansen, co-founder of SUPERFLEX
  • Claus Andersen, owner of Andersen’s Contemporary
  • Débora Mesa, architect and part of the team responsible for the Spanish Pavilion at the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale
  • Dorte Foss, architect
  • Klaus Kastbjerg, CEO and director of Union Holding A/S
  • Simon Frommenwiler, architect and co- founder of HHF Architects.

 The winner will be announced on September 2, during the CHART ART FAIR.

News via: CHART ARCHITECTURE.

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