Young Architects Competitions - WWF Observation Cabins

Young Architects Competitions
WWF Observation Cabins

Architecture is the branch of knowledge that shapes and structures places for human activities. It gives an answer to several and various issues, where solutions embody designer’s creativity and intellect. Architectural quest doesn’t simply resolve itself nor in a stylish, nor a functional, nor an economic, nor a technological answer.
A genuine architectural answer comes through making a patchwork of all those issues, where designer manages to blend and structure them together with sensibility and control. YAC aims to promote contemporary projects that embody a temporal and personal approach to architectural space. Idea is the keyword, Architecture is the answer and project is the medium through which intuition transforms into concrete reality.

1. Brief
In the fight for the protection of ecosystems there are no winners or losers. Yet, human beings seem to linger. While the delicate balances supporting this planet are eroding, anachronistic economic systems linger over reversing course of a race for a progress with no future and a wealth with no tomorrow. This is the awareness at the base of WWF’s initiatives. For sixty years, WWF has been giving voice to the silent cry of those who have none to ask for help. WWF’s oases were created to achieve this goal. They aim at protecting the abundance of this planet and the right to exist of every living creature.
This is YAC’s and WWF’s competition to support one of the most ancient WWF’s oases. Such competition aims at creating a place where to raise awareness, where visitors can reconcile with nature by enjoying and acknowledging the beauty that lies where human beings manage to remain silent and listen.
Thanks to this competition architects will have the opportunity to play a crucial role in defending the planet designing observation points and a visitors’ center.

2. Site
The site of the competition is the Lagoon of Orbetello in Tuscany. More precisely, one should call it a “wetland”: an archetype that the modern era has rejected. This term has been associated with something insecure and unhealthy because wetlands have always been the place of bandits, fugitives, deadly fevers and necromancers.
These are places that modernity tried to remove or limit by coining words as “reclamation” or “draining”. Yet, these are places that play a crucial role in protecting biodiversity.

3. Schedule
03. 15. ~ 04. 11. : “early bird” registration
04. 12. ~ 05. 09. : “standard” registration
05. 10. ~ 06. 06. : “late” registration
06. 09. : material submission deadline
06. 14. : jury summoning
07. 19. : results announcement

4. Jury
Simon Frommenwiler (HHF)
Patrick Lüth (Snøhetta)
Giulio Rigoni (BIG Bjarke Ingels Group)
Kazuyo Sejima (SANAA)
Mariana de Delás (Mariana de Delás)
Fulco Pratesi (WWF Italia)
Renato Grimaldi (Ministero dell’Ambiente)
Gilda Ruberti (Regione Toscana)
Marco Cattaneo (National Geographic Italia)
Nicola Scaranaro (FOSTER + PARTNERS)
Carlo Alessandro Puri Negri (BLUE SGR)
Raulino Silva (Raulino Silva Arquitectos)
Sou Fujimoto (Sou Fujimoto Architects)