European Prize for Urban Public Space 2024

The European Prize for Urban Public Space is an initiative of the Center of Contemporary Culture of Barcelona (CCCB) which, since 2000 and on a biennial basis, recognizes the best interventions of creation and transformation in the public spaces of European cities.

BACKGROUND

The European Prize for Urban Public Space is an initiative of the Center of Contemporary Culture of Barcelona (CCCB) which, since 2000 and on a biennial basis, recognizes the best interventions of creation and transformation in the public spaces of European cities.

The Prize has an honorary nature, is awarded jointly to the authors and promoters of works carried out in the 47 countries that make up the Council of Europe and gives the maximum dissemination to the selected works through the network of European collaborators and partners of the project.

The Prize offers a unique perspective on European cities and aims to become a space of reference to discuss the challenges of urban public space, in collaboration with experts and architectural, academic, and cultural institutions from all over the European territory.

Throughout its 24-year history and 11 editions, 2,507 works have been submitted to the Prize. A selection of the best 382 works from all editions is published on the project’s website (www.publicspace.org).

PUBLIC AND URBAN SCAPE

The European Prize for Urban Public Space has the natural space in the European city that, despite its diversity, shares some common historical elements, such as human scale, compact design and a mixed-use character. In this idea of the European city, public space plays a key role in collective encounters, loaded of political, economic and social values that are inseparable from a physical design that accommodates them and makes them possible. In this way, the Prize, from the observation of the quality of public spaces, also becomes a project that generates attention and reflection on the quality of life and the democratic quality of European cities.

The cities of Europe are facing challenges and transformations that cross the urban reality around the world. From this perspective, the Award proposes a specific look from our most immediate reality to a debate on the future of cities that is global, and that, in a progressively urbanized world, is gaining more and more importance every day. To think the European city is to think about concrete solutions that are being given today in Europe to respond to the global challenge of the urban future.

Today, the climate emergency has transformed global agendas, has added more challenges to the current social problems in our cities and has become a central vector of urban thinking. Issues such as shortages, inequalities, mobility, migrations or emergencies place cities in front of challenges for which there are still no clear answers and which have a direct impact on urban design and public spaces, due to their clearly social or public function. In addition, the impact of technological transformations is an element that can also directly intervene in the urban realities of the surrounding area.

The Award aims to reflect the centrality of these issues and to become an observatory of good practices that will allow us to think of possible solutions for a future in which cities will play a key role in defining the evolution of society. It is a unique award in Europe, as it promotes a space that is both public (open and universally accessible) and urban.

AIM OF THE PRIZE: 12TH AWARD (2024)

The CCCB announces a new edition of the European Prize for Urban Public Space. In this year’s award, the Prize has two distinct categories.

General category

The general category aims to evaluate interventions in public space which took place between 2022 and 2023 with the exception of projects related with transformation of seafronts.

Presentation for the Prize is open and free of charge, and the procedure consists of two rounds. In the first round, the Jury will select 25 works to be published on the Prize website and included in its online archive. Five finalists, selected from these 25 projects, will continue to the second round.

In the second round, the Jury will consider the finalist works in accordance with the terms and conditions set out herewith. As a result of this second round, the Jury will name the winner of this category.

Seafront category

Given the challenges faced by cities that are open to the sea as a consequence of the climate change, this category aims to assess projects of transforming, recovering, and creating seafronts over the last five years, from 2019 to 2023 inclusive.

Presentation for the Prize is open and free of charge, and the procedure consists of two rounds. In the first round, the Jury will select 5 finalists in this category. These will be published on the Prize website and will be included in its online archive.

In the second round, the Jury will name the winner of this category.

ADVISORY COMMITEE

The Award has an institutional network around Europe that allows to consolidate the project throughout the territory and to guarantee recognition of the most outstanding works of intervention in public space.

The institutions that are part of the Advisory Committee for this year’s edition are:

Arc en rêve (Bordeaux), ArkDes (Stockholm), Architekturzentrum Wien (Vienna), Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine (Paris), CIVA (Brussels), Deutsches Architekturmuseum (Frankfurt), Eesti Arhitektuurimuuseum (Tallinn), Kortárs Építészeti Központ (Budapest), Muzej za Arhitekturo in Oblikovanje (Ljubljana) and The Architecture Foundation (London).

JURY

The Jury for this year’s Prize consists of eminent professionals from all over Europe, namely:

President

Beth Galí. Architect (Barcelona)

Members

Sonia Curnier. Architect, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (Switzerland)

Fabrizio Gallanti. Architect and curator, director of arc en rêve (France)

Žaklina Gligorijević. Architect and urban planner (Serbia)

Beate Hølmebakk. Architect and cofounder of Manthley Kula (Norway)

Manon Mollard. Architect and editor of The Architectural Review (United Kingdom)

Francesco Musco. Architect and urban planner, Università Iuav di Venezia (Italy)

Secretary

Lluís Ortega. Architect (Barcelona)

The jury will consider only those entries that comply with the terms and conditions of participation established in these rules and may declare the competition void. The secretary will assist the jury and will take the minutes of the sessions during the voting process.

DATES

5 March Registration period opens at 12 noon (GMT+1)

16 April Registration period closes at 12 noon (GMT+1)

27 and 28 June Jury meeting to choose selected works and finalists from the general category and finalists from the seafront category

1 July Announcement of selected works and finalists

September Presentation of the five finalist works in the seafront category at a public event in Barcelona

28 October Presentation of the five finalist works in the general category in a public event at the CCCB

29 October Final decision made by the Jury and awards ceremony for both categories of the Prize

INFORMATION AND CONSULTATIONS

For further information, please contact publicspace@cccb.org of the Center of Contemporary Culture of Barcelona (CCCB), at Montalegre, 5 (08001) Barcelona.