Clear the stage for Upper Austria's architecture award "Daidalos"

2023-10-14 02:30:05

Upper Austria’s architecture prize “Daidalos” starts its sixth edition today, Saturday. At Daidalos 2024, outstanding architecture will once again have a stage. OÖNachrichten and its partners invite you to apply by January 21, 2024.

The categories in which you can apply are as follows:

Valuable substance: Intelligent, functional and architecturally convincing building in existing buildings (renovation, expansion, densification, spatial-functional redefinition, ecological optimization, etc.). Creation of contemporary, sustainable perspectives for existing buildings.
Cleverly planned: New buildings and plans that make a sophisticated architectural and functional contribution to current construction activity. This also applies to the planning processes (e.g. participatory procedures) and projects relevant to urban development (e.g. local planning). Contributions from the areas of engineering structures and services as well as excellent infrastructure planning are also desired.
Special prize for proven buildings: Buildings and plans that have already proven their special architectural quality and user-friendliness over a longer period of use. In addition to individual buildings, contributions to square and town center design, urban development measures as well as landscape, park and garden designs are also desired.

The Daidalos award winners at the gala in March 2022: Gunar Wilhelm (mia2, left), Simone Schütz (Arcade), Giulia Decorti and Peter Lorenz (both Lorenzateliers). The next award ceremony will take place in March 2024.
Image: Weihbold

The architecture prize’s namesake, Daedalus, is a figure from Greek mythology and is considered the patron of builders and technicians. The labyrinth is his trademark because Daedalus built it so masterfully for the Minotaur on Crete that he could hardly find his way out himself. The trophies of the Upper Austrian Architecture Prize are modeled on the labyrinth.

In each of the previous five editions of the Daidalos (2012, 2014, 2016/17, 2018/19, 2021/22) 70 to 100 projects were submitted. The Daidalos 2023/24, which is now starting, can also be expected to be of high quantity and quality.

Clear the stage for Upper Austria's architecture prize — Project awarded the Daidalos 2022: the Med-Campus Linz
Image: Martin Steinkellner

Expert jury decides

An independent jury of experts will nominate the best projects and choose the winners. The jury consists of the following three experts:

Heidi Pretterhofernew professor of building culture at the Linz University of Art and architect from Vienna
Christian Tabernigarchitect from projektCC from Graz
Georg Wilbertzarchitecture critic for OÖNachrichten

The award winners of the Daidalos will take place on March 21, 2024 at the Daidalos Gala in the Promenade Galleries in Linz.

The OÖNachrichten initiated the Daidalos and awards it together with the Chamber of Civil Engineers for Upper Austria and Salzburg. Other partners and sponsors of Daidalos are Energie AG, Hypo Oberösterreich, the housing company WAG, the state of Upper Austria, the two non-profit housing developers Neue Heimat and WSG as well as the afo architekturforum Oberösterreich. State Councilor Michaela Langer-Weninger takes over the patronage of the special award for proven buildings.

Daidalos reporting in the OÖNachrichten

This is how the OÖNachrichten will report on the Upper Austrian Daidalos Architecture Prize in the next few months:

21st of October: Presentation of the jury
11. November: Topic discussion category “Valuable Substance”
25. November: Topic discussion category “Sophisticatedly planned”
9th of December: Topic discussion “Special Prize for Proven Buildings”
January 13: Round table with experts on the occasion of the Daidalos Architecture Prize
February 24th: Presentation of the nominees in the “Valuable Substance” category
2nd March: Presentation of the nominees in the “Sophisticatedly Planned” category
9th March: Presentation of the nominees for the “Special Prize for Proven Buildings”
March 23rd: Follow-up report on the Daidalos Gala and presentation of the winning projects

Daidalos Architecture Prize: The application

Wer? Architectural offices, civil engineering offices and interdisciplinary project teams (e.g. urban planners, landscape planners) are invited to submit submissions for the Upper Austrian Architecture Prize Daidalos.
Was? Projects that are completed at the time of submission will be accepted. The projects must not be older than around six years (completion after January 1, 2018), with the exception of the special prize for proven buildings. Here the objects must have been completed between 1990 and 2012.
How? Up to five photos (no renderings, photo rights must be stated), up to five plan representations and an explanatory text with a maximum of 1500 characters are permitted for submission.

You can find more information about submitting and uploading documents using the digital form at nachrichten.at/daidalos. The link to the submission itself, which is processed digitally, can also be found here. The deadline for entries for the Daidalos is January 21, 2024.