Alvar Aalto Medal awarded to Danish architectural practice Tegnestuen Vandkunsten

“The tenth Alvar Aalto Medal has been awarded to the Danish architectural practice Tegnestuen Vandkunsten. Representatives of the team received the award today at the headquarters of the Social Insurance Institution of Finland (KELA) designed by Alvar Aalto. This is the first time that the Alvar Aalto Medal was awarded to a team of architects instead of an individual.

Since its establishment in 1967, the Alvar Aalto Medal has been awarded approximately every five years to persons with significant achievements in creative architecture.

For almost forty years now, Tegnestuen Vandkunsten has focused on residential architecture and housing developments. In this field, the group has been a pioneer and trend-setter with designs characterized by convertibility, communality, residential involvement, dense-low rise, and sustainable development – long before they became buzzwords in residential architecture and policies.

Working as a team and recognizing social dynamics have been the necessary prerequisites and main source of inspiration for the creative work produced by Vandkunsten’s 30 designers. For Vandkunsten, social awareness is also a source of beauty which does not compromise their ability to retain a firm grip over aesthetically perfected and innovative spaces, forms and materials.”

For more information (official press release)…

For more information on Tegnestuen Vandkunsten…

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(Source: Denise Macdonald, Communications and Outreach, Royal Architecture Institute of Canada)