Congratulating the winners of the Global Holcim Awards Gold prize 2009 (l-r): Haruko Hirose, Special and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of Japan to Rabat; prize-winner Aziza Chaouni, architect and co-founder, Bureau EAST, Morocco/Canada/USA; Mohammed Gharrabi, Wali of Fez-Bouleman, Morocco; and prize-winner Takako Tajima, urban planner and co-founder, Bureau EAST, Morocco/Canada/USA.
Global Holcim Awards Gold prize for sustainable construction projects presented to multi-national team in Morocco
 pour en savoir plus (français)
مزيد من المعلومات في العربية
A comprehensive and long-term plan to rehabilitate the Medina of Fez received the Global Holcim Awards Gold 2009 and USD 300,000 in prize money. The winning project is designed by a team from Morocco, Canada, Netherlands and USA led by architect Aziza Chaouni and urban planner Takako Tajima. The innovative approach to sustainable construction was selected for the top international prize from almost 5000 plans and visions from 121 countries. IUCN Director General Julia Marton-Lefèvre and celebrated architects and building professionals from three continents presented the trophy at a hand-over event in Fez hosted by Holcim Morocco and opened by the Wali of Fez-Boulemane, Mohammed Gharrabi.
The River remediation and urban development scheme focuses on improving life quality for the people living in Fez. The scheme combines a strategy to comprehensively address the economic and social life of the residents together with the ecology of the heavily-polluted river. Prize-winning architect and co-founder of Bureau EAST Aziza Chaouni (Morocco/Canada) explained that the project aimed to reintegrate the river into the medina as the central lifeline of the city’s urban infrastructure. “We want the medina to still be a living urban environment in the 21st century, not a museum artifact,” she said.
A step-by-step approach
The project was praised by the jury for applying the economic, social and ecological benefits from the recovery of the river which include the rehabilitation of the old town’s architecture, revitalizing public spaces and traditional tanneries, creating new pedestrian zones, promoting the growth of wetlands and biodiversity, rehabilitating older craft industries and sensitizing the population to ecological issues and a clean city. “Each step in the project is part of a longer chain of recoveries, which also allows for future interventions to supplement the scheme”, the jury report stated.
Joe Addo (Ghana), Enrique Norten (Mexico/USA) and Hans-Rudolf Schalcher (Switzerland) represented the Holcim Awards juries at the hand-over ceremony. Member of the Advisory Board of the Holcim Foundation, Enrique Norten, praised the gold winning project for demonstrating an effective approach to addressing a broad array of issues relevant to sustainable construction. “What marks this project is its wisdom: it works with what is there and uses it as a platform for upgrading and keeps the process open to future possibilities,” he said.
Cross-border collaboration
Holcim Ltd CEO Markus Akermann (Switzerland) in his capacity as Chairman of the Management Board of the Holcim Foundation commented that the competition reflected the importance of international cooperation in developing solutions to the challenges of sustainable construction. “Exploring sustainable approaches for the built environment is best achieved through innovation and leveraging the broad perspectives of international project teams – and as the winning project in Fez clearly illustrates, developing step-by-step approaches that can be applied elsewhere” he said.
Investing in environmental sustainability
Director General of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Julia Marton-Lefèvre (Switzerland), applauded the Holcim Awards competition for promoting critical interdisciplinary and long-range perspectives by demonstrating the link between sustainable construction and environmental performance. “The level of commitment for change being shown by the global community to address climate change is, in fact, an incredible opportunity to re-frame our thinking and to put our environment at the center of the discussions”, she said.
Former general architect of the Moroccan Ministry of housing, Saïd Mouline, delivered a closing address that paid tribute to the Kingdom of Morocco, the ancient city of Fez, and the Holcim Awards. “Morocco has always been a land where different identities form strength, through trade – for example – and in the melting pot of Fez, we see that water is not only part of the culture, but part of this dynamic interplay. The Holcim Awards has its part in calling for another view, another vision and new ways of thinking about the built environment, and for reaching toward a better world,” he said.
Competition finalists from ten countries on all continents
The hand-over event was held at the Hall of the Provincial Government, the Wilaya of Fez-Boulemane, followed by an exhibition and dinner at the Batha Museum. The project in Fez had qualified for the second phase of the competition by earlier winning the Holcim Awards Gold for Africa Middle East in 2008. A total of 15 projects that received Holcim Awards on a regional level – three from each of the five regions of the world – were evaluated. The jury was headed by Charles Correa (architect, India) and included Peter Head (structural engineer, UK), Enrique Norten (architect, Mexico/USA), Saskia Sassen (sociologist, USA), Hans-Rudolf Schalcher (civil engineer, Switzerland), and Rolf Soiron (economist, Switzerland). Other Global Holcim Awards winners for 2009 are:
Silver for Low-impact greenfield university campus in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
The Global Holcim Awards Silver with USD 200,000 in prize money was awarded to a new campus for the University of Architecture in Ho Chi Minh City, designed by architect Kazuhiro Kojima (Japan). The project aims for harmony with all elements of the surrounding ecosystem: flooding rice fields, mangroves, winds and seasonal changes.
Bronze for Sustainable planning for a rural community in Beijing, China
A rural planning design for a suburban village in Beijing, China received the Global Holcim Awards Bronze and USD 100,000 for effectively combining heritage preservation, traditional knowledge, and professional project management. The urban planning strategy led by Zhang Yue and Ni Feng (China) improves logistics and public utilities while meeting stringent ecological and energy-saving targets.
“Innovation” prize for Self-contained day labor station in San Francisco, USA
A flexible bus-shelter-like structure that offers shelter and services for day laborers in San Francisco, USA received the Global Holcim Awards “Innovation” prize and USD 50,000. The project designed by Liz Ogbu and John Peterson (USA) uses green and recycled materials to minimize the environmental footprint and economic cost of each facility.
Additional information
Holcim Forum and next Holcim Awards competition
The Holcim Awards competition is run by the Swiss-based Holcim Foundation and offers USD 2 million in prize money per three-year cycle. The competition is sponsored by Holcim Ltd – one of the world’s leading suppliers of cement and aggregates – and its Group companies in more than 70 countries, including Holcim (Maroc) S.A. which operates three cement plants in the country and is based in Rabat.
Along with the Awards competitions, the Holcim Foundation leads a range of sustainability initiatives such as the Holcim Forum series of symposiums for professionals. The next Forum will be held in Mexico City in April 2010 on the theme of Re-inventing Construction. The third Holcim Awards competition cycle opens for entries July 1, 2010.
Media contact
Edward Schwarz, General Manager, Holcim Foundation
Phone 41 58 858 8292, Mobile 41 79 433 99 33, info@holcimfoundation.org
Holcim Foundation, Hagenholzstrasse 85, CH-8050 Zurich/Switzerland |  | | Photos - prize hand-over |  | | Download high-resolution photos from the prize hand-over ceremony, Fez, Morocco - July 16, 2009. |
|