Competition

CONCLUDED JUN 30 , 2021

Brief

WATER TEMPLE

Brief:

Quechua Architecture Competition, Q.A.C., welcomes all participants to take part of this challenge which consists in presenting and developing a project that explores diverse fields of thinking and design. The challenge for this occasion is “Water Temple”.

As one of the most amazing places in Mexico, the Basaltic Prisms of Santa Maria Regla, represent not only one of the most beatiful places in the world, but a tremendous history; being named as the “first magical town” of Mexico, Huasca de Ocampo is the place where the prisms live and pose for the world.

Since the Basaltic Prisms are a result of volcanic eruptions, the topography itself generates a river that crosses the 4 cascades in the place.

As a result, the water presents a marvelous movement through the very little complex that the prisms are, and present the marvelous challenge to create a site dedicated to the most valuable resource the humanity has, water.

Q.A.C. thanks and admires all designers who are willing to take the challenge.

1/4

Winners

FIRST PLACE

ANDES AWARD

Albert la Rosa

Miguel La Rosa

Brazil

COUNTRY

We are two young architects graduated from different countries with different perspectives, studying Latin American architecture to find out what exists and propose what is missing. We see in the competitions the opportunity to encourage a broad reflection on society and architecture.

Quechua Architecture was an opportunity to raise awareness of the importance of the pre-existing natural landscape with the artificial, the proposal takes water as its main element, to bring life to the interior of a space excavated under the waterfall, managing to naturally afforest a space that allows us find ourselves in the most primitive way with the beauty of nature and reaffirm the importance of water as a source of life for humanity.

SECOND PLACE

BASALTICOS AWARD

Xiaoxu Liang

Giovanni Cavaglion

Chengfan Shao

Emanuele Cavaglion

COUNTRY

Italy

Xiaoxu Liang is a young Architect and PhD candidate in Politecnico di Torino. Her research field is related to Cultural Heritage and Urban/Rural landscapes in China.

Giovanni Cavaglion is a licensed Architect from Turin, Italy. After the studies in EPFL Lausanne, Nanjing SEU and Politecnico di Torino, where he got his Master Degree, he is now assistent Profes- sor of an Urban Design Lab in Politecnico di Torino and Store Designer for the Grosso Audisio Architetto studio.

Emanuele Cavaglion is an Architect from Turin. After the studies in Stockholm (KTH), Nanjing (SEU) and Turin (Politecnico), he got a research scholarship from Politecnico di Torino to join a research team and study the strategic development of the city of Turin.

Chengfan Shao is an Archicture student from China. She is successfully completing her bachelor in Landscape Architecture in Huanghuai University, China.

We are a Sino-Italian group, based in Turin, Italy. We created in 2020 a workplace for the develop- ment of innovative ideas and projects in collaboration with architects and designers from China. Art, design, and small-scale architecture are our main fields of interest. We like to develop weird and out-of-the-ordinary designs, new things, which at times seem absurd.

THIRD PLACE

CHIMBORAZO AWARD

Jezim Fuentes

Philippines

COUNTRY

I am a B.S. Architecture student from National College of Science & Technology, Philippines. In school, our professors trained us to think out of the box. That is why I join different design competitions to challenge my creativity and design in various settings and contextuality.

I was eyeing this competition since last year in Competitions.archi website, and seeing the site pictures and studying the design challenge made me excited, which is why in this year's Q.A.C. chal- lenge, I didn't hesitate to participate.

While learning the site, I imagine myself journeying Huasca de Ocampo from the highest topography level of the site, the Basalticos bridge, to the site's lowest topography, which is the Basalticos waterfalls. It made me think of designing a water temple that revitalizes experiences and doesn't dominate the beauty of Huasca De Ocampo Landscape but blends in with it.