ARKxSITE has announced the winners of Site Landmark Portugal competition for Sagres, which selects 3 winners and 7 Honorable Mentions from different countries. This international one-stage architecture ideas competition invited all architecture students, young architects and young professionals with a degree in architecture studies (≤ 40 years old) to develop and submit compelling ideas for the design of a Site Landmark located on a site promontory in Sagres, Algarve, Portugal. 

Sagres has a number of significant landmarks within a prominent landscape; it is a place of great cultural heritage and historical significance with characteristics that must be fully preserved. When generating a vision for an intervention located within such a spectacular place, it was essential that each proposal emphasizes, respects and celebrates the site, while provide visitors with a unique experience.

Jury members for the competition included; David O’Shea (Ireland), ODOS architects,  Javier Castellano + Tomás García Píriz (Spain), CUAC Arquitectura and  Luis Aldrete (Mexico), Luis Aldrete Estudio de Arquitectura. 

See the winning proposals with jury comments below:

1st prize: Pablo Ucendo, Joseba Gordo (Spain) 

Jury comments: The true success of this project lies in the tension that is created between the beautifully inscribed symmetrical manmade concrete world and the naturally rugged landscape within and without. A beautiful composition and an unexpected find! The proposal creates a new topographical relation to the context capable of linking materiality, times and scales, incorporating the maritime horizon from primitive protection afforded by earthworks strategies. 

The universal language, reinforced by circular geometry, is able to take root in the specific reality of the place, which is a geographical area characterized by the idea of limit and infinity. Congratulations to the winners. It is a project that understands the tensions of the place and the landscape provoking an alternate journey where the user can have a new and sensitive experience to connect with an amazing environment.

2nd prize: Andrés González-Meneses (Spain)

Jury comments: A beautiful journey through this manipulated natural terrain. The architects clever shift in the datum and direction forces the user to experience the sheer scale and power of the landscape around whilst keeping them guessing whats next? 

The well balanced juxtapositions of cut landscape and fabricated interventions en route make for some wonderfully crafted spaces. Starting as a path, the proposal is able to alter its own geometry, cracking and sinking as a strategy for adaptation. It faces the rationality of the stone carving of a sculptor and the organic roughness conferred by wind erosion. This duality nature-artifice creates a timeless relationship between sea, mountain, horizon and humankind. 

Congratulations. It is an extraordinary project that understands how to intervene the landscape in a very talented way in a context that no need nothing. It is a very friendly project where the intention of the path is very clear and allows natural beauty do their work without conflict with the architecture.

3rd prize: Marcello Galiotto, Alessandra Rampazzo (Italy)

Sculpturally beautiful, memorable, iconic, well crafted in plan and section and all of a scale that is befitting to its context. Using a mythological reference, the Greek idea of “the edge of the world”, it form a series of interrelated milestones. 

Beyond the metaphors used to build a level of security against the unknown, it has also the ability to establish a cartographic reading of the territory: a mapping code with a third dimension. 

Congratulations. The virtue of this project lies in the understanding to make a reference in the landscape. Allowing the user to understand the territory in terms of its history and contrast in a natural environment of a singular drama.

Honorable Mentions

Adrian Herrera Porcel, Aurora Maria Oset Cardenete (Spain)

Kevin Larson, Isadora Panjaitan, Carlos Poemape, Nick Nagawicki (United States) 

Stella Fabbri, Lavinia Antichi, Sara Bitossi (Italy) 

Ludovica Franchetti Pardo, Gregorio Lacchio (Italy)

Giacomo Tacchi, Gabriele Bonucci, Vieri Cardinali, Lorenzo Del Mastio (Italy) 

Martin Markl, Ricardo Medina (Austria) 

Laura Pastior, Maximilian Seibold (Germany)

World Architecture Community is an official media partner for ARKxSITE competitions. ARKxSITE's next competition Site Dwelling is open for early bird registrations until December 15, 2016 and final submission Deadline: February 4, 2017. 

All images courtesy of ARKxSITE

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