Winners of: The Unbelievable Challenge 2021
The task of the competition, launched on September 15, 2021, was to design a museum of snow on a plot in a prime location in the Finnish City of Rovaniemi, in the arctic circle. The ideas competition for young and graduating architects and designers culminated on Friday December 10, with the announcement of the winner.
The competition looked for creative and unique ideas and solutions for the snow museum. The aim was to find the best sustainable design, one that would also revitalize the museum’s surrounding environment. Highly dependent on snow, Mr. Santa Claus acted as the imaginary commissioner of the museum – a gallery that hopefully never sees the light of day.
Ruukki’s steel-based products had to be used in the entry, and the reusability and recyclability of materials was key. With the competition, the organisers wanted to raise awareness about climate change and more specifically about architects’ possibilities to do something about the issue.
The jury described the winning design as follows:
”We appreciated the skillful combination of the location analysis and the idea of the competition task, aimed at raising awareness of the climate crisis by designing a snow museum. The winning entry has strong educational value. It reflects people’s need for contact with nature and expresses this positive relation and coexistence.”
When evaluating the entries and choosing the winner, the jury emphasized the “big idea” and the overall view that best met the competition criteria: sustainable development and energy efficiency.
Jury member, city architect for Rovaniemi Sipi Hintsanen, found the overall quality of competition entries excellent:
“All finalists showed exceptional ambition and boldness in their design”, he says.
Along Sipi Hintsanen, the Jury consisted of Marta Sękulska-Wrońska (architect, partner, WXCA), Alexandru Oprita (architect, the winner of 2014 competition) and Jānis Zaharāns (Ruukki Construction representative).
“We found that the winner, Re-Ice, expressed thoughtful consideration of the big picture and the plot with its surroundings, making the whole area versatile and inviting, a place where you want to hang out during all seasons”, Hintsanen explains.
The museum will never be constructed. Sipi Hintsanen finds great value in competitions where the project is actually not built:
“They allow freedom in designing. In the real world, architects’ work is often very serious, and we can be tempted to forget our true goals and ideals.”
Supporting young architects in their careers was also a goal of the competition for Ruukki:
”This is the third time we will be able to support and follow the career of a young architect so closely,” says Tiina Tukia, Marketing Director of Ruukki’s Building Envelopes unit.
“I am particularly pleased to have received a lot of publicity on the issue that concerns us all – climate change. We were able to remind ourselves of what is happening to the planet”, Tukia says.
From a total of 18 entries, the Jury selected five finalists to compete for the grand prize. Mohamed Raslan’s The Melting Globe was selected as the first runner-up, nearly tying with the winner. Detached by Štefánia Vasiľková (Slovakia), Iceberg by Elina Harjunpää (Finland) and The Snowdrift by Alice Šindelářová and Petra Macholánová (Czech Republic) also received praise from the Jury. Each finalist received a €1,000 prize.
Partners of the competition were the City of Rovaniemi and the architectural workshops WXCA (Poland) and Snøhetta (Norway).
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Re-Ice1st PlaceRe-IcePoland
- Organized by: Ruukki Construction
- Award in the Competition: 1st Place
- Date Results were Announced: December 10, 2021
- Motivations, Techniques for the Project: Jury notes about the winning entry:
”The jury appreciated the skillful combination of the location analysis and the idea of the competition task, aimed at building awareness of the climate crisis by designing a snow museum. The winning entry has strong educational value. It reflects people’s need for contact with nature and expresses this positive relation and coexistence.The concept gives the visitor a holistic experience. The educational path – as a gentle intervention in the existing landscape – connects with the surrounding trails, making a loop on the plot with various elements of an outdoor interactive exhibition strung on to it. Here, the user can experience playing with water, ice, and snow. The experience will vary depending on the season, which makes the destination attractive all year round.
In the zone away from the river, the author proposed a museum building – two cubatures connected with a lobby that could serve as a shelter for hikers from unfavorable weather. The concept of the architectural form is based on biomimicry – the construction resembles ice rocks, forms inspired by nature, as the author’s goal was to refer to the surrounding landscape.
This winning entry for The Unbelievable Challenge proposes a park complex with an outdoor and indoor exhibition that encourages us to reflect on human activities. It teaches us how to use natural resources wisely and take care of our planet, so that the joy of snow could be experienced by future generations.”
- Details of the recognized Project: The task of the competition was to design a museum of snow on a plot in a prime location in the Finnish City of Rovaniemi, in the arctic circle. The competition looked for creative and unique ideas and solutions for the snow museum. The aim was to find the best sustainable design, one that would also revitalize the museum’s surrounding environment. Highly dependent on snow, Mr. Santa Claus acted as the imaginary commissioner of the museum – a gallery that hopefully never sees the light of day.
- Details about the Competition : The task of the competition, launched on September 15, 2021, was to design a museum of snow on a plot in a prime location in the Finnish City of Rovaniemi, in the arctic circle. The ideas competition for young and graduating architects and designers culminated on Friday December 10, with the announcement of the winner.The competition looked for creative and unique ideas and solutions for the snow museum. The aim was to find the best sustainable design, one that would also revitalize the museum’s surrounding environment. Highly dependent on snow, Mr. Santa Claus acted as the imaginary commissioner of the museum – a gallery that hopefully never sees the light of day.
Ruukki’s steel-based products had to be used in the entry, and the reusability and recyclability of materials was key. With the competition, the organisers wanted to raise awareness about climate change and more specifically about architects’ possibilities to do something about the issue.
The jury described the winning design as follows:
”We appreciated the skillful combination of the location analysis and the idea of the competition task, aimed at raising awareness of the climate crisis by designing a snow museum. The winning entry has strong educational value. It reflects people’s need for contact with nature and expresses this positive relation and coexistence.”When evaluating the entries and choosing the winner, the jury emphasized the “big idea” and the overall view that best met the competition criteria: sustainable development and energy efficiency.
Jury member, city architect for Rovaniemi Sipi Hintsanen, found the overall quality of competition entries excellent:
“All finalists showed exceptional ambition and boldness in their design”, he says.
Along Sipi Hintsanen, the Jury consisted of Marta Sękulska-Wrońska (architect, partner, WXCA), Alexandru Oprita (architect, the winner of 2014 competition) and Jānis Zaharāns (Ruukki Construction representative).“We found that the winner, Re-Ice, expressed thoughtful consideration of the big picture and the plot with its surroundings, making the whole area versatile and inviting, a place where you want to hang out during all seasons”, Hintsanen explains.
The museum will never be constructed. Sipi Hintsanen finds great value in competitions where the project is actually not built:
“They allow freedom in designing. In the real world, architects’ work is often very serious, and we can be tempted to forget our true goals and ideals.”Supporting young architects in their careers was also a goal of the competition for Ruukki:
”This is the third time we will be able to support and follow the career of a young architect so closely,” says Tiina Tukia, Marketing Director of Ruukki’s Building Envelopes unit.“I am particularly pleased to have received a lot of publicity on the issue that concerns us all – climate change. We were able to remind ourselves of what is happening to the planet”, Tukia says.
From a total of 18 entries, the Jury selected five finalists to compete for the grand prize. Mohamed Raslan’s The Melting Globe was selected as the first runner-up, nearly tying with the winner. Detached by Štefánia Vasiľková (Slovakia), Iceberg by Elina Harjunpää (Finland) and The Snowdrift by Alice Šindelářová and Petra Macholánová (Czech Republic) also received praise from the Jury. Each finalist received a €1,000 prize.
Partners of the competition were the City of Rovaniemi and the architectural workshops WXCA (Poland) and Snøhetta (Norway).
- Project’s Author(s) or Firm:
Hanna Galas